One of my other loves is Flight Simulation and in particular, I love 'Combat Simulation'. In 1999 I formed an online-squadron called the 185th Reservoir Dogs, flying Microprose's Falcon 4. The membership quickly grew and we regularly flew "virtual missions" together against other squadrons across the world. All great fun! That squadron is still going strong 20 years later!!
I started off, of course, with Microsoft's FlightSim but quickly grew bored of civil aviation simulation and moved to various combatsims including the very original FALCON in 1987 which now looks shockingly poor but at the time it was groundbreaking (he says laughing out loud)....
A year later, Spectrum Holobyte updated their software and dropped FALCON AT onto our floppy discs....
But it was the 1991 introduction of Spectrum Holobytes' FALCON 3 that really caught my attention. Back then it was incredibly advanced! The graphics and sound were massively improved and so too was the gameplay...
Spectrum Holobyte Packaging
Falcon 3 was beautifully presented with 5 floppy discs, maps and a 'proper' printed manual, brimming with information on how to fly the Viper. It was a very exciting time, but if you look back at it now, it seems laughable. Here's a video of Falcon3 from startup to completion of a mission...
Spectrum Holobyte Falcon 3
Microprose bought out Spectrum and in December 1998, they launched Falcon 4. It was mind bogglingly advanced! Again, it included a superb printed reference manual. I still have my Falcon 4 CD-ROM along with the original box, manual, maps, etc. The very fact that this sim is still widely used across the world is testament to just how fabulous it is.
Microprose Falcon4 packaging
Microprose Falcon4 Intro
Microprose Falcon4 CockPit
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I used to love Microprose's Falcon4 but when LOCK ON arrived with its amazing graphics, I quickly migrated. I used to love making missions in the comprehensive Mission Builder, which I then shared online for others to download.
UbiSoft Lock On
LOCK ON : Modern Air Combat
(Excuse the advert at the start)
Lock On was pretty much all about the A-10 WARTHOG and as much as I adored flying the plane, I did miss the Viper. When DCSWORLD took over, I was really hoping that they'd introduce one, but they spent years developing anything but!
Then this year they eventually announced the Beta Release of their new F-16C Viper! I was thrilled and quickly pre-ordered. The graphics are simply out of this world and the level of realism is dazzling!!
DCS WORLD F-16C Cockpit
To see just how STAGGERINGLY GOOD this new sim is, take a look at the video below and bear in mind that this is all 'in-game' action, not a computer-generated movie...
DCSWORLD F-16C VIPER
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