Recent air combat sim recommendations?

So many recent sims in here.

I dunno this seemed like the most relevant thread.

Oh wow. The memories from F-19. LOVED the experience.

Still holds up, Iā€™m finding.

I played a few minutes of F-16 on my C64 back in the day but it was too soon after I had played F-14 Tomcat on the same platform. F-16 was too bare bones but F-14 was a blast and it used to amuse me that if I bombed the wrong target or shot down friendlies my commanding officer would call on the radio and scream, ā€œPILOT! WHAT DO YOU THINK YOUā€™RE DOING??? RETURN TO BASE IMMEDIATELY!!! YOUā€™LL BE COURT-MARSHALED FOR THIS!!!ā€ It was my first experience with choices & consequences, I think, and I wanted more. F-16 was just bland after that.

Here you go!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=658ax0y8KHs

VR support plus a sneak preview of the new terrain theyā€™re working on.

Oh my. First impression: very smooth. Looks like 1998. Couldnā€™t get my hotas right but vr works straight out of the box. I canā€™t wait to throw myself at the wall of MIGs again.

I never thought Iā€™d play Falcon 4.0 again, but I was apparently wrong. Canā€™t wait to check this out!

What does this require to get started?

I think just a legal copy of Falcon 4.

Which you can get on GoG. They cleverly hide it as an extra to falcon3. Really? Why?!

Steam version works too?

Edit, BMS site says steam version works, and it is on sale for 4 bucks.

How does cockpit VR work in HOTAS sims where you have a hundred buttons? Elite: Dangerous handled it brilliantly with its hologram UI, but for a modern flight simā€¦? Do you basically just need to memorize where every button and dial and key is?

You have a mouse cursor.

Holy crap. The raciest sim porn ever.

On the opposite side of the spectrum, I saw that Tactical Warfare Simulator, the most poorly named World War I combat flight sim ever, was on sale, so I downloaded the demo. I cannot believe they have the gall to charge $49.99 for this. Seriously, except for the VR support, it doesnā€™t even look as good or fly as well as Red Baron 3-D. And it has one of the most obtuse user interfaces Iā€™ve seen on a flight sim. (And I flew all of the Empire flight sims!) Seriously, the UI looks like something from DOS-era shareware.

How can a game that came out in 1998 possibly look like that and still be considered the same game? Iā€™ve heard of heavily modded games, but that looks like a completely different engine!

Wow Iā€™d never even heard of this and yeah, it looks terrible.

More details on whatā€™s coming. In DCS, not Tactical Warfare Simulator.

https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/news/newsletters/a6204cbc7d5df25e887acb434b2f8e1b/

Bummer theyā€™re only doing DLSS 2, since 3 could literally double FPS. But with multithreading and the other improvements coming, DLSS 2 may well be enough.

DLSS 3 adds latency, something thatā€™s absolutely anathema to VR. DLSS2 is fine for VR tho, Iā€™ve tried hacking it into DCS, and it works. Gain isā€¦ so-so. The multicore thing is going to do much more, not just improving whatā€™s there, but opening up an avenue for true improvement, such as AI that canā€™t see through clouds, flies proper flight models, etc.

Also yo, check out that phantom bruuuuuv!