Falcon Collection

I've been a fan of the Falcon series since Falcon AT. I have played Falcon 3.0 and all of its expansions, and the dynamic campaign was groundbreaking in that there were no "canned missions" and each mission affected the order of battle in future missions. You commanded a squadron and could fly as any of the pilots in any mission, and with the MiG-29 and F/A-18 add-ons you could fly the same scenarios in the other jets (and for the other side with the MiG) as well! Additionally, Falcon 3.0 was the first "padlock view", which is still one of the best implemented padlocks ever by giving you a view of your target as well as a representation of where he is relative to your aircraft and your main gauges on the side of the screen. Falcon 3.0 was what really got me into the hardcore end of flight simming, and I put years of time into this series. If the GOG package stopped with Falcon 3.0 Gold, this would still be a great deal. But the real gem here is Falcon 4.0. There's a war going on. Somebody strapped you into a F-16. These are the first words in the Falcon 4.0 manual, and perfectly describes the experience. Falcon 4.0 models the C model F-16 (Falcon 3 modeled the F-16A), with the first clickable cockpit in a modern military flight simulator and a dynamic campaign engine light years ahead of its predecessor. No longer a dynamic mission generator, the dynamic campaign uses a separate processor to manage the overall war, planning sorties and controlling units on both sides in real time. You choose which mission you want to fly (anything with a F-16C), and you can do the preflight planning, launch, or join inflight. The whole time the campaign engine runs in the background. Multiplayer campaigns are also possible, with either a limited client/server with saved campaign status, or a 24 hour persistent server where people can join and fly at will. Check out http://www.bmsforum.org for the latest and greatest Falcon evolution (requires Falcon 4.0).

Sims were the reasons I got into PC's. From F-19, Gunship!, and F-15 Strike Eagle on the Commodore 64 thru the latest updates to Falcon 4.0, I spent waaaayyyy too much time (realistically) flying a desk. The Falcon series stands out in my mind because it is "true to life", but not tedious (I'm looking at you MS Flight Simulator). The earlier versions are interesting to check out, but the real gem is what Falcon 4 has become. Highly recommended. The $5 is an arbitrary amount that really doesn't matter. Falcon's real cost is your time. It will be spent. You have been warned. True story: I transferred into the Virginia Air National Guard (at Richmond) from a unit in Hawaii around mid-2004. While walking thru a parking lot to do some check-in paperwork, I happened to cross paths with a Colonel. Did the standard salute and "Good morning, Sir". Got the standard "Good morning, Seargent" from him and then just before we actually passed I could see his name tag. "Col. Bonanni"! I quickly dropped my salute and extended my hand with a stupid grin on my face. "Peter Bonanni?", I asked. "Boomer? Falcon? Spectrum Holobyte? Gilman Louie? The Art of the Kill?", I pressed while shaking his hand. After a brief pause, he recovered, and switched from "Colonel Mode" to "Sim Nut Nerd". "Yeah, that's me! Wow, I didn't think that anyone even remembered that project." We talked for a while about flight sims and working with Spectrum Holobyte, I've never cared a lick about anyone in the movie or music industry, but here I was getting all fanboy over my new boss. The next month I brought in my Falcon stuff for him to autograph! Skipped the line of people waiting outside his office for "work related" stuff, and just plopped manuals and discs on his desk. Totally cool guy. Some poor folks had to wait in the hall for a while longer while we talked. So, for a few years until he transferred, I actually had Col. Pete "Boomer" Bonanni as my REAL Wing Commander. Cool.

I my opinion, the most interesting part of this bundle is the falcon 4 copy. It allows you to play the modern F4 BMS total conversion mod legally. BMS (now in its version 4.33) simulates very realistically different versions of the F16 (block 40, MLUs, block 52, etc...) with all the avionics, recent munitions, targeting pods, buddy lasing, 3D cockpit, dynamic campaign, updated graphics, support for modern joysticks, support for track IR and a very active multiplayer community. Steep learning curve. BMS is for hardcore simmers.

I have these all in disc form, but nice that GOG are doing the package in a modern Windows package for peanuts, as usual. Even though my Win95 version syill works on Win7, I'm buying this package. If you hurry over to GameFront, they still have all the original SPs and great mods available to download for Falcon 4: http://www.gamefront.com/files/listing/pub2/Falcon_40 It was the first sim I sat down and read the entire manual for, despite having benn flying sims since 1985. My first flight was an amazing experience and I actually made it back to base, sans AVGAS and with a big smile. I like retro sims and now I can spend some time flying these again, with the advantage of modern technology.