I consider myself a serious sim player. I have a fortune invested in my equipment. I am a stickler for realism, generally. I don't use cheats or simplified modes when they are available. F4 is STILL on my hard drive ;)

BUT... I like USAF. There, I said it. I feel better already.

Don't get me wrong... standard disclaimers apply. USAF isn't perfect. I'm a bit annoyed at the cowboy atmosphere. The wingman AI needs some work. USAF detected my system fine but detects Athlon systems incorrectly, and crashes most of the time when I exit. Yes, it needs a patch.

But no sim is ever released completely bug free. And it just ain't fair to judge all sims by one standard. The hard core crowd, of which I am one, need to recognize that there are many out there who want and need this kind of simulation. It's a great introduction to military combat sims and it's also a great sim to fly when you don't have time to spend ten hours a week studying manuals!

USAF: Mid Core Heaven

Check it out: Vietnam, Iraq, and and a campaign set in the future as well. A nice whack of single missions, a powerful mission editor, good multiplayer features, a mission recorder, comprehensive pilot records, stunning graphics... have I missed anything? How about ability to command your wingman or the flight, jump into the action in another aircraft, IFR (in-flight refueling) or use built in voice command? How about a thick spiral bound manual?

For some of you, this is "the other guy's" simulation. But for the weekend jet jockey, this is pretty close to heaven. Wanna fly the Thud in Vietnam? It's all yours. Got an itch to try the Phantom? Check it out. Still pining for an A10? It's in here. You've always loved the F15, but you're not into ground pounding? Climb into the C model here. You've been admiring Falcon 4 but the weight of the manual gives you weak knees? Yep, the F16C and even the F22 are here for you.

No matter what you think of Jane's Combat Simulations, they tend to set the pace with each simulation they release. F15 may have lacked a dynamic campaign and front seat/back seat coop, but it was one helluva great simulation. WW2 Fighters similarly lacked wingman coordination and full dynamics, but it is still stunning graphically and as a multiplayer game it's tough to beat. In the same way, USAF is a survey simulation like WW2 Fighters, and nicely defines the middle realism market for jet jocks.

The action starts on the tarmac. You aren't alone out there!

My goal here is not to do a comprehensive review, but to introduce USAF to those who have waited to hear something more from us. This will be the quick tour, covering the main bases and also suggesting direction for improvement, looking toward that first patch!

Install Your Jet

Remember when Longbow II arrived on the scene, with a maximum install of some 600 MB? In those days the average hard drive was around 1.5 GB. We've come some distance since then, and USAF arrives on two CDs, REQUIRING 415 MB as a minimal installation. Go for the full meal deal and allocate a full 1145 MB of your drive.

I chose the CUSTOM route, leaving out the Vietnam campaign as a way of testing CD access. This means actually SWAPPING in CD number two when loading the campaign, and that is the only time you will notice any access. Leaving out a campaign saves around 250 MB of your hard drive.

Once loaded up you'll get the usual JANE's multimedia intro, followed by the USAF specific video footage. It's worth watching.

Entering the sim, the interface is a cross between the IAF style and WW2 Fighters. Overall it's relatively clean and intuitive. Your first stop will likely be the PREFERENCES.

My system defaulted to 1024x768 but not all the options were turned on. I made that correction, and then turned off the training aids (Easy Aiming and Easy Targetting were turned ON by default.)

When Tim "Flyboy" Henderson installed USAF, it failed to detect his AMD Athlon 600, instead deciding he was running a K6-3 400. It looks like Jane's have optimized for the Pentium III but have not optimized for the Athlon. Too bad, but maybe this will be rectified in a patch. Btw, I've been running under DX7 on WIN98 OSR 2.

Learning the Ropes

Next up, some flight training. This is the narrated, instructor provided style training that we're getting accustomed to. It's nicely done and I didn't find a single flaw in the taxi and takeoff missions I flew in both the F16C and the F22A.

Training Missions

Realism and challenge vary in USAF, with flight models being a cut above the light sim genre, but landing difficulty falling more in that sphere. Landings are very forgiving.

But for most weekend simulation pilots, this isn't a bad design choice. You may argue that they could simply select Easy Landing. I tend to agree.

After the training missions I went straight to Desert Storm and chose the second mission. This mission involves taking out a COMMS center if you choose to fly the F-117A. I took out the center on my first try (!), but neglected to watch my fuel status. By the time I was getting the warning message I had 1000 pounds left and thought I might be able to limp home. Wrong. I had to bail.

Tactical Display

After explaining the loss of a few million dollars worth of military hardware, I reflew the mission. I didn't want to deal with the time consuming process of finding and hooking up to a tanker, so I was careful to monitor my throttle and managed to make it all the way back to base on the single tank.

How Do You Want It?

It's at this point that USAF builds on its strong suit. I chose to fly the mission in the F-117, but after I had hit my target and was out of SAM range, I decided to visit some other action.

Hitting ESC brings up the Tactical Display. From here you can click on any of the aircraft listed along the bottom of the screen, and either VISIT (you can observe but have no control) or FLY (jump in the pilot's seat and get in the action.) If you choose to VISIT, be sure you selected AP NAV mode when you left your assigned aircraft.

Mission Recorder

In fact you can also VISIT other aircraft if you have a long ingress to target. I visited an F111 which was about fifteen miles from the target area when I was still fifty miles out. The action over Baghdad was intense.

I also recorded my second flight in the 117. The entire record was just under 6 meg, a large file but with the hard drives today, not enough to worry about. Playing back the mission, you get every sound and action and can even edit camera views and save the changes. The single drawback was inability to jump in to refly and inability to access Night Vision. Going to an outside view on a night mission isn't very interesting when you can only see clearance lights.

Modified Tactical Display

Ah well. Hitting ESC while running the playback brings you to a modified Tactical Display. From here you can look over the battlefied and choose other aircraft to visit, so you can see other action that occurred during the mission you flew. It's at this point that you may notice some limitations: you can't access other views for other aircraft, only for your own.

This brings up a few other limitations of USAF. Currently you cannot access other views when the simulation is paused. A strange limitation that many have found annoying. Many have also noticed some serious texture tearing. These graphical glitches were quite serious in my installation until I downloaded the latest 3.53 Detonator drivers for my TNT2 board.

Another annoyance relates to control configuration. The USAF demo showed us that there was some extreme sensitivity in the joystick routines. The solution is to enter the PREFERENCES Control setup and edit the joystick settings.

This will take care of one issue, but leave you with another. It's still difficult to maintain level flight apart from engaging the Autopilot. The trim settings (PGUP and PGDN) adjust the trim in strokes that are too broad, and don't have the sensitivity needed. Solution? Simply find the course and heading you desire and engage the AP LVL mode. The second press of the "A" key engages the AP NAV mode and you no longer have control of direction or throttle (other than through the waypoint setting).

Built in voice comms is a first for a JANE's sim. I use Game Commander so I haven't tested the voice comms for USAF. If you use Roger Wilco you may have discovered there is a problem, but the fix is simple. Open your \Resounding Folder (usually under Program Files) and add the following line to the games.txt file: "Jane's USAF" "Jane's USAF" 1 3000. Save the changes and you're ready to rock and roll.

As for AI, yes there are a few glitches here too. I've seen friendly aircraft discover that the mountains are too high (G), and I've had wingmen not respond to commands (only once.) But yes, the graphics are far beyond IAF and the screens here should give you a good sampling.

Mission Builder and JANE'S Combat.net

Yesterday marks my first visit to Jane's Combat.net. I flew a head to head mission just to test the connection and was pleased to find it as smooth as silk. From there I attempted to set up a co-op mission, using the historical Desert Storm campaign missions. Unfortunately, two attempts gave me nothing but a black screen. Your mileage may vary, but I expect there are some issues to work out in this area.

Full Screen FLIR mode.

Mission Builder: UME

Depending on the install you chose you will find a very powerful mission builder tucked away in your \Resource\Missions directory. I haven't had time to experiment much, but it looks possible to create some very sophisticated missions using this resource.

News and Views

USAF has a fairly flexible view system, and you can fly with fixed cockpit, virtual cockpit, and no cockpit view with HUD. You can also fly using an outside view with HUD, a nice option for those atmospheric but less dangerous moments.

The padlock view seems to work well, and you also have options to padlock your target or your wingman. Again, these are fairly standard features but sometimes are missed in the rush to get a product to market. The virtual cockpit slews very nicely, and the reflections are in full color!

More Screens

USAF lends itself to screen shots. I've taken a few from other missions to give you a sample. The terrain in Vietname is VERY different from the terrain in Iraq!

Pilot Records

JANE's has taken the requests of virtual pilots very seriously, and has gone the next mile in making it possible for pilots to compare their abilities and experiences. The ability of USAF to record your mission statistics is simply unsurpassed, and you can even share them with other pilots via the web. Check out the image below.. you can even graph your performance!

F4 Phantom Cockpit

The F4 in Vietnam

The F4 in Vietnam

The Thud in Vietnam

The Thud in Vietnam

The Eagle Hunting