Let me take a stab at this.
Polls we have run reveal that our demographic describes our customer as someone interested in aviation history. The average YAP player does not describe himself as a hard-core gamer (then turn around and list all the games they have gone through getting to this point).
The first thing, then, is to ask yourself what book, story, myth or image from the era draws you to it? Phantoms? Hueys? Crusaders? Next, prepare yourself to go relive one of those missions.
By "prepare", we mean fly the practice missions like you mean it. YAP is not PacMan or Grand Theft Auto...where any doofus can just push a button and "do". The downfall and entry fee of aviation sims is that the player must fly. The complication of YAP is that the player must fly well.
There are 5 practice missions that will get you up to speed to fly the first "10" sorties. They are not dull. We purposely filled them with eye candy so you will fly them. You will learn what you need to know and learn what you need to research (like what keystrokes do what).
Then pick a mission from the first set and go do it. But here there is also something to do first. Read about the mission. We provide a short briefing about the history and what goes on in the game. You may want to Google more about it. The more you know, the better we look. You will see that we went to a some trouble to make it familiar to both a participant and someone wishing to see it from the inside. Also, the more you know, the more likely you are to WANT to see it as real. Once you take the Leap of Faith, you are in Vietnam in the 1960's and the outcome of your flight is entirely up to you. You will see what the aircrews saw...what the teller of the story told us.
I had Falcon 4. It's great art and programming. But it's just a cartoon of a fantasy using 3D drawings of airplanes...Grand Theft Airplane. When you have completed a YAP mission, you will know you have accomplished something and learned something, too.
Try that.
Oh yeah. I almost forgot....you get to blow things up.