While Darkwolf's post about that F-18c domain being purchased by ED pretty much seals the deal on what the "US fixed wing jet" will be, I think they'll already have their hands full modeling the F-18 to the same high standard demonstrated by BS and WH to present us with a half-decent dynamic campaign. Think about it: the F-18 breaks new ground in two major areas for ED: 1) air-to-ground radar modeling 2) carrier operations modeling (more specifically the logic for the marshal stack).

This is personal hearsay but it seems to me if ED figures they can't do something to a top-notch standard they won't do it. They've selected aircraft that don't have an air-to-ground radar and they have yet to do the dynamic campaign. I'd imagine these will require significant progressions to the game engine, or outright new modules for it (as in the case of the dynamic campaign).

If you recall the complexity of day-to-day carrier operations in Jane's F-18 you can see this will take some work to implement in the DCS engine; though the more I think about it many aspects of this have already been handled with the current air traffic control. If it really is the F-18 they'll want to nail down the AG radar which will take some doing.

I'm sure ED is more than capable of tackling carrier ops and AG radar, I just don't think it would be realistic to expect them to attempt a quality dynamic campaign in the same release as well. They'd be tackling three bears in one release - carrier ops being a black bear, AG radar a Grizzly, and dynamic campaign being a Polar (and HUGE one at that). I don't think they want to bite off more than they can chew at this point.

Again though that's only my opinion. Speculation does make for interesting conversation. . .

I have to wonder where this A/G Radar myth came from. You make it sounds like it is a major stumbling block and for this reason they have been avoiding it.

Also the DC is happening in iterations - it will never be just "Done". The First part was the mission generator in Warthog and BS2 - FC3 will see the Resource management system and other parts will follow.

Carrier ops will be the major thing to do, as it will require precision on the part of the AI. Easier said than done.

Nate

I bet less is known about the F/A-18E than the A-10C but Jane's managed to model it very well 13 years ago and VRS have made huge leaps since then.

I, with DCS sims, am simply happy to learn the aircraft's systems and even if no campaign came with it user created ones would be more than adequate. I really hope it is the Hornet is one of my favourite aircraft behind the Hog as GraphSim's F/A-18 was my first proper fixed wing sim on my Mac all those years ago and remained an awesome aircraft for me.

ED isn't a 3rd party modders trying to figure out how to create new scripts and function, like hundreds of guys does with ArmA. No, they are the main programmer/owner of the DCS series, so i don't see the AG radar as being hard to do for them, neither the dynamic campaign.
Don't get me wrong, i do not want to say "blah everybody can do it". I mean : they are the creator of the game engine, whatever the difficulty is, i'm sure they know enough their engine and their work to get the job done. DCS is an awesome platform and i'm sure they will do something great, as usual.

I think the myth comes from classifications. A/G radar is classified to the point of ED having to guess at everything for it to work.

Also as much as I want a 15 I think an 18 would bring a new difficulty to the DCS series. I could spend countless hours trapping!

I'm quite loathe to settle on the legacy Hornet, if I'm perfectly honest. I want the payload capacity to launch a veritable Macross Missile Massacre of slammers, the gas, and the avionics to get the job done like I could with the Superhornet in Jane's F/A-18.

I'd happily settle for a Tornado or Harrier

Go all air to air, no fuel tanks. Take your flight of 4. That's 40-48 missiles. If you're running a short range defense, you're all set for Itano Circus

FWIW, I do believe it would be the C variant of the F-18, not the E.

But that's the thing: With a flight of 4 C/D Hornets, they can only carry 40 at the most. whereas with a flight of 4 E/F Superhornets can carry 48. And MORE is better!

And you never know when your flight might need those extra eight AMRAAMs. In the immortal words of Burt Gummer: "If you need it, but don't have it, you sing a different tune."