Which company will release the first WWII aircraft for Microsoft Flight Simulator (2020), and what will it be? What if anything will it show, do you think that previous iterations weren't able to do? In other words, what has been missing from our understanding of those venerable old planes. Whenever I see them fly over Long Beach here, I am always struck by how loud they are. 

Probably one of those Aeroplane Heaven Control-Ezy affairs. Possibly their Pucara, since it is already out for FSX and P3D and was quite evidently geared toward the new sim conceptually, or maybe their F-14, as it would tie in nicely with the new Top Gun sequel movie which is due for a release soonish.

19 minutes ago, Chock said:

 the new Top Gun sequel movie which is due for a release soonish.

With everything that is happening in the world, I believe it was pushed to next summer.

1 minute ago, andyjohnston.net said:

With everything that is happening in the world, I believe it was pushed to next summer.

That's true, but it's still all over the internet on movie news channels etc.

1 hour ago, dobee51 said:

Which company will release the first WWII aircraft for Microsoft Flight Simulator (2020), and what will it be? What if anything will it show, do you think that previous iterations weren't able to do? In other words, what has been missing from our understanding of those venerable old planes. Whenever I see them fly over Long Beach here, I am always struck by how loud they are. t

An excellent question Dobee !  Funny I just wrote a post about that at A2A.

These aircraft, big prop, big engine, are interesting to learn and to fly, even in a non combat situation. Leave your Cherokee a year in the hangar. After a year you will fly it, clumsily maybe the first time, but without too much problem. It is like a bicycle, it comes back fast.

Do the same with the P-51. It is no bicycle 😉  ! If you don't get back first to the manual and some good threads there from Dudley H, chances are huge that you will find yourself in a dire situation just some tens meters after pushing the throttle forward., having a closer look at the daisies in the field along the runway. They need attention, they are not forgiving. I like that in an aircraft.

A2A is the only designer of really good WW2 warbirds now that Rob Young has retired and that would be a small catastrophe in our little world if we didn't see at least one back in the new sim. Yes, I am ready to pay the price for a niche product.

 

Edited July 27, 20205 yr by Dominique_K

6 minutes ago, Dominique_K said:

An excellent question Dobee !  Funny I just wrote a post about that at A2A.

 

 

Purely coincidental I assure you. Normally I would have been all over the A2A forum by this time, but I got sidetracked watching two leaked videos here this morning. Ha.

AH's facebook had images of the Jaguar instrument panel (for Ctrl-Ezy), so I hope that's going to turn up in the near future..

.. a jet can still be a "warbird"..

I'm hoping for the Sim Skunk Works jet warbirds, and revamps of the Justflight Canberra and AeroplaneHeaven Meteor and Hunter ... though that's probably just wishful thinking...

Not at all keen on the ctrl-ezy planes with their half-panels 😞

 

17 minutes ago, HighBypass said:

AH's facebook had images of the Jaguar instrument panel (for Ctrl-Ezy), so I hope that's going to turn up in the near future..

I'd perhaps prefer it if the Jag wasn't Control-Ezy, but then again AH did say they might expand some of them if there appeared to be demand. The Jag has been pretty well ignored in flight sims which is a shame because it's a great aeroplane, not fancy or especially pretty, but good at what it does and it is interesting, if not exactly unique, in the way it carries Sidewinders. The're really loud too, as most people in the UK will know.

12 minutes ago, keithb77 said:

Not at all keen on the ctrl-ezy planes with their half-panels 😞

It is a bit of a Marmite thing.. and there is only one at the moment, so who knows. If a modelled non-functional tub is produced, then AH would still get complaints about not being able to see parts of the plane when you crank the view round to look (wingtip, prop, intake etc.) I reckon.

I must be the only Ctrl-Ezy "enthusiastic male" on here - the Pucara is fun to fly IMHO.

I don't know which one will be first but I know which one I wish was first. 

PMDG-DC6. My favorite simulation aircraft ever. (and I have had a lot)

16 hours ago, Taver said:

PMDG-DC6

Seconded ... but unlikely to be the first ...

19 hours ago, HighBypass said:

 

.. a jet can still be a "warbird"..

One generally calls ‘warbirds’ the WW2 piston/prop aicraft.

I would also put into the category some late jets like the Me-262, P-59b, the Gloster Meteor or DH Vampire but not the Jaguar, F14 or DC6 😁 !

As for AH, I’ll pass... A2A anyday.

Edited July 28, 20205 yr by Dominique_K

Nah, maybe years ago we'd have specified that only an old prop fighter was a warbird, but these days in observing the variety of preserved stuff which turns up at airshows, I'd say the term can readily be applied to any ex-military aeroplane which is getting on a bit, not even necessarily one no longer in service anywhere.

Some might choose to go with criteria similar to the more clearly-defined and sort of semi-official terminology used for old cars, whereby a veteran car is one built before the end of WW1, a vintage car is one from the end of WW1 to the end of WW2, and a classic car is anything over 30 years old (some people specify between 30 and 49 years). But that's cars of course.

In which case, at fifty years old, I'd say the Grumman F-14 easily qualifies for being regarded as an old warbird. There are no F-14s in service with the US forces at all, but there are one or two still (allegedly) operational with the Iranian Air Force, although given that the F-14 is now seriously getting on a bit (it was around in the Vietnam War after all, that's how old it is), and the US is hardly keen to be making spare parts for the Iranians, I suspect that those Iranian F-14s will be pretty worn out, even the US thought F-14s were too expensive to run and developed the F/A-18 instead!

Likewise, the SEPECAT Jaguar, which at 47 years old, and no longer in service with either of the original operators (UK and France), but still in limited service with the Indian Air Force, is definitely fitting into the equivalent car definition for a 'classic' at nearly half a century old. Being an older type, its deployment in the  Gulf War in an air-to-air role, was questioned by some people at the time given its capabilities compared to the potential of possibly coming up against MiG-29s, but it did okay and with this in mind I don't think there's any doubting that it is an old warbird.

The DC-6 is kind of a warbird, if you want to stretch the definition a bit, but factually it is only a warbird if we are talking about a C-118 military version and not an old civil airliner, in which case I would say it was a classic, not a warbird. As a design, it was originally ordered as a military transport in 1944 (C-112, later becoming the C-118); it being a longer and higher-flying evolution of the DC-4 (C-54), but not going into production until 1946, by which time there was not the pressing need for it, so it ended up selling well for Douglas in its revised civil airliner guise, as we know.

MSFS is a "peaceful" sim so there'll not be any military stuff.

 

Posted by one of the developers on the Alpha forum apparently.