I feel the need...

ttaskmaster · 27 Feb 2015 at 13:06

The need for speed!!!

Been chatting with a guy who is an aircraft handler (actually a Shooter, the one who launches planes off a carrier deck) and learning what all the signals mean...
Which led to watching scenes in Top Gun far too much...

And now I want to have a crack at flying an F-14 off a carrier!! :cool:

Sooo.... can anyone recommend a decent flight sim that will let me do this?

Raumarik · 27 Feb 2015 at 13:40

X-Plane would be my suggestion tbh, Microsoft flight sim just looks terrifying from what I've seen my brother in law BECOME.

Honestly he's obsessed with flight plans.

Kosmiche · 27 Feb 2015 at 14:24

DCS World with Flaming Cliffs 3 add on!

zola25 · 27 Feb 2015 at 14:26

Thirdwire's Strike Fighters 2:North Atlantic

Darujhistan · 27 Feb 2015 at 14:54

ttaskmaster · 27 Feb 2015 at 16:38

Is the F-14/Carrier scenario included in any of these, or do they come as add-ons?

zola25 · 27 Feb 2015 at 21:46

SF2 North Atlantic has F-14's and carriers as part of the stock game. There's an enormous modding community for it too, but as I said that combo is in the stock game.

It's a bit of a sim light - think one notch below Flaming Cliffs in complexity - but is by no means an arcade game, it is still a sim

ttaskmaster · 2 Mar 2015 at 13:20

zola25 said:
think one notch below Flaming Cliffs in complexity -

Which is how complex, exactly?
I'm mostly into helicopters and spaceships - I've not played any airplane sims!!

I'll start looking for some of these and check them out!

bJN · 2 Mar 2015 at 15:39

ttaskmaster said:
Which is how complex, exactly?
I'm mostly into helicopters and spaceships - I've not played any airplane sims!!

I'll start looking for some of these and check them out!

If you need to ask the question, then probably too complex. The DCS sims are notoriously harsh and exceptionally realistic. Enjoy the 10+ minutes on the ground trying to ignite the engines

ttaskmaster · 2 Mar 2015 at 16:20

bJN said:
If you need to ask the question, then probably too complex. The DCS sims are notoriously harsh and exceptionally realistic. Enjoy the 10+ minutes on the ground trying to ignite the engines

Well, I most recently played TakeOn Helicopters, which I thought seemed a bit simplistic... I guess it's a case of try it and see... at least until my F-14 gets a compression stall and crashes!

zola25 · 2 Mar 2015 at 17:01

As bJN says the DCS sims are very complex, with pretty much every real life switch modelled. Flaming Cliffs - which started life as LOMAC and is now a plugin to DCS - is much less complex than true DCS titles but is still quite complex.

The best thing to do is look at some reviews, or indeed the forums on SimHQ, to get a feel for which one might suit you.

zola25 · 2 Mar 2015 at 17:04

ttaskmaster said:
Well, I most recently played TakeOn Helicopters, which I thought seemed a bit simplistic... I guess it's a case of try it and see... at least until my F-14 gets a compression stall and crashes!

Try not to hit your head on the canopy when ejecting

ttaskmaster · 2 Mar 2015 at 17:22

zola25 said:
As bJN says the DCS sims are very complex, with pretty much every real life switch modelled.

Do any of them have tutorials/flying lessons, perchance?
That's one thing I did like about the Heli-Sims I've played so far.

zola25 said:
Try not to hit your head on the canopy when ejecting

Nah, I'll be pinned forward, Zola. I won't be able to reach the ejection handle - *You'll* have to punch us out...!

VincentHanna · 2 Mar 2015 at 17:23

The F14 has been out of service since 2006.

What carrier would you be flying this off?

Telecaster · 2 Mar 2015 at 17:26

VincentHanna said:
The F14 has been out of service since 2006.

What carrier would you be flying this off?

It's only a game lol.

Flack88 · 2 Mar 2015 at 17:29

DCS with Flaming Cliffs 3 all the way!

ttaskmaster · 2 Mar 2015 at 17:32

VincentHanna said:
The F14 has been out of service since 2006.
What carrier would you be flying this off?

Oh, I'll start by flying out from the same currently-disused airfields that all the WW2 flight sims use, I expect...

Cavallino · 2 Mar 2015 at 17:39

No brainer

zola25 · 2 Mar 2015 at 18:35

ttaskmaster said:
Do any of them have tutorials/flying lessons, perchance?
That's one thing I did like about the Heli-Sims I've played so far.

There are training scenarios in FC3, pretty sure there are in the hardcore DCS modules too. Note that DCS/FC doesn't currently have an F-14, but you can make the AI version flyable with the F-15 cockpit. Edit: it does have the Su-33 that you can fly off the Admiral Kuznetzov though.

ttaskmaster said:
Nah, I'll be pinned forward, Zola. I won't be able to reach the ejection handle - *You'll* have to punch us out...!

VincentHanna said:
The F14 has been out of service since 2006.
What carrier would you be flying this off?

It's still in service in Iran although they have no carriers we know about ;-)

. Not everyone sticks to modern day for simming, although it's sim light one of the draws of Strike Fighters + mods is that it spans every period from WW2 to present day.