t's
arguably the toughest job in the world: landing an aircraft on a
rumbling carrier deck with more tides and turbulence than any
President will every know. FS Flight Deck from Abacus
Publishing captures the feel and general sense of difficulty that
this challenge represents for many a Naval top gun past and present.
What's In The Box?
Along with the CDROM, the manual comes in two parts. There's a small
manual detailing installation and setup and a larger one that goes
into the history and technical specs about the aircraft carriers, the
aircraft included with the program, and carriers in general.
The scenery includes four aircraft carriers and 27 airplanes from
which to choose that date from WWII to the present. There is also
scenery of Wake Island Army Air base and the Sembawang and Temgah
airstrips in Singapore.
What was nice about installation was that I didn't have to install
all of the aircraft. This was a plus for me, but the die hard fliers
out there who also share their hard drive with the shoot-em-up sims
will go for the whole shebang!
The Panels: Head's Up!
The panels are largely a mix & match of gauges from several of the
default aircraft. When Flight Deck hit the market last fall, this
would have been sufficient. But in recent months, the deluge of
stunning panels with new gauges on the Web and in commercial packages
made me wish that the panels could have been a bit more original.
F/A-18 Hornet shortly after takeoff from the carrier USS Kitty Hawk.
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This doesn't diminish their effectiveness however. The jet panel
incorporates a "head's up" display (HUD). For the Top Gun greenies
out there, a head's up display is an aid to the pilot with speed and
altitude information straight ahead in the line of sight. Not one to
have much experience with military craft, I found the head's up a
nice touch. On the USS Ranger, Enterprise, and Kitty Hawk, the
"Meatball" visual landing aid is also incorporated. This is roughly
a visual equivalent to the commercial ILS landing system used in
civil aviation. This feature presently doesn't work in 3-D mode but
a patch is in the works.
The Aircraft
The aircraft are well represented in both detail and flyability.
Included are prop aircraft like the Douglas AD-6 Skyraider and F8F
Bearcat up to jet aircraft like the F-4S Phantom and the F/A-18A
Hornet in two different guises. All aircraft were designed by Flight
Shop aircraft veteran designer
Paul Hartl. The
aircraft are nicely detailed and fly quite well. I've never piloted
a military aircraft and in fact, when I fly one of the heavies, I'm
several rows behind first class. But the handling qualities of the
aircraft I flew was different between models and I encountered no
problems with any aircraft characteristics.
Situations
F/A-18 Hornet panel at night with head's up and EFIS display
on a foggy approach.
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A number of situations are included which will start you in specific
situations on specific carriers. Like most commercial packages, the
situations incorporate different weather scenarios, different
aircraft, etc.
Summary
Flight Deck by Abacus is a nice add-on to Flight Simulator 95 or 98.
The challenge of aircraft carrier takeoffs and landings is well
simulated and is a nice diversion from the standard touchdown at
Meigs! Now if we just had weapons to fire and an enemy at 12 o'clock!
John Goodlow
Email:
njgoodlow@sprintmail.com
Visit Abacus Publishing's Web site at
www.abacuspub.com
