Sim pilot view on Arma 3

I've been spending a lot of time lately in Arma 3 so I've decided to share my opinion in this game from the point of view of a flight simulator pilot looking at the flight possibilities in Arma 3. This is somehow related to the recent release of Helicopters DLC for Arma 3, but I will not focus on that part since I did not get the chance to buy and try the full DLC, however I've had some fun with the flight improvements the DLC introduced that come for free for everyone with the latest Arma 3 update (most notably the new realistic flight model).

What is Arma?

X-Plane 10 preview

My first contact with the world of flight simulators was one of the first demo versions of the X-Plane that I found on a CD received togheter with a popular gaming magazine. I remember I first installed that demo during the Easter and even though I was allowed to fly only 5 or 6 minutes, I got hooked and spent the entire Easter holiday learning as much as I could about the different airplanes and exploring the demo world (South California at that moment).
So, as soons as I found out yesterday about the release of the version 10 demo, I could not resist and  I took the game for a quick test run.

Infinite Flight - new mobile flight simulator

A new mobile phone flight simulator, produced by Flying Development Studios, has been released for Windows Phone 7 devices. It features very nice graphics, 15 airports in San Francisco Bay area, multiple day/time and weather presets, a Cessna C172SP trainer aircraft and many more features.

More details can be found on the official site.

New helicopter game in progress - Take on Helicopters

Bohemia Interactive, the creators of the military simulator Arma series, announced they are working on a helicopter game based on the Arma II engine. The launch is planned for Q4, 2011.

Take On Helicopters will feature two beautifully rich and expansive environments, based upon real-world North American and South Asian terrain-data, cutting-edge technology, helicopters modelled in stunning detail, a large-scale, open-world sandbox and authentic flight dynamics.

More details can be found on the official site.

Online ATC simulator game

ATC-SIM is a very realistic online ATC simulator, with and interface which resemble a real ATC screen, that can help you get rid of boredom.
It also has a scoring system implemented to see where you rank between the fellow controllers, and various airports you can control on.
The only downside I found is the fact that you need to learn all those text commands to control the aircraft, but if you print them and keep them on your desk, they are not that hard to memorize with time.

Updates and brand new screenshots from Microsoft Flight!

The development team behind upcoming Microsoft Flight title has released some brand new screenshots, as well as a news update communicating the fact that the game will contain an offline mode next to the online experience.

Read more details and enjoy the screenshots directly on the official site!

Apache: Air Assault - New helicopter combat game

On November 19th, 2010 a nice new helicopter combat simulation game has been relased. It features the Apache AH64 helicopter and lets you take it on a 16 mission campaign in various landscapes along side multiplayer game. From the screenshots and videos I can tell the scenery is one of the most complex I have yet seen in a simulation, with dense vegetation and lighting effects.

Regarding the realism it seems the developers added two modes the game can be played in, which you can select at the begining of each mission in the campaign. The training mode makes flying the helicopter very easy, while the realistic mode gives you a similar to reality flying experience. The cockpit is nice, but you cannot move buttons and switches, which taking into account that this is an action game it is not that of a bad thing.

Apache: Air Assault is available for multiple platforms, such as Xbox 360, PS3, PC.

Here are some videos I found:

Trailer:


Gameplay:

Tom Clancy's HAWX

For the dogfighting fans and those who like aerial combat games I will try to present a few features of this nice combat flying game from Ubisoft, which is available for multiple platforms including PC and XBOX 360. From the start I would like to say the game does not want to be a flight simulator but more like an arcade or action game so do not expect to have all knobs and switches working in the cockpit, or the systems modeled to the last detail. There is no fuel gauge, no advanced instruments, the player does not even have to take off and land his aircraft, every mission is started in mid air. Even so I can bet you will not be bored with it and it promises a lot of fun during either the single player campaign or in multi player mode. 

X-Plane 9 Mobile for iPhone review

How would it be to be able to have a flight simulator in your pocket every day? Dream no more! The team at Laminar Research managed to move simulation to your pocket with the release of the X-Plane app for iPhone, which is a miniature copy of the very realistic simulator that is available on the desktop computers, guaranteed to keep you busy and entertained during breaks or while getting bored waiting.

I recently played it on the iPhone of a friend and decided to write this short review about it. 

The X-Plane 9 Mobile app includes the following aircraft:

    * Cessna 172
    * Columbia 400
    * Piper Malibu
    * Cirrus Vision
    * Piaggio Avanti
    * Beechcraft King Air

and the following regions:

    * Innsbruck, Austria
    * Hawaii
    * Boswell Bay, Alaska
    * Southern California
    * San Francisco, California
    * Desert Sky, California

While this application is not designed to be a simulator, but more a game to play, it still keeps quite a few options from original X-Plane which can customize your flight experience. You can set the region, select the aircraft, weather, weight and many others. You even have a small map of the area containing the navaids.
And yes, you can even do instrument flights with it!

After starting the application from the iPhone menu you are already in the game on the runway which is good as you can start flying in a couple of second. To change location, aircraft and option you need to click one of the icons at the top of the screen. From the same place you can pause the simulation or change the views. For IFR fans a instrument panel is also included, but it will be full screen giving you no possibility to see the scenery.

To start flying just click on the brakes icon to disable the brakes and on the area in the right side of the screen to set the flaps. When good to go just set the throttle from the left side of the screen. The plane will start to roll on the runway. Make sure you keep the  iPhone horizontal as any tilt will cause the plane to turn as well.

When ready to take off just tilt the iPhone towards you and soon you will find yourself floating between the clouds ;)
It takes some time to get used with the controls but I managed to do a landing correctly form the first try so I would say it is pretty easy to use.

You have also the option to customize the controls and flight dynamics of the aircraft to make it easier or harder.

There are different views you can choose from (outside and inside) but the one I used most of the time was the fighter hood like below which displays most of the parameters you need.

Scenery itself is ok, considering we are talking about a phone application, and it ran very smoothly on the iPhone 3Gs that I used for testing. Same applies to the instrument panel and 3d model of the aircrafts.

I would recommend reading the article about Flying X-Plane mobile that is posted on the X-Plane.com website if you would like to find out more about how to play it.
All being said I would consider this one of the best aviation related mobile games available on the market.
Wish you  many hours of iPhone simming and take great care with the controls not to end up like me below:

Airline manager - Facebook aplication for pilots

I came across this nice Facebook game which sounds very promising:

http://apps.facebook.com/airline_manager