Flight Modeling vs. Flight Handling.

[ElAurens]

I'm not intending to open a can of worms with this, but we are having an interesting discussion of this on our forum, and wondered what all of you think about it.

We were discussing RoF actually, with one of the guys that has time in about a dozen or so different bi-planes, including a full scale replica SE5a and a three quarter scale Nieuport 17.

The question was do the planes in the simulation behave or "feel" like the real thing, or are they just generic?

This was his response as a real pilot and sim flyer...

The problem is the missuse of the term “Flight Model” in a game/sim, its nothing more than raw data gathered from books and is fairly accurately represented in IL2, COD and ROF as they are only programming raw data and not flight handling data from pilot interviews (silly Russians).

Aircraft “Flight Handling” is a whole new subject; this is really what we are talking about when we ask questions about the “Flight Model“. I haven’t been flying ROF as of lately, life has been interfering in my gaming activities.

How does “Flight Handling” compare from aircraft to aircraft in Rise of Flight you ask! Let me work on that question.

To put it in a context that I can relate to being someone involved in motorsport of the 4 wheeled variety...

You can have two cars with identical performance numbers across the board, top speed, braking, acceleration, lateral Gs, etc... Yet one will have to be bullied into doing it and the other will behave as if connected directly to your brain.

His assertion is that (or seems to me to be that) just knowing the numbers and having the virtual aircraft meet them is not enough, you need the actual pilot's input on how the aircraft behaves in your hands, how it feels, how easy or hard it is to fly and operate.

This is what, to me, is missing in most simulations that I have experience with.

Discuss.