So you should be able to tell me. What was in the box for the sealed copy? Mine was opened, too. Just had a disc and a manual.

Same as the sealed box then, and if you got yours at Northgate Gamestop here in Seattle it might have been my XB360 copy I swapped for a PS3 one

Very fair review, Magnum! As a sim-er reading a review by a sim-er I would liked have known a little more how the planes feel and fly. In Simulator mode, I found the models very close if not identical to their counterparts in IL2:1946. I have enjoyed simply flying around more in this sim than any other with the exception of Rise of Flight. (Try flying circles inside the crater at Diamond Head.)

I don't cover or compare flight models... because 1) I don't know how real planes feel, 2) I don't play many PC flight sims, and 3) that is a debatable section... now if I was an ex-WW2 pilot then I would definitely add it. lol

How do most, if any of these gamers really know...what flight sim has the better flight model... how do we know if DSC's A-10 is really how that thing flies or just what the developers claim? We just assume it's an accurate flight model because we are told it is, and others who have flown the A-10c claim it is.

But we've also seen real world race car drivers claim some arcade racer, like Shift 1 and 2, are soooo realisitic... but are they really, or just a few realistic features that lets a real race car driver claim it.

IMO

My copy turned up today. Still sealed with the official xbox 360 tape.. Not bad for £21.. Now to give it some flight time. Controller for me so i hope it lives up to the hype

21 Quid? Where from?

Yeah, Kludger. I think I got your copy then.

Too bad they sold it to me as 'new' and charged 40 bucks instead of used and charged 35 like they probably should have.

Magnum,

You are of course correct in that none of us know how these planes actually fly. But we do have a close idea of how planes, in general, fly. Ace Combat was so far off that it would be a gross compliment to call it "off". IL2 is reasonbly close (again in general) in capturing the feel and physics of flight. To a PC sim enthusiast the assumption would be that Birds of Steel is considerably closer to Ace Combat than it would be to IL2. Another analogy: I have never driven a Farrari but I am quite sure that Forza is pretty close when compared to, say, Grand Theft Auto. But that's all. Your review was very good yet I am left still wanting to show my PC sim friends how genuinely this sim feels and how the cockpits look and work. <-- Errr, strike that. The review was fair, positive and nicely done. If I wrote flight sim reviews--every sim would be THE MOST AWSOME SIM EVER! And my credibiliy would spiral.

Wow Snapdad, small world!

If it's any consolation, all I did with it was open it, install it, did the first mission and decided I wanted the PS3 version instead to try to use my X52 flightstick, so I plopped it back in the case and ran back up to Gamestop to ask them if I could swap it, so you are just missing the cellophane wrapper hehe.

Still they should have given you a discount for being open, probably because they sold the other copies is why they didn't, I got the last PS3 copy but they had 2 other XB360 copies when I took that one back.

Ebay.. caught a guy selling his still sealed promotional copy. I got lucky.