I'm afraid I'm finding the Strike Fighters 2 games less fun than I used to. Either the recent patches have completely reduced the difficulty of the games or I've just gotten too used to flying them but I'm scoring ridiculous numbers of kills and they feel somewhat cheap and the fun is going out of playing.

Sooo...can anyone suggest another modern air war sim that I might be interested in? What got me interested in Strike Fighters 2 in the first place was:

1) Campaign mode - I liked the campaign mode in RB3D and EAW and I'm not really that into flying one-off missions
2) It's a "modern" sim but not really...that is, I liked the fact that the planes and weapons they covered were during the "infancy" of modern air combat when missiles weren't wonder weapons and things were still somewhat "experimental". I looked around and most sims seem to be enamored with the latest hardware. Frankly, I don't want to fly a F-22 or F-35...I'd rather be flying a F-4 Phantom or a Mirage.

Thanks in advance!

FG2000

So buy Flaming Cliffs 2 and fly the Russian aircraft - I do, especially fun in the Su-25 and not a screen in sight.

There are two fantastic campaigns you can fly it in, too. If you get the older Flaming Cliffs there are loads of user made stuff, too.

In FC2 you can use the AdA add-on and fly stuff like the Mirace F1C, too.

FC2 is pretty much your only other option for modern flight combat.

Having come from the SF2 universe as well, I'm going to recommend you wait and get FC3.

If you just have to have something now, DCS A-10C is not bad and it has enough simplifications that it isn't a switchology nightmare for those of us who fly SF2 for the sheer joy of being able to hop in, crank it and yank it.

DCS World is eventually going to be the sim of choice around here because it will have just about everything you need. Third party developers are already making aircraft like the Fishbed and the Tomcat.

I have A-10C. I've done the tutorials... please tell me I can switch all the switchology/procedures off. I have enough time to play it maybe 2 hours a week, and at this rate I will never learn to fly the thing.

I love the SF2 series because I don't have to memorize a flight manual.

Dude, I know this is heresy, but I fly with simplified avionics only.

I need to write an article on this because whoever engineered the simplified avionics in A-10C put a lot of thought into it. Because I haven't found a simplified avionics suite that was easy enough to use, but still made it a challenge since Jane's F-15.

I can understand if that's not a road you want to travel down, but it works for me.

I'm all about simple avionics. I'd like to have the time to invest in learning the 'proper' way of doing it, like Falcon 4, but I'm not a college student anymore. I can't sink in 10+ hours a week, never mind a day, into a game like that.

I haven't noticed the simple avionics in the tutorial, I suspect because the tutorials aren't designed to teach you how to use the simple avionics. I haven't flown an actual mission yet, so I'm not sure how simple it will be (or what I need to do to fly a plane with simple avionics).

Hello, all - I'm a bit embarrassed to say this but it turns out my recent dissatisfaction with Strike Fighters 2 had more to do with the fact that I had installed in on my new PC and didn't realize that the default settings were NORMAL (basically EASY) than with any recent patches or increase in skill on my part. Once I set them to HARD, I was no longer terrorizing Mig-23's in my Harrier but it was the other way around. I should have known something was amiss since I had also installed First Eagles and my SE5a was turning and burning with Albatros's but now, I'm routinely getting shot through the head if I do this.

I'll look up DCS and Falcon 4.0, though.

Variety, after all, is the spice of life.

What are the campaigns like in DCS? Are they "dynamic" or scripted?

Unless they've recently published an add-on, the campaigns in DCS are static.

There is, though, a dynamic single mission generator that is absolutely outstanding.

Change "single mission" to "campaign" and I'm in. It's just the way my brain is wired. Must be all of those hours in Falcon4, EECH and Longbow2. I've tried FC2, I know it's my own sickness, but I need dynamic campaigns.