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»	COMBATSIM.COM ARCHIVE FORUM » Game Discussions (Title-specific) » Jane's F/A-18 » A few observations.

Author

Topic: A few observations.

Reaper
Member
Member # 964

posted 10-26-2000 07:47 AM

After my first day at JF18, I've noticed a few things that disturb me.

When taking off from a runway, my wingman doesn't have any landing gear.

I was watching from the chase camera as I did a turn. I noticed the wingman doesn't bank when he turns in formation.

Theres something funky about the flight model too, I just can't put my finger on it though.

Yeah, its not Falcon4, but thats not necessarily a bad thing. Overall I think it was $8 well spent.

Posts: 335 | From: US | Registered: Nov 1999 | IP: Logged

Recluse
Member
Member # 2694

posted 10-26-2000 09:27 AM

The landing gear thing is just a minor glitch. In the Mission builder, you can place aircraft on the runway with an Initial action of TAKEOFF, but if you dont set their altitude and speed to 0 you see the gear up thing. Very easy to miss when building missions with tons of aircraft.

Posts: 279 | From: | Registered: Jan 2000 | IP: Logged

SPIKE14
Member
Member # 1125

posted 10-26-2000 10:19 AM

Yup...there is a problem with the flight model.....I think it's just too damn accurate.

SPIKE out

Posts: 322 | From: Houston, Texas | Registered: Nov 1999 | IP: Logged

Overkill
Member
Member # 5169

posted 10-26-2000 11:22 AM

Personally, it feels a bit sluggish to me almost like I am flying through something a bit thicker than air. Since I am not a hornet driver, that might be right. I don't know. That is a minor quibble. Once I get engrossed in the avionics and saving my arse, I really don't mind.

[This message has been edited by Overkill (edited 10-26-2000).]

Posts: 597 | From: Midlothian, TX, USA | Registered: Jun 2000 | IP: Logged

The Whistler
Member
Member # 4609

posted 10-26-2000 01:30 PM

I agree with overkill. I have seen hornets (As not Es) flying around, and cockpit footage, and they look more maneuverable than the one in JF-18.

Posts: 1736 | From: Ottawa, Ontario, Canada sierrahotel69@icqmail.com | Registered: May 2000 | IP: Logged

Hornit
Member
Member # 962

posted 10-26-2000 02:17 PM

Well it is very close to what I remember the real aircraft being like. It is very accurate regarding roll rate, pitch authority, and accel/decel. It has a bit of weirdness in the inverted high aoa regime but that's it. I think it captures the feel of the F-18 rather well. One other area that I don't like is the "auto rotation" when doing takeoffs on land. It is not like this in the real world, being totally manual unless on the ship.

Is it sluggish? Not really, the F-18 and to a greater extent the F-18E/F are the slowest current generation fighters in the world. Something to think about before you tangle with the bad guys!

Hornit

Posts: 955 | From: USA | Registered: Nov 1999 | IP: Logged

Binki
Member
Member # 4646

posted 10-26-2000 02:45 PM

I bet if we rigged a system that dropped 5 or 6 hundred pounds of sand bags in our lap each time we yanked our joystick back, we wouldn't think the flight model was that sluggish. I mean, with the computer our eyes are telling us to pull harder on the stick, but in real life, a pilot's body is begging him to decrease input.

Posts: 20 | From: San Diego,CA,USA | Registered: May 2000 | IP: Logged

Overkill
Member
Member # 5169

posted 10-26-2000 03:12 PM

Hey, if Hornit says that is the way it feels then I believe him. He's been there. If this is THE ultra-realistic FM then that might be what seems so wierd to people. We aren't used to something so true to life.

Posts: 597 | From: Midlothian, TX, USA | Registered: Jun 2000 | IP: Logged

tankd0g
Member
Member # 7571

posted 10-26-2000 03:17 PM

You guys who are noticing sluggishness, you might want to try choppign downt eh detail a little to see if that makes a differnce. I notice on my machine at least that the roll rite increases if I set the detail to the lowest setting.

Posts: 8 | From: | Registered: Oct 2000 | IP: Logged

The Whistler
Member
Member # 4609

posted 10-26-2000 04:17 PM

"Well it is very close to what I remember the real aircraft being like. It is very accurate regarding roll rate, pitch authority, and accel/decel."

Nevermind what I said than

Posts: 1736 | From: Ottawa, Ontario, Canada sierrahotel69@icqmail.com | Registered: May 2000 | IP: Logged

Reaper
Member
Member # 964

posted 10-26-2000 07:08 PM

Its probably because I'm not used to flying a fully FBW plane. Flanker just feels natural to me, but FBW planes take some getting used to.

Posts: 335 | From: US | Registered: Nov 1999 | IP: Logged

Brister
Member
Member # 1233

posted 10-27-2000 01:38 AM

Just out of professional curiosity, does anyone know where I can read up on the flight control system on the E model? I've read on here a few times the A-D flight control system was similar to the F-15's. Just curious about the changes.

Brister

Posts: 62 | From: | Registered: Dec 1999 | IP: Logged

Orangutan
Member
Member # 104

posted 10-27-2000 07:07 AM

Back in January a local newspaper had a Finnish air force Hornet pilot 'test drive' JF-18 for the pc section of their weekend supplement.
while he didn't find the flight and aerial combat aspectsparicularly realistic he said it does a pretty good job for a pc sim.
He said the AAM operation or firing parameters or such (hard to translate this to english, playing from memory and being no engineer and all) are off by some margin. And the man worded it so that it was obvious he was not disposed to discuss this in any further detail.
What he particularly liked was the cockpit. This is, according to him, as good a representation of the cockpit and the avionics suite as a layman and an armchair pilot can get.

Cheers,
Orangutan

Posts: 70 | From: Helsinki, Finland | Registered: Sep 1999 | IP: Logged

Hunter
Member
Member # 1599

posted 10-27-2000 11:10 PM

I suspect if our sims' weapon envelopes were on the money, someone, somewhere, would be hanging by a noose. LOL. Which brings up an interesting point, none of the modern jet sims seem to have exactly the same weapons parameters, indicating that the designers were doing best guess engineering. As I see it, it's not a problem. The difference between what is modeled and what is real is not likely to be so great that it destroys emersion factors. They are, just numbers, after all. Which brings up some interesting situations I've encountered where there were more problematic modeling issues, for instance, the ability of rear aspect heaters in Falcon 4.0 to make killer face shots; the seemingly lousy accuracy of AIM120s in JF-18 (they don't call these things slammers for nothing); the tendancy of 20mm gun ammunition to bounce off wings and fuselage in Graphic Sims F-18 Hornet. But then there are all the cases where they seem to get it right. But, gee, if they were perfect, Iraq, Russia, China and a whole host of pesky demagogues would be building lans in their air squadron offices.

Posts: 154 | From: Lexington, IL USA | Registered: Dec 1999 | IP: Logged

Reaper
Member
Member # 964

posted 10-27-2000 11:53 PM

Is the F/A-18 the only plane that shows external stores, or did I turn that off somehow?

Posts: 335 | From: US | Registered: Nov 1999 | IP: Logged

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