Games PC FALCON 4.0 User Manual

Falcon 4 SuperPAK 4

USER'S MANUAL

Falcon 4 SuperPAK 4

USER'S MANUAL

Falcon 4 SuperPAK 4

User's manual

Falcon 4.0 is the intellectual property of Infogrames Inc.

With the "SuperPAK 4" (SP4) patch, your MicroProse Falcon 4.0 combat flight simulator (F4) has vastly improved from the original game. This document should be read in conjunction with the original Falcon 4.0 manual and the SuperPAK 3 manual to understand the extent of changes in this version.

For additional knowhow about the changes made to Falcon over the last four years and an insight into the ideas behind them, we suggest reading the Realism Patch 5 (RP5) manual - a worthy lecture in terms of air warfare, weapons, weapon systems and air combat tactics and techniques.

This is NOT an official patch release from MicroProse. DO NOT contact G2 Interactive, Atari, Hasbro Interactive or MicroProse for technical support if you are experiencing problems with this patch.

DISCLAIMER: WE ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANYTHING THAT GOES WRONG WITH YOUR COMPUTER DUE TO ACTIONS TAKEN BASED ON THIS DOCUMENT OR THIS SOFTWARE. YOU USE THIS SOFTWARE ENTIRELY AT YOUR OWN RISK.

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Falcon 4 SuperPAK 4

USER'S MANUAL

FAQ - FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Ù I can’t load HARMs onto my F-16

Take care what variant of the F-16 you’re using: SuperPAK 4 features more than a dozens different F-16 (-CG, -CJ, Block 40 etc.). Not all of them can use HARMs!

Ù Why is this manual so small?

In contrast to previous SuperPAKs, the SP4 manual isn’t a replacement, but an addendum to the SuperPAK 3 manual. This is because SP4 doesn’t feature any new cockpit or simulator functions that would need explanation. Instead, SP4 is major rehaul of the “Data Universe” of Falcon, improving the realism in all parts of the simulator. In addition, SP4 includes a HTML-based introduction doc, including a vast list of reference links, plus a HTML-based version of the Tactical Reference. Enough reading, be assured…

Ù Can I use SP4 with the new BMS patch?

Yes, you can. While SP4 wasn’t officially tested with BMS 1.x, it should work without problems (at least that’s what many betatesters found in the last few weeks). Just make sure that you first install Falcon 4 1.08, then SP4, and finally BMS.

Check www.benchmarksims.com for the latest version of BMS.

Ù The FreeFalcon planes look much better

Yes, that is because they already work with 512x512 and larger textures, while F4UT restricted itself to 256x256 to make SP4, as the final milestone in our classical SuperPAK series, available to ALL Users. Unfotunately, this is only possible by limiting the size of the textures used to 256x256 pixels, as some older video cards simply don’t work with higherres textures. We hope that an additional patch for SP4 featuring the improved models and textures will be available soon.

Ù How can I add my own photos to the Tactical Reference?

The photographs for the Ta cRef Reference are contained in the tacrdata.zip in the Zips subfolder. If you extract this file (be sure to ‘use folder names’ or extract into Art/tacrdata) you can add or replace the photographs. The photographs must have a maximum size 382x150 pixels, 16.7 M colours (24-bit) in Truevision Targa (.TGA) uncompressed format. All Tactical Reference entities have photograph names encoded in the TacRefDB.bin, the list of filenames can be found in the TacRef.xls in the Falcon directory.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

FAQ - Frequently Asked Questions.......................................................................................3

Table of contents.....................................................................................................................4

Introduction..............................................................................................................................7

Foreword...............................................................................................................................8

New Features in SuperPAK 4 .................................................................................................9

About This Manual................................................................................................................10

Reporting Game Crashes .....................................................................................................10

SuperPAK and the Unified Team on the web......................................................................10

Airbases and Objectives.......................................................................................................12

Parking and Airport Ground Operations ..............................................................................12

Building Hitboxes.................................................................................................................13

AI Flight Enhancements........................................................................................................14

The slow speed/high AOA problem.....................................................................................14

Fuel Rates/ Ranges.............................................................................................................14

AI Refuelling (Tanker) Behaviour.........................................................................................14

Flight Formations.................................................................................................................15

Air Tasking Orders (ATO).....................................................................................................18

Flight Models..........................................................................................................................19

New models.........................................................................................................................19

F16 limiters..........................................................................................................................19

Mig29 Variants.....................................................................................................................19

Wingtip and Engine smoke..................................................................................................20

Hitboxes..............................................................................................................................20

CoG and gear locations.......................................................................................................20

Ground effect.......................................................................................................................21

Move speeds and additional data........................................................................................21

General clean up.................................................................................................................21

Falcon 4 SuperPAK 4

USER'S MANUAL

Damage modelling................................................................................................................ 22

Radars.................................................................................................................................... 23

Radar mode switching........................................................................................................23

Engagement envelopes...................................................................................................... 23

Hit probability......................................................................................................................24

Missile volleys.....................................................................................................................24

Smoke trails........................................................................................................................ 24

Other radar systems........................................................................................................... 25

Rotating radar dishes..........................................................................................................25

Notes.................................................................................................................................. 25

Radar and IR guided SAM systems – figures used in SP4.................................................26

Missiles.................................................................................................................................. 27

Missile visibility....................................................................................................................27

Aircraft sensor/ ACD............................................................................................................. 27

Credits ................................................................................................................................... 29

Special Thanks...................................................................................................................30

Known Issues in SP4............................................................................................................ 31

Upgrading from previous versions..................................................................................... 31

The data world of Falcon 4................................................................................................... 32

Chapter

Welcome

Falcon 4 SuperPAK 4

USER'S MANUAL

INTRODUCTION

Welcome to SuperPAK 4! The Falcon 4 Unified Team takes another step forward in creating the ultimate combat flight simulator.

In relation to the last SuperPAK (SP3 featuring the final exe modifications), this version of SuperPAK concentrates on the data part of Falcon. This includes:

Ù The graphics: 3D-Models (Planes, Vehicles, Weapons, Buildings),

including detailed textures (skins).

Ù Realistic weapons, weapon systems and flight models (well... as close as it can be!) Ù AI flight behaviour improvements Ù An even better, photorealistic F-16 cockpit (including a separate wide-view option) Ù Countless data bugfixes and corrections

FOREWORD

Half a decade ago it was, December 1998, when Microprose finally released Falcon 4. The rest, they say, is history…

Today, we are happy to present you SuperPAK 4, the ultimate “spring-cleaning” of the Falcon 4 data universe. Building upon the foundation laid by the previous SuperPAKs, SP4 now brings to frutition many of the features introduced in the SP3 exe. In addition, tens of thousands of data entries in the various data tables have been edited, added, reworked and corrected to bring you the ultimate in combat flight simulation and campaign warfare realism.

It’s been a long and treacherous road, with many pitfalls and unexpected turns. The work on SP4 proved to be much more difficult than any previous patch. The task was so huge, the developers so few, that keeping up the focus and effort wasn’t always possible. In addition, the kind of work needed for SP4 was much more tedious than anything before – working on the source code for the exe and introducing new features is “easier”, more rewarding and more fun; creating new or updated 3D models and textures can be done for a selected single object and be released as a single small patch. SuperPAK 4 however brings it all together – and this big integration package needed not only a huge effort to coordinate all the works into one patch, but also exponentially increased the possibilites of bugs, as the data is all connected together into the Falcon 4 world that we know and love.

But now, the main task is done – SuperPAK 4 is the final “old school” patch for Falcon 4; the culmination of a generation of patches that started with the first iBeta and Realism patches ages ago. To make SP4 accessible to all virtual falconeers out there, we refrained from using textures larger than 256x256 pixels, so users of old Voodoo and TNT graphics cards can still use the rigs they originally bought for Falcon ;-)

Looking ahead, we are proud and happy to see that the end is also the beginning, that SuperPAK4 will be the foundation for a new generation of Falcon: Thanks to the support from the entire Falcon development community, producing models, skins, theaters and terrains, the best combat flight simulator ever will continue to grow and improve.

Enjoy the show!

The Falcon 4 Unified Team

Falcon 4 SuperPAK 4

USER'S MANUAL

NEW FEATURES IN SUPERPAK 4

Some of the most notable improvements in SuperPAK 4 are:

• The addition of over one hundred new planes, vehicles and munitions. This includes 3D models and textures, apropriate flight models and loadout configurations, squadron creation, and game mode configurations (TE, Dogfight), therefore creating a unified, complete and theatre-independent database of weapons, weapon systems and aircraft to allow seamless integration of additional theatres. Most notable features are

• The inclusion of most variants of the F-16 (incuding two-seaters)

• The addition of separate 3D cockpits for the A-10, F/A-18C and F/A-22A so that you will

get matching 3D cockpits when flying these planes!

• Beautiful new models for many key planes in the Korean theatre, such as the F-5, F/A-

18D, SU-27, MiG-29A and MiG-19.

• New planes such as the Mirage 2000, F/A-18E, or MB-339CD of Frecce Tricolore fame.

• Older planes for usage in classical theatres such as Vietnam (e.g. A-4, A-7, F-100, F-

105, F-4 and variants)

• Many, many ships.

• All major cu rrent and past weapon systems (missiles, bombs).

• A large re-population of all theatre objectives, including towns, villages, industrial complexes

and airbases. The latter now also feature improved parking spot data, using different parking spots for smaller or larger aircraft and making the spawning of aircraft well before take-off a reality.

• A complete rework of all hitpoint and damage properties of all entities (so that a single AK-47 normally won’t be able to take out an A-10 with a few shots or that a single bomb won’t destroy a aircraft carrier anymore)

• A vastlly extended Tactical Reference, also included as illustrated HTML for easier browsing, searching and printing.

• Optimisation of missile flight models

• Improved flight formations

• Reworked Air Traffic Operations, improving the mission generation and tasking in campaign

mode.

• Hundreds of additional data fixes (e.g. plane shadow sizes).

ABOUT THIS MANUAL

This manual is an addendum to the SP3 manual. As SuperPAK 4 doesn’t feature any new functions, but rather a wealth of re-worked data, there isn’t that much new to learn. We’re therefore only trying to spotlight some of the major new stuff that is relevant or interesting.

To learn more about the munitions, vehicles and aircraft that make up Falcon 4, con sult the Tactical Reference in Falcon or open the HTML version of it, found in the docs/SP_TacRef subfolder.

REPORTING GAME CRASHES

We need your crashlogs to further improve the SuperPAK! Even if the EXE modifications have stopped, crashlogs can still help in finding erroneous data.

If you experience a "crash to the desktop" in Falcon 4.0 with SuperPAK 4, you will find a file called "crashlog.txt" in your Falcon4 root folder. Please open this file with Notepad and add an exact description of what you were doing where when the game crashed. Include your system specifications and email this crashlog to our team (crashlogs@f4ut.frugalsworld.com). Please do also keep the TE (.tac file in campaign\SAVE folder), the campaign save file (.cam file) or the ACMI (if available) in a safe place in case our developers need them to recreate your crash.

SUPERPAK AND THE UNIFIED TEAM ON THE WEB

Visit our homepage at f4ut.frugalsworld.com for feedback, SuperPAK news, additional downloads and in-depth articles!

The big success of the SuperPAK series has caused server overloads and exponentially increased bandwidth costs for our hosting providers. Please check out www.frugalsworld.com and www.f4freeware.net and support the community's main forums and file servers by giving a small donation.

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