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King of Flight Sims

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: May 02, 2007
Author: Amazon User

This extremely comprehensive and demanding flight-sim appeared back in about 2000 and, after release looked like it was in trouble, dogged by both huge (then) system requirements and numerous bugs. Based on the F-16 (and following a string of hardcore sims going back to the original Falcon of 1987!), "F4" had been awaited breathlessly by fans, and arrived with numerous bugs. MPS, F4's publisher suddenly announced that they were dropping the sim, paving the way for F4's nearest competitor, "Jane's F/A-18" to become the top game for fans of highly detailed and demanding ("hardcore") flight-sims. By 2002, with the stream of flight-sims having stagnated, any good 3-year old sim still has much to offer - but the sim to beat isn't necessarily "F/A-18" (a great sim to be sure) but F4, rescued and brought to beautiful useability by a legion of on-line sim-fanatics. Having gained access to F4's source-code, these fans have crafted their own software called "Service Packs" which partly patch but mostly expand the original game. I'll keep this review confined to the original, though. In short - F4 still has much to offer.

F4 is focused on the F-16, the USAF's premiere multi-role fighter. Though F-16 sims have come and gone in hordes, F4 never lets you forget that the proof is in the execution. The flight model is demanding: slippery along each of the major directional axes and, for a light fighter, can lose energy and get heavy really quick. The avionics are also comprehensive - think that "multi-mode radar" means "air-to-air" and "air-to-ground"? Here, you'll be fiddling with modes even in "pure" situations (in which you'll be either primed for counter-air or ground-strike missions) learning the nuances of "range-while-search" or "track-while-search" modes while hunting MiGs. The range of weapons is wider than on older games - echoing the F-16's maturation from a small jet that could only fight with iron-dumb bombs and short range missiles like the Sidewinder to a more complex machine geared for "smart" bombs, anti-radiation missiles and AMRAAM in night or adverse weather. The enemies aren't slouches either (although that may have much to do with my low-grade skills).

F4's campaign is set in a futuristic North Korea (making it more topical than "Jane's F/A-18" which has you flying off Russia's arctic frontier). An elaborate setup menu allows you to tailor realism and controllability. My Thrustmater WCS/FCS setup was recognized here as quickly as on "Jane's F/A-18" (unsurprising since they both have to run through Windows's control panel - but thank heaven for small miracles nonetheless) though F4's key-mapping editor seems more stubborn than that of the other game. While the game ran well normally using my GeForce3 card, the menu appears to offer support only for 3DFx cards and not OpenGL, the API for that GeForce graphics-acceleration. Unfortunately, F4 was one of those great games that appeared immediately before the end of 3dFx's reign as the king of graphics acceleration. Sound was also an issue - with the sim modeling a great range of sounds (from the screams and roars of your engine down to the distinctive howls, clicks and whistles of each type's fire-control radar), but also suffering a lot of stuttering. Attention to detail is magnificent. Control surfaces and engine nozzles are convincingly animated and the F-16's trademark shoulder vortices appear in high-speed climbs. You can even customize the skins on both your airplane and those of your enemies. I gave mine the Israeli-style camo paint job that appeared in the "Iron Eagle" movies (now there's an idea for a sim, certainly one that can't be more unrealistic than the flick it was based on). The beauty is that, while F4 remains cutting edge by virtue of how far ahead of its time it was (and how few new sims have come to the market since then), the faster computers that can run F4 more comfortably are cheaper and more widely available.

SYSTEM ISSUES: I "flew" my F4 on a Pentium4 running at 4Ghz. XP accepted this sim out of the box (something else that "Jane's F/A-18" couldn't quite claim). Performance was largely smooth but became noticeably choppy at times even on simple "instant action" flights. In more elaborate game play - especially during dynamic campaigns - F4 reveals itself an incredible hog for just about every resource your computer has: the CPU, main memory, graphics memory etc. Worse, F4 suffers an acute "memory leakage" problem: as you'd expect, it takes a lot of RAM to "create" each of those enemy tanks and soldiers and endow them with AI (but not so much that they don't just turn north and run for cover), but the program doesn't de-allocate or give that RAM back as quickly as it takes it away, which means that your campaigns will bog down really quickly.

In short - if you want a truly hardcore sim, one that will make you forget your machine's obsolescence, consider what your system offers but also remain informed about what each sim's fan-base offers. With tech support becoming less supportive for such games, F4 and its competitors from 1999 will always rely on the perseverance of fans to adress their flaws. For either Jane's or F4 you'll need a machine with an even 1Ghz of processing muscle. OpenGL owners should consider F/A-18 (again - no slouch), but those owning late-generation graphics cards based on 3DFx's "Voodoo" technology should get F4.

F4 is THE benchmark combat flight simulator

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 4 / 5
Date: June 28, 2004
Author: Amazon User

Its been over four years since the release of Falcon 4.0, but it is still proving to be THE benchmark modern fighter simulator.

While the more recent fighter simulators (i.e., LOMAC) are being "dumbed down", Falcon 4.0 remains the most realistic systems simulation that a game consumer can find.

The learning curve required is not compatible with the arcade gamer. On air-to-ground sorties, you don't simply press one button to lock on and another to fire -- you have to use your fire control computer. The many types of radar and delivery methods will be daunting for the new player.

In realistic mode (after downloading the "SP4" freeware addon), expect to spend your first day with Falcon 4.0 just learning how to fire up your F-16 and get it running. From a cold cockpit, this is a systematic process with no less than twelve steps. Once you get it though, it'll be second nature.

As you are learning to master your F-16, the war is raging all around you. You are but a small drop of water in the ocean of war in the campaign.

Its unfortunate that this incredible simulator is faulted by bugs that cause infrequent CTD's (crashes to desktop). Downloading and installing "SP4" resolves many of the issues, but they still occur -- however less frequently. If it weren't for the bugs, this would merit 5+ stars.

Highly recommend.

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 4 / 7
Date: May 07, 2004
Author: Amazon User

Gigantic and imposing, 'Falcon' is more or less the last word in ultra-realistic, ultra-anal combat flight simulators, one which shot itself in the foot. After half a decade in the making, it came out two years ago to variable reviews - most praised the stunning graphics, the realism and the campaign, whilst bemoaning the monster PC required, and the mountain of bugs. Nonetheless, this is a product of quality and depth, something to which the passionate network of fan sites testifies. Two years later it still looks stunning (the horizon stretches away seemingly forever, and only the chunky textures look dated). The newer patches (multi-megabyte downloads all) fixed the bugs, leaving the world with a rock-hard simulation of an F16 locked in combat with North Korea.

Apart from the ultra-realism (just for example, you don't just have to fly waypoints - you have to do it *on time*) the campaign mode sets it apart from the competition - you're basically flying over a giant war-game, one that is played out in real-time (even when you're selecting ammunition load-outs and so on), and your actions, however small, play a part in the big picture. As you soar over the battlefield, you watch explosions ripple along the ground in the distance. The complexities involved in planning and administering strike missions can be daunting - thankfully, you don't have to, as you can just drop yourself into an existing mission.

Despite the ability to tweak the realism, this is still frighteningly complex to start with, even if you're a flight sim veteran. The relative antiquity of the F16, compared to such sci-fi aircraft as the much-simulated F22, contributes to this - if you're expecting to just press 't' to hit the nearest ground target, you'll be horrified at the array of radar modes, bombing crosshairs, and the insanely strange way in which you can't just press a button to drop a bomb - your fire control computer does that for you. Nonetheless, once you start to get the hang of it, it's gripping.

As in real life, the Other People fire back - and, often, your first warning of an incoming missile will be a loud bang, followed by a complete loss of control, a spin, a radio voice announcing an incoming missile, and a crash. It's not fair, but then again neither is real life. Flying low over enemy vehicles will get you shot to pieces, and with 510 cannon rounds you can't strafe them into oblivion. On the other hand, I can't think of another sim that lets you drop napalm over the enemy.

Also, I bought my first FS software to fly the number one freeware aircraft simulator on the Internet - The TR-3B Flying Triangle. I flew fighters for the Air Force in late Vietnam, specifically the F-111 and am rated commercial also. The TR-3B Flight Simulator for Microsoft's Flight Sim, is based on the writings, lectures, and TV interviews of Edgar Fouche who wrote "Alien Rapture." (See amazon)

Why? This is what the genius who developed it wrote: "For the experienced flight simmer on FS2002 PRO, I have developed this complete exotic amphibian TR-3B package, which is now available as freeware for download. It includes 3 models - the purple Astra, blue Locust and white Hellas - and as an extra 4th model the TR-3X with its own speedy attacker flight dynamics. The package includes TR-3B panel & gauges, noise cancellation sounds, fsuipc and special lights effects.

This TR-3B is a heavy tactical reconnaissance aircraft equipped with a magnetic field disruptor that reduces the weight by 89 percent (it is not the same as anti-gravity, though). It has been created for Microsoft Flight Simulator. All gauges are included.

The TR-3B can float like a speedboat at Mach 1.5 over water, fly like a heavy helicopter, like a bush plane, a business jet, like a military jet and lift like a rocket. Cruise speed is approx Mach 4.7 at FL340 and above, and approx Mach 2 at sea level. Service ceiling approx 69,000 feet ASL. Super stable. FSFREEWARE, SURCLARO, FSPLANET aircraft simulator sites have reported as many as 5000 downloads in one week!

I searched and read many many web pages about his book and the author, Edgar Fouche including; startfinish(put in the dot com.)biz/wise Click on links for Fouche and Flying Triangle. You will find his full presentation, and the download links for the TR-3B. Get the Great TR-3B Top Secret aircraft simulator and X-Plane, which I highly recommend.

A phoenix that's rixen from the ashes numerous times.

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 8 / 8
Date: March 08, 2004
Author: Amazon User

Unfortunately, the author of the Gamespot review wrote it barely 2 months after Falcon 4.0's debuet, and a whole month before Microprose (its original owner) started releasing patches that tried to fix the problems. By the end of that year (December 7, 1999), the 1.08 patch had been released, and the game's code was relatively stable & bug free.

Of course, many have said that each patch, while fixing some things, actually broke other things in the source code. Sure, the last patch that was issued was a step in the right direction. Many thought, though, that it could've gone much further. Unfortunately, the original owner ceased all efforts with the 1.08 patch. Luckily, though, their efforts were picked up & continued by 3rd party modification groups (i.e. Realism Patch Group, eRazor, F4UT), and the code, bit & bit (through tons of turmoil), over the next 4 years, was fixed.

This is the best flight simulation I've EVER played!! The realism will BLOW YOUR MIND!! It's even better with the latest SuperPAK patch, and the Free Falcon & BMS add ons. They take Falcon 4.0 to new & exciting heights!! You will definately get your money's worth if you buy this game!! It just keeps on giving & giving!!

The benchmark by which they will all be measured

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 9 / 10
Date: February 10, 2004
Author: Amazon User

Summary: Fantastic flight model, incredible depth of simulation, amazing thoroughness of detail, beautiful scenery, fairly stable with 1.08 patch. Also, absolutely spellbinding on every level. The only jet fighter simulator better than this is classified.

Words simply cannot express the mind-boggling excellence of this simulation, or my level of satisfaction at finally buying, installing and taking on its challenge.
I'm a real-life pilot with over 2000 hours of small airplane flight time, and I think it's safe to say that I've got about 10,000 hours of "flight" time on classic sims such as F-19, F-117A, Janes WWII Fighters, EF2000, Mig Alley, Falcon 3.0, Janes F-15 Strike Eagle and FS98. I started "flying" on an Apple IIe in 1983, on the original Microsoft Flight simulator with a green screen monitor. Aviation, especially fighter aviation, has been an obsession of mine since I was 6 years old. If your profile sounds anything like mine, the simple truth is that Falcon 4.0 is your holy grail.
In the earlier Falcon 3.0, the people at Spectrum Holobyte pushed the outer limits of what the "casual" PC flyer could learn and do. In creating Falcon 4.0, the team at Microprose didn't just push those limits; they rammed right through them like a Durandal through runway concrete. Be assured, Falcon 4.0 isn't a game. It is nothing less than a full blown recreation of nearly every significant function and capability of the General Dynamics F-16C Block 50/52, and of every sight, sound and situation that the real life pilot of that aircraft would experience in wartime. Name a system, a weapon, a readout, a display, a HUD function, a capability or a feature of the real F-16, and the odds are about 98% that you'll find it perfectly simulated in Falcon 4.0. About the only thing this sim can't do, is yank the blood down out of your brain and make your head weigh 80 pounds, and I'm sure that only budget considerations stopped this world-class team of software developers from finding a way to provide us with that experience.
If all you want to do is ram the throttle forward, punch holes in the sky, and gun down the bad guys without having to think too much, the excellent "Jane's WWII Fighters" is the sim for you. If, however, you recognize that modern-day fighter pilots are the ultimate high performance human beings who combine tactical combat knowledge with the ability to manage incredibly complex airplanes and systems under intense physical and mental stress, and if taking on just the idea of that kind of challenge appeals to you, buy Falcon 4.0 right now before it disappears completely. The sad truth is that this sim is simply too good for 90% of its potential market - the average "casual" PC flyer will open the (very well written) 100+ page manual and feel like a Maverick has hit him or her in the noggin. USAF fighter pilots are some of the smartest, brightest, most over-achieving people on the planet, and to master Falcon 4.0, that's pretty much who you will need to be as well. If you've got what it takes, however, the rewards are here - and I do mean all the rewards are here. Everything. This is as good as PC-based jet fighter sims are ever going to be.
Note: This review applies to Falcon 4.0 flown in Campaign mode with avionics, flight model and systems all set to "realistic." If you just want to turn, burn and heave missiles at things, you can turn all that stuff down to "easy," enter the Dogfight arena, and have a blast! Also, the essential Version 1.08 patch can be found at "falcon4.com"

Falcon 4.0

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 2 / 7
Date: December 17, 2003
Author: Amazon User

Just like the real thing. This is not a game but a flight simulator and will take time to master.

Hours ( days) of fun.

The only true combat flight sim on the market

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 3 / 4
Date: November 28, 2003
Author: Amazon User

This is as real as it gets.

Falcon 4.0 on it's own is not that crash hot, you need to get the community addons, (current standard is SP3), and that is where the negative reviews are coming from. But if you have the addons, you will find this the best simulator on the market by a rediculously huge margin. I am a current pilot in the Royal Australian Air Force, and know quite a few other pilots who swear by Falcon, we recently tried LOMAC and were hugely disapointed. There really is no comparison, and with Falcon OIR on the horizon which is going to be a simple easy install of falcon and all the community work, plus some new improvements, Falcon is only going to get better.

Stunning Graphics, and realism

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 0 / 1
Date: April 20, 2003
Author: Amazon User

First the bad news, the missions are slow to load, probably due to the sheer ammount of graphics to be loaded. Also, the enemy AI pilots don't seem to manuver like a real pilot would - there are no true manuvers. With closely matched aircraft, both planes end up turning in a verticle circle until one can fire on the other.
The good news is that the graphics are as good as anything I've ever seen. I love the interactivity with AWACS, ground control, and refueling tankers (although I still haven't managed to succesfully refuel). It's one of the best modern combat flight simulations on the market, and worth every penny.

None Better

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 2 / 3
Date: April 03, 2003
Author: Amazon User

It gets better every year! Members of the Falcon 4 community have worked on this game for years to improve it. Free downloadable improvements, including multiple cockpits of various other aircraft, are being added all the time. It has the best dynamic campaign of any flight sim on the market! Other Theaters of Operation have also been added, including Desert Storm, The Balkans, and Vietnam.
If you can find it, then buy it!

Don't bail-out of Falcon 4.0 just yet.

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 7 / 7
Date: January 12, 2003
Author: Amazon User

This extremely comprehensive and demanding flight-sim appeared back in about 2000 and, after release looked like it was in trouble. Despite the hype (a lot of it deserved), Falcon4 (or "F4") was dogged by both huge system requirements and numerous bugs. Based on the F-16 (and following a string of hardcore sims going back to the original Falcon of 1987!), "F4" had been awaited breathlessly by fans, and arrived with numerous bugs. MPS, F4's publisher suddenly announced that they were dropping the sim, paving the way for F4's nearest competitor, "Jane's F/A-18" to become the top game for fans of highly detailed and demanding ("hardcore") flight-sims. By 2002, with the stream of flight-sims having stagnated, a 3-year old sim still has much to offer - but the sim to beat isn't necessarily "F/A-18" (a great sim to be sure) but F4, rescued and brought to beautiful useability by a legion of on-line sim-fanatics. Having gained access to F4's source-code, these fans have crafted their own software called "Service Packs" which partly patch but mostly expand the original game. I'll keep this review confined to the original, though. In short - F4 still has much to offer.

F4 is focused on the F-16, the USAF's premiere multi-role fighter. Not an original concept (you can fly the "Viper" in campaigns, single missions and "instant action") but F4 never lets you forget that the proof is in the execution. The flight model is demanding: slippery along each of the major directional axes and, for a light fighter, can lose energy and get heavy really quick. The avionics are also comprehensive - think that "multi-mode radar" means "air-to-air" and "air-to-ground"? Here, you'll be fiddling with modes even in "pure" situations (in which you'll be either primed for counter-air or ground-strike missions) learning the nuances of "range-while-search" or "track-while-search" modes while hunting MiGs. The range of weapons is wider than on older games - echoing the F-16's maturation from a small jet that could only fight with iron-dumb bombs and short range missiles like the Sidewinder to a more complex machine geared for "smart" bombs, anti-radiation missiles and AMRAAM in night or adverse weather. The enemies aren't slouches either (although that may have much to do with my failure to master this sim).

F4's campaign is set in a futuristic North Korea (making it more topical than "Jane's F/A-18" which has you flying off Russia's arctic frontier). An elaborate setup menu allows you to tailor realism and controllability. My Thrustmater WCS/FCS setup was recognized here as quickly as on "Jane's F/A-18" (unsurprising since they both have to run through Windows's control panel - but thank heaven for small miracles nonetheless) though F4's key-mapping editor seems more stubborn than that of the other game. While the game ran well normally using my GeForce3 card, the menu appears to offer support only for 3DFx cards and not OpenGL, the API for that GeForce graphics-acceleration. Unfortunately, F4 was one of those great games that appeared immediately before the end of 3dFx's reign as the king of graphics acceleration. Not only is 3DFx a thing of the past, but "Glide", the 3DFx API isn't supported by newer operating systems like WinXP. Like "Flanker 2.5", you can play Glide-supported games on your OpenGL system and still appreciate how far ahead of their time they were, but - stuck in software-only mode - never forgetting how long ago that time was. Sound was also an issue - with the sim modeling a great range of sounds (from the screams and roars of your engine down to the distinctive howls, clicks and whistles of each type's fire-control radar), but also suffering a lot of stuttering. Attention to detail is magnificent. Control surfaces and engine nozzles are convincingly animated and the F-16's trademark shoulder vortices appear in high-speed climbs. You can even customize the skins on both your airplane and those of your enemies. I gave mine the Israeli-style camo paint job that appeared in the "Iron Eagle" movies (now there's an idea for a sim, certainly one that can't be more unrealistic than the flick it was based on). The beauty is that, while F4 remains cutting edge by virtue of how far ahead of its time it was (and how few new sims have come to the market since then), the faster computers that can run F4 more comfortably are cheaper and more widely available.

SYSTEM ISSUES: I "flew" my F4 on a Pentium4 running at 4Ghz. XP accepted this sim out of the box (something else that "Jane's F/A-18" couldn't quite claim). Performance was largely smooth but became noticeably choppy at times even on simple "instant action" flights. In more elaborate game play - especially during dynamic campaigns - F4 reveals itself an incredible hog for just about every resource your computer has: the CPU, main memory, graphics memory etc. Worse, F4 suffers an acute "memory leakage" problem: as you'd expect, it takes a lot of RAM to "create" each of those enemy tanks and soldiers and endow them with AI (but not so much that they don't just turn north and run for cover), but the program doesn't de-allocate or give that RAM back as quickly as it takes it away, which means that your campaigns will bog down really quickly.

In short - if you want a truly hardcore sim, one that will make you forget your machine's obsolescence, consider what your system offers but also remain informed about what each sim's fan-base offers. With tech support becoming less supportive for such games, F4 and its competitors from 1999 will always rely on the perseverance of fans to adress their flaws. For either Jane's or F4 you'll need a machine with an even 1Ghz of processing muscle. OpenGL owners should consider F/A-18 (again - no slouch), but those owning late-generation graphics cards based on 3DFx's "Voodoo" technology should get F4.

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