Report 040: Mission editor Ready news - Vector Thrust

This report contains the changes of the 0.2260 update.

And it’s here!
This update took a bit of time to iron out all small bugs and issues with the editor. But now it is completely finished and ready to start making new missions.

As it has been stated before, the editor was made to be as user friendly as possible. However, if the users find something that need to be changed or improved, feel free to point out.

As for this mode, it can be assessed in the main menu or at any time by pressing Ctrl+E. however I encourage you, when making new original missions assess it by the main menu, when you want to explore the functionalities the editor, use it during a mission.

With this I look forward to play your missions in the future.

Now onto the already preview units previewed units, they will be no surprise since there were all identified very quickly.

Fist let’s start with the Tacit Blue. A ground support aircraft designed as a low-observable, stealthy battlefield observation platform.

Although in reality, Tacit Blue only acts as a recon, in the game, the Tacit Blue will be armed and it will serve as a CAS aircraft.
This aircraft, often called the "Whale" relies on its stealthiness to secretly collect information on enemy ground forces and in the game it boost the detection capabilities of nearby allied ground vehicles.

The second unit is the XST, although at first impression, it may be visually similar to the Hopples Diamond, this aircraft is far more agile and combat capable, but with the drawback of being less stealthy.

The XST can be easily identified by the large, over-sized air intake on top of its cockpit which facilitates better airflow at greater angles of attack than the Nighthawk and also allowing for a lower stall speed performance as air continues to flow into the engines.

And finally the P.125. that is an stealthy interdictor aircraft developed in two versions. The VTOL and CTOL.
This version is the conventional take of version, designed as the P.125 ECR, with the role of Suppression of Enemy Air Defences.

Perhaps the most distinguishing feature of the P.125 is the lack of a cockpit, the pilot sits fully enclosed inside the aircraft in a high-recline seat, relying on electronic instruments and a complex camera system to maintain operational awareness. This unique design allows the aircraft to exploit its high agility and G-tolerance to the fullest, but can leaves it especially vulnerable to electronic interference.

To be part of the P.125’s loadout it was added the ALARM (Air Launched Anti-Radiation Missile) in order the aircraft to properly fulfill the SEAD role.
The ALARM is passive seeker similar to the AGM-88 HARM, this means it can only lock to targets that possess an active radar.

Still regarding to the P.125, one of the unique characteristics of this aircraft, is that the pilot is buried inside the fuselage.
It would have been a missed opportunity if it wasn’t added a cockpit immediately, also another interesting aspect of this aircraft, is that the pilot can only see the outside through a computer rendered vision.
This detail was considered in the course of the development, it was clear that this concept of buried cockpit would have been more interesting if the Synthetic vision was also recreated.

The goal was to simulate computer graphics in the game itself and here it is:

Third person view:

A normal vision like any other aircraft

Cockpit view:

An enclosed cockpit, displaying the outside trough various monitors.

Hud view:

The Synthetic vision only without the cockpit model.

A single screen shot can capture the whole effect, so I encourage you to give it a try in this view.
In this version, the Synthetic vision is not fully completed. In the future versions, to stay more true to the original concept it won’t display clouds, fog or natural light.

And that’s all for this update, there were more planes and weapons planned for this update, however the fine-tuning of the mission editor consumed a large amount of time, so that content postponed to the next release.

• Added Mission editor
• Added Synthetic vision

• Added Tacit Blue
• Added XST
• Added P.125 ECR
• Added ALARM missile

Stay tuned, more reports will follow.