Ben Chiu just wrote a guest editorial about sim reviews that I was really happy to see. He referred to real world pilot "snobbery" in arguing a case that sim enthusiasts do a better job of designing sims than real pilots. It is my hope that this will start some more constructive discussion on the subject of just whom are these games being produced for? A handful of cyber aces, or the few million "others" who essentially make these products possible?

My gripe is not with the realism of the sim, nor the developer's claims of realism, justified or not. It's with the treatment of these issues given in many of the reviews that are written, in context of the question of who they are written for, and who is reading them.

As near as I can tell, the target audience is one thing, but the vast majority of people who read them are an altogether different crowd. In the early days of simulations, it was a pretty small group of highly computer literate people. People who particularly had a lot of spare time to devote to developing expertise.

I recognize that what Ben refers to as a "snob" is essentially a cyber ace who'd just as soon keep combat sims within a small, exclusive club, that disdains novices. Read the forums and this becomes rather obvious. But today the average simmer is a weekend warrior at best, merely a dabbler who, unless some better manuals and learning opportunities come along, is most likely to give it up as too time consuming to learn by trial and error.

The average simmer today isn't going to come home from work everyday (assuming he does work) and immediately fire up the computer for three hours of aerial combat. He's got other responsibilities that come first. If he can't learn the sim in a reasonable period of time, he's going to give it up. We have to keep in mind that sims will only improve in proportion to the success of the developers. If they can't achieve a mass market and profit, then the sims aren't going to continue to improve. Its really that simple.

Let me use the analogy of an amateur sport of any kind, let's try golf. Perhaps something like a mere 1% have handicaps of under 10, while the other 90% have handicaps of 30 to 60. If golf magazines wrote articles only for the 1% who are essentially pros, they couldn't sell their magazines because only 1% would know what they are talking about.

It should make sense then, that whether one is a real world pilot, or a cyber ace, if you're going to write from the standpoint of an ace, for aces, then you're going to be talking over the heads of the 99% of simmers who purchase them, and make the creation of our beloved games possible. In other words, without the 99% who pay the bills, we wouldn't have these great sims around to criticize.

But before anyone's ego gets bruised, let it be said that there is a place for both. If there really is a problem as I have suggested, then there is also a solution. First, we recognize that anyone with a high degree of acquired skill likes to be recognized for it. Everyone loves praise and recognition. After all, if the writers are honest, they'll admit to doing a little boasting and getting some recognition plays a large role in why they take the time to write. Nothing wrong with that.

What is wrong is that they're talking over the heads of most of their audience. Unless, that is, they are addressing only their fellow aces. I doubt very much that that is the case, and I believe that writers simply forget, or fail to recognize the composition of their audience.

Conversely, one can be sure that the manufacturers of sims have NOT forgotten, because if the product doesn't sell in volume, they are out of business. So we might start off by realizing that any developer who seeks only to please the 1% isn't going to be around for long. I'm equally certain that the folks who run Combatsim.com haven't forgotten this either.

So what to do? I see at least two possible remedies for review writers (software and hardware) to improve their efforts and appeal to a wider readership. As far as I'm concerned, they can offer all the critique they want about realism, as long as they also do not ignore the vast majority who play these games. Or, if they do choose to talk only to their own exclusive club, then the caliber of their reviews should be so indicated: For Experts and Real World Pilots only.

But let's face it, the vast majority of cyber pilots are duffers. Can anyone believe that the casual pilot really cares whether some arcane, tiny little technical detail perfectly mirrors the real aircraft when perhaps .0001% of simmers will ever fly one of those aircraft? They will NEVER know the difference, and won't in the slightest be bothered by the reviewer's disappointments.

When expert reviewers pick on these nits, it all looks rather absurd to the other 99%, even while that 1% are perfectly sincere in what they are saying. That last review by Wolford and Spann was a great piece of work, really well done, but it went over my head like a rocket. To their credit, they at least mentioned the potential viewpoint of us duffers, so clearly those two are aware of this.

Microprose Falcon 4.0

The solution for the reviewer is:

• Clearly state the skill level of the intended audience, or,
  
• Write for the top end, as well as the bottom and/or middle.

If we think it through a little further, we can see that creating a rating system for reviews would end up being a little cumbersome, although in some instances writing only for the minority would be perfectly acceptable, so long as the reader is informed of that.

It seems to me the better solution, and one that would please a much larger audience, for the reviewer to hone his writing skills further and take into consideration a larger audience. When you write, think about who you are talking to. Is it only a handful of experts like yourself? Or is it that highly varied, but unknown, audience out there, whom you will never know?

Novalogic's MiG 29 Fulcrum.

Take it from people who write for public consumption, you have to think in those terms. Combatsim.com, or any other sim publication, is not an arcane technical publication, though at times some articles make it appear so. The audience ranges from children to senior citizens.

I know guys in their 60's and 70's, who've never held a flight yolk in their hands, yet alone a joystick, who are taking up air combat as a hobby. I also have two nephews, ages 11 & 12, who are doing the same. On their own, with no help. So who do they turn to? Combatsim.com, of course. Think, also, about these kinds of people, for they are the bread and butter of gaming.

It would not be all that difficult for the writer to divide it up and include at least two points of view, for surely he can hearken back to the time when he was neither a cyber or real world ace. Nobody was born an expert.

If you want to see how its done, just take a look at some of Andy Bush's writing, which appears frequently on this site. Andy is both a real world pilot and cyber ace, but he studiously avoids succumbing to achievement-motivated egoism, and the desire to be critical from the absolutely most realistic point of view.

The major difference between his writing and others is that Andy was a fighter school pilot who is cognizant of how difficult it is for novices to comprehend the three dimensional world of air combat in the written language, without even those nice little plastic airplanes on the ends of sticks to help with visualization. But I'm not merely referring to BFM essays, but all types of reviews.

It's not that difficult to put oneself into the shoes of a novice, or a mid-level pilot, and to consider a sim (or piece of hardware) from that very different viewpoint. It's more fair to the readers, and more fair to sim makers as well (I can hear them gnashing their teeth from a thousand miles away, every time they read one).

Sim publishers must be tearing their hair out wondering how they can please some of us (and realizing that they can't). Or perhaps they have felt forced to make some ill-founded claims of perfection out of mere frustration, rather than the often alleged motive of greed. This old saw may cut two ways. Some of the criticism in reviews is as far off-base as those they accuse of being misleading.

Most of us are happy as clams just to find out what a new sim is all about, the graphics, frame rates, what platforms it runs best on, how well it works, a reasonable level of realism, and is an all-around entertaining package. Or not. Its fair to say that missile trails look like squeezed toothpaste lines, and ground objects appear as if they were paper cut-outs glued onto a map. This is fair game for critique.

So are bugs, gross discrepancies in realism, and major faults in mission generators. But its hardly fair to slam every sim in sight because it does not measure up to the one that is currently most favored. This is like Mark McGuire watching a Minor League game and criticizing the game play because it doesn't measure up to the Pros.

Unfortunately, this is usually what happens with sim reviews. A disservice is done to everyone but the 1% if a basically well made sim gets blasted for reasons that the landing gear extended at 350 knots, when it should have been 300, that the instrument panel doesn't have some switches in exactly the right place, or the corner velocity is 230 instead of 190.

Most of us just don't give a hoot. We'd all be a lot better off knowing the competency level that is being addressed.

Editor: We think Dave has hit the nail squarely, and we will strive to serve the broader market of our readership and also simulation producers, while continuing to serve the hard core crowd. We will also aim to assess a simulation according to it's target market rather than measure all sims against the highest standards of realism.