Incredible as it may seem, the concept of the centrality of air superiority is not a recent invention! Luftwaffe leaders acknowledged the need to gain air superiority even in their prewar writings. The first Luftwaffe chief of the general staff, Gen Walther Wever, listed the need "to combat the enemy air force" among the Luftwaffe's priority tasks. Prior to the Polish campaign, Gen Hans Jeschonnek, a later chief of staff, wrote that:

  "the most proper and essential task is the battle against the enemy air force, and it must be executed vigorously and at all costs. The second task, the support of the army, in the first days of the war cannot claim the same level of importance.... What may be achieved in the first two days by using one's own air force against an opposing army does not compare with the damage an enemy air force may inflict if it remains battleworthy."

After three days at E3, its a pleasure to sit in my cozy office and reflect on what I've seen. There are a great crop of military simulations, most of them devoted to my greatest love: flight!

In my first foray into E3 coverage I gave you my best picks, and some of my favorite gripes, about the E3 showing. In this article I want to revisit the prop sim scene and summarize the promise of an incredible array of combat flight sims in the classic genre. So, suit up, start your engines, sit back and enjoy the ride.

The toughest part of my quick "Best of Show" article was choosing the best from a very solid lineup. How does one really pick EAW over Fighter Legends, for example? Its a pretty subjective process, has a lot to do with my own bias toward dynamic campaigns, and I can assure you that I plan to fly Fighter Legends and Microsoft Fighter Combat plenty this year! Ok, enough of the disclaimers, on to the show! We'll proceed to the target, following waypoints in alphabetical order ;-D

I could start with Confirmed Kill, but since this is online only in its initial release, I will pass and move directly to European Air War. Next we will do a loop and boom n' zoom at Fighter Duel 2.0. From there we will egress at 15,000 feet to Fighter Combat (Microsoft), and then dive out of the sun at Fighter Legends. Pulling around for a snap shot, we'll take a crack at Fighter Squadron: Screamin Demons, then rally for another shot at Luftwaffe. That should leave us in good shape for a stroll down MiG Alley, a sweep over Nations, and a birds eye view of Wings of Destiny. Whew!

I've never believed in love at first sight. Yeah, I know, we all know someone who claims the experience, but your neighborhood shrink will tell you its much more complicated than that and spew fifty cent words like cathexis and talk about Greek myths like Oedipus. But when I first saw EAW I knew something special was in the works.

Picture it. Its a dimly lit room. You turn your head and are greeted by a scene that must have been common in Europe in 1944: its a flight of B17s. Actually, its several flights, and as the camera angle pans around you can see that the sky is filled with these huge machines, maybe fifty of them.

Suddenly you hear the thump of guns, and flak bursts appear in the sky. These black clouds expand, dissipate and expand into transparency, then are gone. Now you zoom out, and you see that there are scores of these clouds appearing. Here and there a bomber is hit, and sometimes damage in minimal. But occasionally you see an aircraft catch fire, or an engine knocked out. One or two are beginning to trail smoke. Even the smoke trails are affected by the wind.

Then from above and at five oclock a score or more of German fighters dive into the orderly group. Now the guns on the B17s are blazing, up to six positions on each bomber attempting to engage the German bandits before its too late. You can see spent shells spewing away from the big aircraft if you are close enough.

Now the British fighter cover has engaged the Germans, and as some bombers begin to spiral from the sky with heavy damage, the entire scene becomes completely chaotic. There could be 120 aircraft in the melee. You zoom in close to one B17 and see an engine spitting fire on the right, and a piece of tail missing on the left side. The gunners positions spit fire and the bomber cants leftward as a Messerschmitt engages from above left. The gunners got him! The Mess does a slow roll and then spirals earthward, the plane intact but the pilot unconscious or dead.

WOW! Its amazing, and remember that this is not merely a disjointed mission, but a part of a huge tapestry that is woven intricately into a single piece of cloth: a fully dynamic campaign system. The scenes I described above, including all the details, were observed first hand in the early beta of EAW on display at E3.

As a graphical work EAW is impressive enough, and with twenty flyable airframes there is plenty of variety. But the sounds and GUI are likewise impressive. The period feel to the interface is every bit as impressive as the WWII air museum interface that Janes have used for Fighter Legends. Music and art all contribute to a sense that you are there. Engines, guns, bomb blasts, lighting effects, fires... you just can't miss the obsessive attention to detail.

About the only thing missing from EAW at present is a higher resolution, the ability to fly bombers, and coop play in campaign mode. MPS is non-committal on the higher res mode, though we can hope for a future upgrade, but they are a little less hesitant on the possibility for a bomber flight in the future. As for coop play in the campaign, methinks we might see this along with a bomber or two to fly in an add on in 1999. Which bombers? I would guess the Ju88 and the Stuka and possibly the B17. IMHO only.

Click for larger image.

Next up, Fighter Duel 2.0. This one, like EAW, is taking forever. Why? Simple. They want to do it right. These guys are damn good and I bet they could push FD2 out the door by September and most of us wouldn't notice the difference, but frankly, they, like MPS, have a reputation at stake and they intend to stay firmly planted at the top of the charts for realism.

Its not difficult to assess their determination in this regard. There are well over a hundred parameters considered individually for each aircraft in flight, and there is a large and nasty guy with a stopwatch checking accuracy in such things as turn performance at a given weight, altitude and speed. I mean these guys even calculate ballistics on an individual bullet at a given air pressure and specific muzzle velocity! They can even vary this muzzle velocity as the gun heats up!

Yes, I did recommend a good psychiatrist, but it turns out he is already on the beta team ;-D Stress does weird things to people, you know? Your next question should be: how many processors running at 400 MHz will we need? Actually, these guys have been doing amazing things with the code: remember, when FD original was released no one could believe the frame rate and connection stability at the detail levels they gave us.

However, having said that, if you have a dual processor system running SLI mode under NT5, you can use every ounce of power you have. If you are running under Direct3d, you can put this all on a 21" display at 1600x1200 if you like.

Click for 640x480.

While Fighter Duel 2.0 does not sport a fully dynamic campaign, the AI is quite sophisticated, including a strategic level of response AND resource management. If you destroy your primaries and secondaries the enemy have less ability to field good pilots and/or aircraft. Matt Shaw commented that, "We have levels. As you progress through the campaign, in each level, there are four to six missions. Depending on factors of randomness and success or failure will determine which missions you get when you advance to the next level.

For example, if you do very poorly in an offensive mission your next mission might be defensive. If you do well there your rating will improve and your crews overall ability will increase. Part of this is random also."

Seriously, I have little doubt that FD 2.0 will appeal to the hard core crowd in spades. As for the rest, there will be the usual methods of dumbing down the challenge so that players can enter where they are comfortable. FD 2.0 is LOOKING great too, with cockpits simply the best out there. Remember the cockpit from the original, with the whole thing shaking from vibration and the individual needles dancing? Stunning and immersive down to the last rivet. Even Janes Fighter Legends will have to pull a close second in that department.

Click to continue . . .

MS Combat Flight Simulator. Click for 800x600.

MS Combat Flight Simulator shares code with FS98 but with an improved terrain system. The unknown factor is the offensive and defensive virtual pilot AI. This is a new area for Microsoft, but they do bring a wealth of programming power to the sim genre! CFS will be set in Europe and expandability is a primary goal so new aircraft will continue to be added after the initial release.

In fact as I was speaking with the Program Manger, Kris Shankar, he indicated to me that Microsoft will release the tools needed for complete customizability of the missions. In short, you can edit these files in text mode or from an Excel spreadsheet. He pulled up a mission configuration file and showed me how a parameter like "winds=0" can be edited to "winds=5" to give the maximum wind force in a mission.

When I first took the stick I was sorely disappointed. While flight ws smooth and frame rate excellent, the model felt sloppy and completely unrealistic. I asked Kris what was up and he took me to the setup screen where we selected the realistic flight model. We also moved the resolution up a notch to 800x600, maxed out the terrain detail and added clouds. (You can go to 1280x1024 if your hardware can handle it, the sim is D3d only).

Back in sim the frame rate had taken a nose dive to about 1000 feet and 10-12 fps, and this on a PII 333 with Voodoo2. The scene had about ten aircraft in view at a variety of distances. I quickly manouvered on the tail of a Ju88 and took him out. Kris assured me there was plenty of optimization to do and that Fighter Combat is still not in beta.

As for other matters - ballistics, difficulty, realism and flight model - Fighter Combat aims squarely at the middle of the crowd and will likely have broad appeal. However, there is a good deal happening behind the scenes including calculations for atmospheric effects, G effects, and even compressibility and aileron reversal at high speed!

It really wasn't very difficult to score a hit compared to the FSSD beta. Nevertheless, ballistics are modeled and even the weight of the bullets is considered for your aircraft. The sim is looking quite good, and the aircraft are very nicely rendered. Clouds were unfinished, which may partly explain the frame rate kill when they were rendered.

As for padlock, that all important feature for serious duelers, the only active padlock was the basic virtual cockpit lock. The feature is still under revision, and I spoke with Kris about some options. I really dislike the red and green labels (these appear on screen by default and identify the various aircraft along with their current distance), which can be deselected, but the idea of a distance label for a current target could be seen as a useful cheat to compensate for the liability of a simulation limited to the modern computer monitor.

CFS is aimed at a broad audience and should do very well for Microsoft. But don't be fooled: the designers are serious about realism, and flying at maximum settings should hold plenty of challenge. Its also fun to fly, damage and effects are nicely done. And with an open interface and plans to continue to add new aircraft, it should have an extended life.

Click for 800x600 victory salute...

UNBELIEVABLE... That was the only thought I had when I fired up the Fighter Squadron beta for the first time. If the graphics don't cause your jaw to fall through your desk, the physics, sound and damage modelling will. For ultimate realism FSSD will be the main competition for Fighter Duel 2, though it should hit the stands sooner.

From the strobe effect on props (feather and watch the apparent reversal of direction), attention to detail in damage modelling (crash lightly and bend your prop or your gear, crash hard and watch a prop break or pieces of your airframe go flying, wheels break off and go rolling or bouncing away), and the flames and smoke that erupt as you score more hits on your adversary (watch the flames spread rearward as they are fanned in the wind), the Parsoft crowd seem similarly obsessive on detail. If thats not enough, cast your eyes over your wing and watch your wing flex and your flaps shake in the turbulence, watch from an outside view and see your gear compress when you land.

The sounds ARE awesome, from starting to idle to full throttle. Drop to an idle and the aircraft starts to shake. Ignition off and it revs as it leans out then dies. If you have a subwoofer the roar of the engines WILL be transmitted to your body via vibration. As for combat, the padlock is fairly standard, with scrolling or fixed views as you choose.

Fighter Squadron: Click for 800x600 FW-109

I changed resolution to 800x600. Just for fun I put my gear down on the P38 and watched it unfold from the external view. Slow.. very realistic. Then I came in over the beach.. incidentally, the most realistic transition graphics from sand and salt to land and water I have seen anywhere. I came down gently on the sand, slowed, and started to sink! But then I rolled out to the hard ground. Unfortunately once my momentum was gone I was on a slope and I rolled backward and sank in the sand! FSSD will have semi-dynamic campaigns and also allow us to FLY bombers!

With some of the best damage graphics and a really beautiful virtual cockpit, Janes Fighter Legends looks fantastic. Its also one of the new sims in this E3 roundup that will grow with your hardware, allowing you to run at the maximum resolution your hardware will handle.

Click for 1024x768 image.

In itself thats a very attractive feature. Since PII 350s and 400s are being sold in droves, and since AMD has released their 350 MHz K6-2 with its parallel MMX units, you can bet that many of us will be flying at 1024x768 and beyond with Voodoo2 and the new Matrox, S3, and nVidia based boards this fall.

OK, so what about realism in Fighter Legends? The flight model feels good, better than MS Combat Simulator but not as solid as Fighter Duel 2.0 or FSSD. Nevertheless, its far beyond the USNF series, with a full six degrees of freedom, and this sim is only hitting beta so it could improve significantly yet.

Truth be told, its one heck of a lot of fun to fly, and online play will be hot. Janescombat online will go active before that much longer, and I expect it will host Longbow, F15, Fighter Legends, IAF and eventually Fleet Commander also. With all the great hardware generated effects we've come to expect, smoke, flames, glare, dynamic lighting, shadows etc. its an impressive visual feast.

In fact, damage modelling is also as good as anything else ever produced by Janes, so the graphics are not merely eye candy, they do represent where you have hit an opponent or been hit yourself. Clip the wing off an opponent and you will see it spin to the ground, exactly as it should it if is a real object.

Click for 640x480 image.

What surprised me were the radio calls. Yes, much as in F15, you will find a LOT of radio dialogue modelled, but this time in multiple languages! Rather cool, and helps much with the immersion factor.

The structure of the sim is branching, and all 70 missions take place in about ten days of conflict in the Battle of the Ardennes in 1944. Use of video is great and creates that sense of being there. The mission editor is said to be very solid and allows the player to set random elements, much as F15s mission editor. And even though there is no dynamic campaign, we all know that Janes is very good at creating a sense of dynamism. Ground object AI, again as in F15 or Longbow 2, is dynamic and strong.

Go to Part II