It didn't take me long to realize I had made a serious mistake. I had assumed that since Microsoft had never made a military flight sim before, they would come to the project with little determination and even less skill. I miscalculated!

Lets face it, Microsoft is everyones favorite whipping boy. They make a great target. True, WIN95 has been a headache for gamers for three years now, but the direction of running games under a single coherent interface is a good one, and it may be WIN98 that finally warms our hearts for stability and ease of configuration.

Yesterday I spoke with the producer and some of the designers of MS Combat Flight Simulator, and whatever WIN98 brings us, Microsoft Combat Flight Simulator looks set to bring us a solid entry in the serious WWII prop sim genre. For example, drag from a windmilling prop is modeled. Weather conditions will affect engine performance, and torque is modeled individually on various aircraft. Even aileron reversal and compressibility effects are modeled at high speed! I know, its hard to take, but read on!

MS Combat Flight Simulator is an impressive piece of work. While it shares code with FS98, critical parts of the code have been reworked to fit the genre, and the best parts of the code are still here. The terrain system is improved and the 3d engine has been optimized for better frame rates. At altitude the terrain looks as good as EAW, VERY good indeed!

Lets face it, Microsoft brings a wealth of resources to whatever they undertake. Not only that, they bring innovation and the ability to spend time and resources to get it right. In the case of Combat Flight Simulator (CFS) innovation includes the technique for modeling AI pilot situational awareness as well as AI pilot control input.

We had the same kind of eyes: 20/10. We saw everything that went on in the sky, before anyone else in the squadron, or even the group.
   Chuck Yeager, from the introduction to "To Fly and to Fight."

There was no radar on WWII fighters, and seeing the enemy first was often the key to air to air victories in WWII. Consequently, the guy who could spot the enemy had the greatest chance for survival as well as for success.

Microsoft has taken this reality seriously and has designed realistic SA into their CPPs (computer controlled pilots). The field of view for CPPs is divided into six sections and each section is modelled according to the pilots current attitude, taking into account the parts of his aircraft as well as sun attitude and cloud layers. As a result, these guys will realistically lose sight of you depending on where you are before and during a dogfight.

AI pilots come in different flavors (5 levels of skill) as well as flying with the same flight model you will use. But here again Microsoft has done some innovation, and instead of simply modeling manouvers according to pilot skill and aircraft characteristics, they have modeled the actual control input on the stick. In other words, the game simulates the stick position chosen by the CPP and then the aircraft responds accordingly. This means that a zealous pilot could lose control the same as you would! But it also means that the limitations of his aircraft will always be as realistic as your own.

MS Combat Flight Simulator. Click for 800x600.

CPPs are also aware of the individual strengths of their aircraft, and the higher their level of skill, the better they will take advantage of those strengths and seek to exploit the weaknesses of yours! We will see CPPs using energy, altitude, and manouverability to their advantage, not to mention speed and power and damage potential of their weapons. Even target fixation is modeled so if you come upon a German fighter who is locked on the tail of your comrade you have a good chance of taking him out before he knows what hit him.

And yes, Microsoft is there with the rest of the pack this year in modelling ballistics and physics in appropriate ways. Individual bullets have ballistics, and various guns have appropriate muzzle velocities. Naturally, a 50 mm cannon will do much more damage when connecting with an airframe than a 30 mm gun!

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Speaking of damage modeling, when I locked on the tail of a Ju88 in the Spit I flew at E3, the smoke, pieces of tail section, and then the flames that appeared all looked fantastic! Attention to detail is particularly high in this area because the graphic artists spent time viewing actual footage of air to air encounters and crashes. They wanted to give this experience the highest realism possible, and early impressions are that they have scored!

Damage modeling is object oriented, and there is a great variety of damage you can inflict on the enemy (or have inflicted on yourself!) You can hit fuel or oil lines, and the smoke trail you see will be white or black according to whether an engine is damaged or you've hit a radiator. Pieces of tail, wing or elevators can be damaged, your radio can be hit, control lines can be damaged, and you can be wounded or killed. CPPs can also be killed outright apart from any damage to their aircraft.

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An amazing amount of research lurks quietly behind CFS. The design team has looked at wind tunnel data based on testing of models of these aircraft in early production as well as actual engineering documents. They've also scoured anecdotal information, and have even had WWII pilots look over their flight models! Most recently an Australian Hurricane pilot has been used as a consultant.

In flight players will hear their wingmen via the radio, and you will also hear German accented voices on your radio =) Your wing will let you know when he's been hit or hurt, and he will also let you know if someone gets on your six (if he has sight!) Unfortunately, there is no wing control modelled via radio, a big disappointment but the team felt there was not time to include this feature. Perhaps with enough user requests we will see this in a later add-on.

MS Combat Flight Simulator. Click for 800x600.

The graphics engine of CFS will handle anything you throw at it under DX6. At E3 I moved the resolution to 800x600, maxed out the terrain detail and added clouds. Clouds were very early and didn't look very good, but I expect we will see the state of the art by the time the sim is complete. Resolution is dependent on your hardware, so you can go to 1024x768 under Voodoo2 SLI and beyond that if you have an 8 meg Riva board or get yourself the latest hotrod in the form of the Matrox G200 or Riva TNT later this summer.

In fact I've been running the Falcon 4 alpha up to 1600x1200! I imagine that Combat Flight Sim would look very, very good at that resolution. I've recently received new information, not that surprising, that the sim will fully support DX6 which means that it is 3D NOW ready, good news for those investing in the new AMD hardware!

Even more interesting, there will be full support for multiple monitors under WIN98. This means that you could set up your forward view on a large screen and use other monitors for left and right views.

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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.

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CFS will be set in Europe and expandability is a primary goal so new aircraft will continue to be added after the initial release. There are two campaigns: the Battle of Britain where you can fly for the Germans or the Brisith, and the European war where you can fly for the Americans or Germans. Each campaign features three phases, further divided into eight missions.

Single missions and a quick action mode are also available, and you can customize a combat situation to your preference and then jump in and fly. You'll also be able to share these missions easily with others, since a simple text file defines mission data.

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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.

Initially it was hoped that a voice module would be integral to the first release, but due to time constraints this hasn't been included. Since this would add incredible depth to gameplay and a LOT more fun when adding other human pilots to the mix, its high on the list for a later release.

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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. With an open interface and plans to continue to add new aircraft, CFS should have an extended life. Watch for a hands on beta report soon. Click HERE to download a Combat Flight Sim AVI.