After years of jet sims, 1999 has proven to be a banner year for prop sims. And there is no sign of any slow down! My last update on coming WWII Sims for 1999 was in May. Time to revisit the scene, since a few more titles have been added since then.

The combat prop fan currently has a choice of the following sims:

• Combat Flight Sim
• European Air War
• Fighter Squadron
• Flying Corps Gold
• Luftwaffe Commander
• MiG Alley
• Red Baron II
• WWII Fighters

and online:

• Dawn of Aces Flying Circus
• Warbirds
• Fighter Ace
• Air Warrior 3

That is quite a collection of talent! But believe it or not, there are eleven more combat prop sims in development. Here is the list of coming prop action:

• HiTechCreations: Aces High
• Simguild: Battle of Britain
• Wayward Design: B17 II
• Sierra: Desert Fighters
• Microsoft: Combat Flight Sim II
• VR1: Fighter Ace II
• Psygnosis: Nations Fighter Command
• Looking Glass: Flight Combat
• Crosswind Simulations: Stormbird
• Maddox Games: IL2 Sturmovik
• Playnet: WWII Online.

Somewhere out in the distance Rowan has already begun work on their own Battle of Britain, and Parsoft is working on a follow up to Fighter Squadron. (For fairly serious add ons, note Battle for Midway and Fighting Tigers by Abacus.)

Click to continue

Aces High

The division in the iMagic community resulted in a new effort to produce a worthy successor to Warbirds. Here is part of the press release from HiTech Creations (at least one of the principals is an ex-Warbirds designer.)

"Aces High is an online multi-player combat flight simulator utilizing a variety of World War II vintage fighters and bombers from six countries, each modeled in intricate detail. Whether you love airplanes, history, the thrill of competition, or social recreation, Aces High has much to offer. Unlike stand-alone sims, there's nothing artificial about the intelligence of your opponents and allies. The challenge of combat, teamwork, camaraderie, and social interaction are all real."

"Aces High is about the science and art of air combat. It is designed to be very representative of air combat through the use of real world tactics. While the game is easy to learn, it is difficult to master. However, you don't have to attend ground school just to figure out the start sequence of an engine. We don't model complexity for the sake of it, but we don't shy away from those factors we feel are inherent to the real experience."

B17. Click HERE for internal shot.

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