Documentation:

There are two forms of documentation that the perfect sim would include: 1) reference material on aircraft systems and operations; and 2) tutorial information on how to use the systems to best implement the tactics that will bring success in the simulated world.

Most every sim includes information of the reference material type in the box: these are the manuals that ship with the sims. The threshold in this category is a simple explanation for operating or using each element of the sim that is a visible part of the sim pilots view of the virtual universe.

Some sims do this very well others do it very poorly. A favourite example to illustrate where the threshold lies is perhaps the ubiquitous threat warning display. At least one sim presents such a system where different symbols are placed on a display with a variety of accompanying sounds to represent different types of threat and severity of those threats.

Simply explaining what each symbol represents however does not tell a sim pilot how to read the threat display and analyze which threats are greatest. For this, examples of threat displays that show relative threat severity given symbol placement and sound cues are needed.

To say it another way: if you know what the individual symbols are but can't interpret the picture presented by the whole display and hence turn it into some useful action that will preserve your virtual life, then the documentation missed the threshold.

In fact, the threat warning display might as well be replaced by a picture of Van Gogh "Sunflowers" for all the good it does you if you can't interpret the picture it paints in your cockpit.

[footnote: at the risk of going overboard on this example, one of the worst and most frustrating examples of documentation omissions relates to the threat warning display in a particular sim (you'll know which one) for which the manual offered advice to switch the threat display to LOWALT mode to reprioritize threats for low altitude. Not one iota of information was offered as to the difference between regular and LOWALT modes; how does one use this documentation tautology sensibly?? Are we to guess?? No, the reference docs must tell the secret...]

The above is a single example but the principle should hold true for all elements of sim reference documentation: if it's in the sim and the developer expects a sim pilot to use it or read something into it, then the docs better explain what it is and how to make sense of its implementation in the sim. This then is the threshold for documentation.

The second type of information is more tutorial in nature. This is typified today by the after-market strategy guide. For the perfect sim, this should also be in the original box of course.

Tutorial material should go beyond the basic explanation of what a modeled system is and how to interpret its representation in the sim. Here the expectation is for information that will help the virtual pilot perform better and improve technique in using a sim's systems.

While no after market guide (or manual for that matter) has yet reached perfection, there's one shining example in this category that others which follow will be judged against: the EF2000 strategy guide is an excellent example of tutorial documentation.

[footnote: while there is no affiliation with the authors of this book, a recommendation is still in order. It should be noted that even non-EF2000 sim pilots might be well advised to seek this work out: it has great material on BFM and energy management that are well worth the price of admission. Also many a sim pilot might improve their survivablity in sims by taking to heart the advice on T&BJF (sic).]

A couple more points relate to documentation.

Having drawn a distinction between reference and tutorial material, it's worth pointing out that most "hardcore" sim pilots know what the basics of BFM are and something about rudimentary energy management to boot. For this reason, the threshold listed above does not necessarily include these more tutorial elements. In point of fact, writers of documentation for the perfect sim might not even need to describe such things as pursuit curves at all; just tell us what the flight envelopes are for the airframe modeled and its adversary aircraft and we'll do the rest!

It's also worth a sentence or two to decry the disturbing tendency of current products to push the reference material into after-market guides. A sim is not complete without docs to tell you how to operate it. If you must separate out the documentation into another product that's fine but please make sure the two are available at the same time. To ship a sim without adequate documentation is like selling a VCR without the programming instructions: you (or more likely your local ten year old) can work out how to record things but why should it be so hard??

Lastly, three cheers for innovation! GSC shipped Hornet3.0 with a most interesting combination of documentation materials. Their printed manual resembles nothing so much as an authentic defence department 3-1 manual and the online video presentation materials complement this nicely to form a well rounded reference package. Such a presentation also adds to the qualitative feel of the sim experience in no small part.

Mission Planner:

Given the ability to work with stored mission files, a good mission editor can also provide a means for sim nuts all over the world to torture each other with ever more devious challenges.

The key to making all of this work is to make the mission planner flexible enough to allow pilots to customize but at the same time provide sensible enough defaults for the various scenarios that there is no actual need for pilots to spend hours tweaking mission parameters before they can get to fly. Once again, balance is the key.

Click to continue . . .

Tactical Engagement. Falcon 4.0.

Many sims provide interesting and challenging "canned" missions. This demonstrates that most developers are easily able to provide missions with sensible defaults that can be flown without tweaking.

Some sims provide good mission editing capabilities that allow sim pilots to tinker with mission plans, either by modifying or creating from scratch.

The perfect sim should take sensible defaults and the ability to customize in every case and marry the two.

If this is the way it should work, then the other part of the equation is to specify where the threshold is in terms of the parameters that should be present and thus tweakable in a mission plan.

Here there is a long list but once again, if you start from the premise of simulating squadron level operations the list falls out from mimicking real life.

Flanker 2 Mission Editor. Click for 1024x768.

The air tasking order is the beginning of the mission plan. For a training scenario or instant action, this is probably a list of canned situations over a training range (say Nellis or Fallon for example). For a campaign this is a list of the available mission choices present at the given stage of the virtual war. Multiplayer play in all its forms is probably just a special case of these two. Interesting stand alone missions could be generated either from scratch or by taking and saving customized missions from the training or campaign scenarios.

Once an initial setup is selected from the air tasking order list, the mission moves through several planning stages for a strike package, the fundamental planning unit. [footnote: assume that strike package doesn't necessarily imply A-G only; if you have full control of planes and roles for them in the mission editor then setting up fighter sweeps should be just as easy as scud hunts.]

Target imagery and area maps should be available to orient the flight. [footnote: emphasis on the orient! A pretty 3D picture of a target spinning may look good but it's hard to figure out just what you'll see from your chosen approach heading if all you have is the rotating picture without compass bearing cues.]

An intelligence brief detailing likely threats, both A-A and AAA/SAM should be included. [footnote: for the revenge minded developer, doing a realistic implementation of the spotty accuracy reportedly common in intelligence briefs would promote a healthy and apparently realistic distrust of intelligence types!]

Weather briefing might also be appropriate if the simulated world caters for different conditions. This is probably above the threshold although the degenerate simple case for environmental conditions, night and day, should be expected.

Available aircraft and aircrew as well as munitions and other stores to be used on the target should be presented. Here again override for default options is key. Multiplayer sims that don't allow all human pilots in a strike package to select their own role and loadout will miss the threshold.

Available support assets should also be listed (and/or requestable); these would include AWACS/JSTARS, tanker, electronic warfare and other supporting flights such as escorts or wild weasels. In the perfect sim, you should be able to assign yourself (and other human pilots) to roles anywhere in the strike package, consistent with the airframes modeled, of course.

Then there's the flight plan itself. Here the threshold is missed by a surprising number of current sims. At it's most basic you should be able to manipulate flight path, number and placement of waypoints, as well as speed, altitude and proposed activity (mostly for directing the AI pilots of which more to come) for all waypoints.

If this is the threshold, there is plenty of head room for the perfect sim to flourish in this area.

Fuel planning is a critical element of any real life flying experience, whether you're in a Cessna 150 or a Strike Eagle. Some attempts have been made in this area but most are seeming afterthoughts (literaly in the case of the innovative Falcon3 third party add-on FalCalc).

Timed waypoints, which is to say allowing coordination between multiple flights on separate flight plans for time-on-target would add a considerable touch of reality to the planning process. This has been demonstrated to some degree by mission planners like that in DI's Tornado sim. But to date, there is no mission planner that can provide the same facility for sims with multiplayer support where many human sim pilots may be allocated in different flights.

Janes F15.

Mission editors in Tornado and Su-27 are the ones most often held up as the cream of the crop to date in terms of their capabilities for mission customization. The perfect sim should build on the lead shown by these two and make the mission planner at least as capable as these to meet the threshold. Beyond that innovations such as fuel management and timed waypoints will move the sim considerably nearer perfection.

Once again, Jane's F-15 is the standard bearer for this year in mission planners. About the only thing missing is actual target imagery photographs although arguably the zoomable targeting map is adequate recompense. The FLIR style target fly-by in DiD's TAW is worth a mention though as an interesting innovation on this front.

Go to Part IV