Fantastic news that we’ve got today with an official Facebook post from Eagle Dynamics: DCS F-14 Tomcat is officially in the making by Leatherneck Simulations! The same module had already been announced a while ago by IRIS for DCS World but was never released. Needless to say that hopes are really high that the Tomcat would finally make it to the DCS hangar.
Let’s face it, Top Gun movie or not, the Cat is extremely sexy, and its weaponry, especially the AWG-9 Radar/AIM-54 Phoenix deadly combo makes it a force to be reckoned with in the air-to-air arena.
Leatherneck Sims have listed mouthwatering features with an estimation Beta release date set for the end of the year; take a look:
– Highly Accurate 6-DOF (Degrees of Freedom) Cockpit
– Highly Accurate avionics and weapons system modelling – including the vaunted AWG-9 Radar system and AIM-54 Phoenix missiles.
– AIM-54 Phoenix Simulation with a CFD based AFM
– ‘JESTER AI’ – A Proprietary AI System for fully voiced, dependable and smart RIO/WSO
– Highly Accurate Flight Model – Based on Real Performance Data
– Both -A and -B Model F-14’s
– Multiplayer Multicrew capability. Fly together as RIO and Pilot!
– Animated Crew Members – Closely Integrated with JESTER AI
– Highly Detailed External Model, Animations and Textures
– Highly Accurate Aircraft System and Subsystem Modelling
– One Free Theatre bundled with the Aircraft
– Full, lengthy single-player campaign
– Full Suite of Documentation, including game manual, quickstart guides, and more.
– Fully voiced and interactive training missions, teaching you to fly and fight.
…and much, much more!
Leatherneck Sims is gaining tremendous popularity among the DCS community as they have proved, through the release of DCS MiG-21Bis, to be a very solid developer when it comes to product quality and customer service; This is of course an excellent indication for the development of the Tomcat.
The F-14 will most likely become the first flyable interceptor of DCS World; it’s phenomenal long range interception capabilities will surely rock the DCS multiplayer arena and even air superiority fighters will have to adapt to the new threat especially over sea where it will most likely operate as a carrier based jet alongside the mighty F/A-18 Hornet, another very much anticipated module in the making.
Theater-wise, both the F-14 and the F/A-18 would fit extremely well in the upcoming Strait of Hormuz theater as defenders of the allied fleet, or go head to head if Iranians come into play.
Another very exciting feature is, they said the ability to fly the F-14 as the pilot or as a RIO (stands for Radar Intercept Officer). RIO’s main task is handling the super-powerful radar that equips the F-14; this reduces the workload on the pilot, but more noteworthy, this will open the possibility to team up with an online player who would be sitting inside the same jet! A lot of folks have been longing for this for so long, the movie ‘Top Gun’ having of course brought the relationship Pilot/RIO to a whole new level. It must be super exciting to fly with your bud and share the same fate.
Pictures shown here are early versions but you can already clearly see the level of detail and quality Leatherneck is committed to deliver after they set a new benchmark with their latest and very successful MiG-21Bis module.
This also promises a bunch of updates! each module, each version brings a new update to DCS World where things get fixed and sometimes other things get broken. This is an ongoing process due to the nature of the plugin system that DCS World uses so the bigger the system gets, the more tweaking will be needed to keep the game stable, especially online as this is where the true potential of the game can be reached.