stuart666

From what ive read, they were using stock footage of F14's that were filmed before 2006, and they have CGIed them to look like the one they were filming on the carrier deck. So hopefully that will avoid the awful treatment of aircraft by CGI in the past, in that they are using real aircraft and (hopefully) will avoid effects as we saw in 'Pearl Harbour'. IE, Flying Saucer acceleration and performance. There is some good coverage of the filming on the Theodore Roosevelt on 'The Drive'. https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/26505/an-f-14-tomcat-has-returned-to-the-deck-of-an-operational-carrier-for-top-gun-2-production https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/26523/photos-show-f-14-used-in-top-gun-2-production-snared-in-carriers-crash-barricade

I predict that the very day an F14D is made for DCS, someone will pipe up and say 'Gee... No Tomcat 21 already?' :D

A Sea Vixen was one of the earliest aircraft I remember seeing, being dragged across a road in front of me for storage in a hangar, before presumably being turned into a target drone. A handsome looking aeroplane, its a great shame the last flying survivor had its mishap and is now grounded. I suppose at the risk of being parochial, I would love to see a British Jet aircraft in this sim. Ok, we have the AV8B, but its not quite the same. Id love a sea vixen, but im not sure it would be popular. I hazard the thought a Buccaneer almost certainly would be. Particularly with an Ark Royal to land it on. There are so many well documented, historic aircraft out there. I dont get the fascination with an interesting but small build group of aircraft for which there isnt even adequate documentation. Why not ask for a Lockheed A12 sim as well. :D

Id rather a perfectly done A and B than a half baked D model. They have made a perfectly reasonable explanation why they cant do it, its time to stop mussing their hair over it. Now if you have time, there is this really great concept I have for a De Havilland Sea Vixen, I wont take up much of your time..... :D

I was flying it the other day, and it felt very much like the first version that was released, albeit they now seem to be achieving it from the right performance modifiers. I do notice the controls seem a LOT lighter and more responsive than they were. Its just generally a very nice kite to throw around now

ACM mode. I have to agree, Phoenix is a lot of fun in ACM mode. Its like a radar homing Sidewinder with a nuclear warhead. :D

I played it post post patch last night for something like an hour and a half in multiplayer (lots of dogfighting so using the pilots radar lockup a lot), and it didnt crash once. So from my perspective at the moment, it looks solved. Nice work.

If future generations want a complete Tomcat, they will have to drag it out the sea. Vandals.

The thing is, its my understanding that anything to the West of Murmansk, isnt Kola. So when people say Kola is not the map, they might be entirely truthful in that. But it doesn't necessarily mean its not North Cape. I hope it is. It would be a near perfect map for DCS as things stand.

This might be the replica cockpit described by the author of 'Top Gun Day's'. The films art department went all out and measured up a Tomcat cockpit (certainly the rio's pit, and I think the forward cockpit as well) for all the blue sky scenes where maverick and goose are turning and burning. They tried filming many of the scenes in the rear cockpit of an F14, but the results were said to be horrible, so after that they filmed it on the ground. It was supposedly a fairly accurate replica, but the guy who made it tapped up a real rio about what all the labels said. You wont see them in the film, but the perfectionist in him wanted it right. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Topgun-Days-Dogfighting-Cheating-Hollywood/dp/1620871033/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=top+gun+days&qid=1561377629&s=gateway&sr=8-1 I wonder if it survived. It would save them a ton of money for Top Gun 2. :D

Ah, see what you mean. You want an intermediate position between the two, with all the function but without the highlights. No, I dont believe you can do that. It wouldnt surprise me if it could be modded though. By someone far smarter than myself anyway. :D

select the other one in the Jester options. He will do his own thing, other than bits he needs you to do.

Thats right where you are going wrong. You dont LOOK at the probe. You dont LOOK at the drogue. All you look at is the drogue receiver, which you keep in the same place just to the right of the center of the upper window. Keep it there, you fly right into it. If you are trying to coordinate a coupling, it will never work. The trick is to put your plane in the right piece of sky, and you will (if not at the first, at the second or third try) couple right up. Dont rush it. If he pulls the hose in, recontact the tanker, and go again. Ill be the first to admit VR does help. But I honestly think if you trim it right, and keep the receiver in the window, sooner or later its a done deal. It was for me, and im notably crap at it. :D

Ive always found it this way. The fast targets described ive always noted using TWS as a pilot. I reckon you are right, I think thats target jamming, in the not particularly great way that DCS models it. Ive my doubts whether a Mig23 jamming suite would be anything like as effective as that. Not much Heatblur could do about it I daresay.

I have never, ever refueled middair in any sim before. I tried on the DID sims. I tried on the early Flanker Games. I tried on the AV8B. Nothing worked. And I tried it on the F14, and yes, its difficult, and yes ive put off doing it again in case I lost the knack. But I did it, and I think, personally, the F14, is one of the easier ones to do, largely because the fuel probe is so near to your line of vision. If you think this is difficult, do it in the AV8 where its above you to the left out of your vision line. Get stabilized first. Get the probe out, get the wings to bomb, get the speed right, and trim, trim, trim. And then, and ONLY then when you have it trimmed up, go for it. I could give you plenty more tips, but the best thing to do is not look at the hose, just look at the hose receiver and keep that in position, just off of centre on the right of the upper canopy frame. And when you connect run in a bit closer to the tanker, then pull off a tiny bit of power. Ive not had the joy of figures of 8's, but im willing to bet if you concentrate on his wing and the probe receiver, and put a bit of power in, it will go fine. Dont be despondent, and dont give up. Just keep trying. It will click eventually. It took me ages by contrast to the Herc to engage with the Viking, but that came eventually too. Just concentrate on the receiver. BTW, I have no curves on my setup. The lesson im taking from all this is, if someone manifestly unsuited for in flight refueling as myself can do it, anyone can, given enough practice.

This is still useful. Granted its F16 specific, but its all still relevant.

The Tom Cooper books indicates that, as long ago as the mid 80's, the Iranians were up to building parts that the US figured could only be obtained by themselves. I think some of the computer chips might be off the cards, and the Iranians dont seem quite up to making a full copy of the Phoenix missile (they can build Phoenix bodies, with Hawk missile internals). There was even talk ive read online of fitting Russian fighter engines in the F14's. Personally I doubt thats possible, but I would LOVE to see someone try. :)

Thank you for pointing that out. Its a pity its not Kola, but in truth it must have changed massively from what it was in WW2. OK, so my money is still on North Cape/Finland/Norway and just maybe a slice of Northern Sweden as well. He might be disingenuous in saying no Kola. In theory, everything to the east of Murmansk is Kola. That doesn't rule out to the west up to the Norwegian/Finnish Border. And that area cant have changed much in the past 70 years. There are 2 big foxtrot oscar Airfields for Naval Aviation there. Ideal for your Backfire spamming needs. Anyway, its a theory. I look forward to seeing it blown out the water. :D

Yeah I had one too. I threw it out when all the switches started failing. I wish we had a mini stick on the Warthog joystick. It seems a little artificial doing it on the throttle base. Works well mind. I use autothrottle too. I cant think of a good reason not to.

Thanks for the hint above about setting it up with an axis control. Previously ive used it with the default thrustmaster setup, and all you have is on/off. With an axis setup, It seems much more useable. First time I used it I got a 3 wire, so clearly there is some improvement here. :D

I think whatever chosen is going to be fairly empty of towns. Because this is a freebie and its going to take ages to put all those in. Its unreasonable to expect them to do a lot of cities for what is essentially a freebie. Also, towns today are going to be rather bigger than during WW2, which makes the interchange between era's somewhat problematic. Its got water. So we are looking at map with a sizeable body of water to hide a carrier in. Maybe a third to half of the map. Its somewhere that saw considerable combat in WW2 and conceivably would have done in WW3. Its difficult to see that this could include the Philippines or Okinawa. I think its North Cape/Finland. With an outside chance on Libya/North Africa. On a REALLY REALLY outside chance, the Aleutians.

It is, although its not clear to me if Heatblur 'own' the Aim54's they are using, or those are the ED ones they use for the A model. I think someone said there are 2 different incarnations of phoenix in the game at present? I do know that if you are 4 up, you REALLY feel it. Its near marginal getting off the deck, and you are very slow indeed to climb to altitude. Its almost like you are doing everything with the drag brakes open.

Early on there are some photos with early A models with smaller tanks with fins on them. They look like they may have come off an A4 or a Skyray or something.

They did this at Tonopah with the Red Eagles as well. The early Mig21's they had either didnt have a radar detector, or it was so mediocre they supplemented it with these. If nothing else, it gave an indication when something was locked onto you.

That explains a lot. I saw it perform that exact behavior in a recent offline mission. I wondered what it thought it was doing. On the positive side, it works fantastically in ACM mode. Its like a radar homing sidewinder with a nuclear warhead. :D