Administrators CP_Admin Posted May 11 Administrators Share Posted May 11 Attention Pilots! Developer Diaries about Combat Pilot will be posted in this thread. The Combat Pilot Team 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Executive Producer Skystreak Productions Jason_Williams Posted July 25 Executive Producer Skystreak Productions Share Posted July 25 DD 01 Dear Pilots, Welcome to our very first Developer Diary for Combat Pilot! We hope this will be the first of many to come as we continue to build our initial prototype and get ready to take flight. Today we want to share some images of our early work which includes the legendary Mitsubishi A6M2 Type 0 Model 21 flown by the Imperial Japanese Navy. The Allies assigned it the code name Zeke, but most remember it as simply the Zero. To Japanese pilots it was known as the Rei-sen. The A6M was extremely successful in the early months of the Pacific War and was superior to its American and Allied opponents like the F4F Wildcat and F2A Buffalo. It was built in large numbers throughout the war and several different variants were produced. The A6M2 Model 21 saw action in all the important early Pacific battles such as Pearl Harbor, Coral Sea and Midway and the A6M in all it's various forms continued to see service throughout the war. The Zero has become possibly the most recognizable icon of the Pacific War. We are building a flyable A6M2 to be featured in Combat Pilot and as you can see work is progressing and its beginning to take its very famous shape. It’s a long way from completion still, but you can be assured we will keep you informed of its progress. We also plan to have a Japanese aircraft carrier ready for her to operate from when our prototype is ready. What good is a warplane without some available ordnance to drop on the enemy? Well, we have constructed our first bomb for Combat Pilot and it’s an American 250lb General Purpose bomb. This little bundle of joy will be carried aloft and dropped by our F4F-4 we are building for Combat Pilot. Our art team has done a great job on it. We hope you have enjoyed our first Developer Diary and gives you a glimpse into the work we are doing at this early stage of development. Building Combat Pilot will require a lot of hard work and commitment from our small team and patience from everyone in the community, but we think it will be worth it. At this early stage of the project, we are focused mainly on the fundamentals such as flight and systems modeling and some basic content like the Zeke and bomb above. We are also building the infrastructure and defenses of Midway Atoll. So, lots of work to do. We want to be careful not to make promises we can’t keep, but we do promise to keep you informed of our progress over the next year or so as we work to complete our initial development goals. We know many of you want to know as much as possible about our plans for Combat Pilot both short and long-term, but until we overcome some of these early technical hurdles we can’t say or promise too much. Our initial goals are modest, but we think achievable. We’ll share more about those goals a little later. And please remember that Developer Diaries may be quite infrequent as we continue to get our sea legs, but please keep an eye on our website, Discord, and socials as you never know when one may drop. We want to thank all of you who have expressed your excitement for Combat Pilot and for sending well wishes and encouragement to us since we went public with the project. We also want to thank everyone in the community who has sent us great references and helped us with research. It’s much appreciated! Add power! The Combat Pilot Team You can Discuss this Developer Diary HERE. 22 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Executive Producer Skystreak Productions Popular Post Jason_Williams Posted August 28 Executive Producer Skystreak Productions Popular Post Share Posted August 28 DD 02 Dear Pilots, Welcome to our second Developer Diary for Combat Pilot! Today we are showing off a very famous U.S. Navy and U.S. Marine Corps fighter – the pugnacious F4F-4! The Wildcat as it was called was the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps’ front-line fighter when war broke out. Like the Zero it fought in all the major early war battles and helped blunt the Japanese juggernaut during the first critical year of the war. The Wildcat was outclassed by the A6M in just about every way and losses were high. Several F4F pilots earned the Medal of Honor for their bravery while flying her and even though outperformed, many pilots became aces in the F4F series. American pilots had to invent new tactics to compete with the Zero including the famous “Thach Weave” that focused on teamwork to down A6Ms. The Wildcat’s contribution to the Pacific War cannot be overlooked or understated. Like the Spitfire in Europe, the Wildcat became a symbol of the dark early days in the Pacific Theater when the Allies where on their back foot. The F4F would eventually be replaced by the F6F Hellcat in front-line squadrons. The F4F came in several marks (-3 / -3a / -4 / FM-1 / FM-2) which were all very similar, but with some main differences. The -3 and -3a were fixed wing versions with four .50 cal. guns. The -4 came equipped with six guns, but with fewer rounds per gun and folding wings for saving space onboard aircraft carriers. The FM-1 and FM-2 were the ultimate variants of the Wildcat reverting back to four guns, sporting a more powerful engine, folding wings, and adding an increased bomb load and rocket carrying ability. The later FM-1/2 models were used extensively by escort carriers to hunt submarines and served throughout the war. The Wildcat also served with the Royal Navy where it was known as the Martlet I / II / III / IV / V / VI. There were also photo recon versions of the F4F called the F4F-3P and F4F-7. All Wildcats had a version of the Pratt & Whitney R-1830 ‘Twin Wasp’ engine as it’s powerplant except for the FM-2 which was fitted with the R-1820-56 engine. We are focusing on the F4F-4 model with the R-1830-86 engine for our initial Combat Pilot prototype. It was a fierce combatant at the Battle of Midway and best able to represent carrier ops with its folding wings. We hope to make all the marks of the F4F in time. The Mk. 13 aerial torpedo used by the U.S. early in the war was a very unsatisfactory weapon. It often ran off course, sank, ran at the wrong depth, or failed to detonate. During the Battle of Midway no American torpedoes found their target. Compared to the deadly Japanese Type 91 torpedoes, the Mk.13 was woefully inadequate. However, the U.S. Navy made improvements to the Mk.13 and by mid-war they were more reliable and new tactics were devised to take advantage of its improved reliability. The Mk.13 was somewhat squat looking. It was 13ft. 5in. long and 22.5 inches around. The warhead weighed 600 lbs. and was filled with Torpex explosive. The Mk.13 had a maximum speed of 33.5 knots with an effective range of 6,300 yards. The Mk.13 was also used by American PT boats when their usual Mk. 8 or Mk. 10 torpedoes were in short supply. In this case the Mk.13 was simply rolled off the side of the boat into the water during the attack run. Climb Mount Niitaka! The Combat Pilot Team You can Discuss this Developer Diary HERE. 63 14 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Executive Producer Skystreak Productions Popular Post Jason_Williams Posted November 2 Executive Producer Skystreak Productions Popular Post Share Posted November 2 DD 03 Dear Pilots, Our work on Combat Pilot continues and we have completed our first official 6 months as a team and results are positive. The hardest part of creating something out of nothing is creating a strong foundation for where we want go. You have to walk before you can fly, but when tangible progress is made it's very satisfying to see. Right now, that work is focused on physics, flight-modeling, research (technical and historical), and 3D assets. But even somewhat straightforward tasks like building models requires research and finding the right artist to make what you need. And until you establish some standards it’s a little bit like stumbling around in the dark. When it comes to art and 3D assets we are starting to find our groove and you can see that in the pics I’ve chosen below. We hope you like them and it’s an example of where we are headed stylistically. F4F-4 Work Continues Our F4F-4 built by Chris is coming along nicely. He’s working primarily on the landing gear now and you can see there is some good detail there just like the rest of the plane. Lots and lots of rivets hold this bird together. He also worked on the propeller hub recently. Our F4F is going to be very nice. Sakae 12 Engine Our A6M2 is also coming along and John has spent some time texturing the Zeke’s Sakae 12 14 cylinder engine. It doesn’t even have its special materials applied yet. She’ll look even better when that happens. US GP HE Bombs You can’t have a warbird sim without some wartime weapons. Carl has spent a great deal of time working on our standard American General Purpose High-Explosive bombs as a primer for his future contributions. Here are some shots of this explosive family. Can you tell they are all related? Mk. 13 Torpedo Carl has also built the troublesome early-war Mk. 13 torpedo. Imagine dropping this fish while lining up on a Japanese flat-top! The history of the Mark 13 is quite interesting and often misunderstood. This lame guppy turned into a ferocious shark by war’s end thanks to incremental improvements made throughout the war. Development of the Mk.13 torpedo started in 1925 and was the first US torpedo designed specifically to be dropped from aircraft, and as such had to meet the requirements of the Navy Aeronautical Bureau which was responsible for torpedo plane design and development. After being accepted into service in 1936, this was the model with which the US Navy went to war in late 1941. As the historical record shows, it performed very poorly in the early stages of WW2. Navy pilots risked their lives only to find their torpedo would not explode, run wildly off course, or sink to the bottom. Still, the Mark 13 remained in production until after the war; but why if it was so bad? After these early failures, the US Navy set up an improvement program to eliminate the problems with the Mk. 13. Investigators found that some of the problems were due to its design, construction, as well as poor aero and hydrodynamics. For instance, it was found that if it hit the water at too shallow of an angle it would often sustain critical internal damage and simply not explode when or if it reached its intended target Significant improvements to internal parts, as well as some external changes, allowed the Mk.13 to become more resistant to the violence of entering the water. The development of stabilizers, drag rings, and shroud rings improved its water entry survivability and raised the launching altitude from a mere 50 feet to a whopping 2,400 feet! This new durability also raised the maximum launch speed for the drop from 110 knots (126 mph / 203 kph) to 410 knots (471 mph / 759 kph) which greatly increased aircrew survivability. These improvements made a huge difference in its effectiveness, warranting continued mass production while newer torpedo designs were considered. One of the Mk.13’s biggest achievements was being credited (in part) for the sinking of the Japanese battleship Yamato in 1945. Even though other types of torpedoes had come to the forefront during the war, the Mark 13 was the most prolific of them all, with almost 17,000 (out of a total of 64,000 units over 8 types) being produced during the war. 3-Inch / 50 Caliber Dual Purpose Gun The quick firing 3-inch / 50 Caliber gun saw action throughout the Pacific Theater and was used primarily for air defense on a wide variety of smaller warships like destroyer escorts, frigates, and patrol boats, as well as auxiliary and cargo vessels. However, in the case of the Battle of Midway it was also deployed as a shore battery by the US Navy for island defense. Had the invasion of Midway happened it would have seen heavy action in that role. However, it did see action at Wake Island where it helped repel the initial invasion attempt. In the US there are several museum examples and outdoor exhibits of this gun that you can visit. Jason visited a couple in San Diego as part of our research. Our Lead Modeler Tom has gone to great pains to reproduce this amazingly versatile gun for Combat Pilot and it represents an important first step for our team. We’ve posted so many pics of it because it is our first mechanically complex object that has been successfully modeled and textured to give us the aesthetic for which we are aiming. It also allows us to test how larger objects will look in the engine. It was also a technically challenging design that required quite a lot of research to achieve this result. For a new team like ours, it’s important to be able to create complex assets successfully and get over that first hurdle. The 3/50 is a complex piece of machinery that required several men and a great deal of teamwork to operate effectively. It could be aimed with iron sights or telescopic sights and fired a 3-inch shell weighing 13 pounds out to a maximum range of 14,600 yards (8.2 mi / 13.3 km) at 45 degrees elevation and had a ceiling of 29,800 feet (9,100 m) at 85 degrees elevation. We have more interesting guns to make and we hope they will all look as good as this one. Beyond what we've shown you here today our engineers continue to work on our flight-modeling and physics in a big way. We hope to have significant progress in our flight-modeling by Christmas of this year. Early FM work has gone fairly well for the engineers so we are quite encouraged and we recently reached an internal milestone by finishing a tool requiring some custom programming that will help us make FMs easier. Also, the virtual keels of our first two aircraft carriers the USS Enterprise and the IJN Akagi have been laid by the talented team that is making them. More on these capital ships as work progresses. We have also begun work on the Cable Company buildings, Seaplane Hangar and Pan Am Hotel found on Midway Atoll during the battle. These will be featured in future DDs of course. We hope you enjoy these images. I shall return! The Combat Pilot Team You can Discuss this Developer Diary HERE. 62 12 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Executive Producer Skystreak Productions Popular Post Jason_Williams Posted Friday at 02:42 AM Executive Producer Skystreak Productions Popular Post Share Posted Friday at 02:42 AM DD 04 Dear Pilots, The holiday season is now in full swing and we want to wish everyone in the Combat Pilot community a Happy Hanukkah and Merry Christmas! We hope that 2023 ends on a peaceful and prosperous note for everyone and 2024 brings great things to you and yours. Progress on our initial prototype inches forward week by week and as usual we’d like to share some more images and news with you. Since our last DD we’ve seen progress on buildings for Midway, our aircraft carriers, and our airplanes. Let’s see what this week has in store. Midway Atoll Infrastructure Midway is often referred to as an island, but it’s really an atoll, consisting of two main islands (Sand and Eastern) and a coral reef system with a lagoon in the center. Several Pacific battles took place on atolls during the war which makes for some unique and exotic scenery, but a horrendous amount of blood was shed for their control. Battles on atolls such as Wake, Makin, Kwajalein, Eniwetok, and Tarawa come to mind. Midway was spared an amphibious assault due to the US naval victory out at sea, but it was attacked by air and took some serious damage. One of our goals is to make a faithful recreation of the infrastructure and defenses found on Midway during the battle. In our opinion, other games and simulators haven’t portrayed Midway very accurately over the years so we hope to change that and set a new standard. Midway went through several stages of growth, abandonment, and decay before, during and after WWII, so depicting her as it looked in June 1942 is a challenge. Detailed maps and quality images are surprisingly rare. We’ve been able to dig up some good references though with help from the community. Which we greatly appreciate. Midway was not only a naval base and military airfield, but it was also a civilian seaplane base for Pan-Am’s clipper service to the Far East. Additionally, Midway was an outpost servicing underwater telegraph cables. Therefore, not all infrastructure on Midway was military in nature. Here are a few images of buildings that Carl has created for Midway so far. They will be textured soon and really come to life. 5 in. / 51 Cal. Gun Midway’s beaches were defended by a mix of 3-inch, 5-inch, and 7-inch guns. Below is a pic of our 5-inch gun made again by Tamas who also made the 3in gun from DD 03. Boom! A6M2 Landing Gear Work on our Zeke continues and more progress has been made. This time on the landing gear. John has brought the Zero’s exterior mesh close to completion and next up is the wingtip folding mechanism. Then it will be time to texture it. F4F-4 Engine and Landing Gear Our valiant, but stubby American fighter is also nearing completion of what we consider to be the external mesh even though it clearly includes some nice internal details. We’re even hanging some stores underneath her. Chris has the R-1830 Twin Wasp looking sharp and everything will look even better once we have textures on it. 5 in. / 38 Cal. Gun for USS Enterprise Our USS Enterprise is being built by a veteran team that Jason has worked with for a long time and the guns are being built by Stefan who really knows his way around WW2 era ships. Matter of fact, some of you may own books that feature Stefan’s previous work. Below are images of the high-poly model that will, of course, be further optimized for performance considerations, However, our goal is to have our ships be as detailed and as beautiful as possible, while maintaining good performance. This gun will also be textured soon. CV-6 USS Enterprise (Yorktown Class) And speaking of the Enterprise, here is a very early look at her big beautiful hull and superstructure under development. Trying to land on her pitching and rolling deck will be a blast! More on the ‘Big E’ as she takes shape. We hope to have images of the Akagi in our next DD. Work on her started a little bit after Enterprise. Early Flights of the Zeke! We know everyone is eager to see one of our warbirds flying in the engine itself and that is already happening. Our A6M can indeed take to the virtual sky in our internal testing, but we are still working out the kinks in its flight model and researching its performance envelop. Some in the community have helped us locate performance data for the Zeke which we greatly appreciate. The current A6M2 model imported into the engine is without textures and animations so it’s a little odd to watch fly. What we do have working is basic flight and systems like landing gear and wheel brakes. We already have support for phenomena like stalls and ground effect which will be refined more and more over time. We also have basic instrumentation working, but it’s currently just a digital display. We still need to build our proper instrumentation for actual cockpits with gauges etc. The last thing we want to do is show you something too raw, but we’ve included a pic of our early work below. It includes a basic shader for the water so the ocean already looks quite tropical. As you can see, there's not much to look at yet, but big kudos to our engineering team for getting the Zeke airborne so fast. Remember, when compared to other sims on the market, we are just a newborn so a long way to go still. However, we have made strong progress in 2023 and we hope to show you something a bit more impressive in Q1 of 2024. We have also begun work on our damage model design and researching basic multiplayer support as well as increased controller support. Again, long way to go, but we’re making progress on the flying front. Enjoy! AIR RAID ON PEARL HARBOR X THIS IS NOT DRILL The Combat Pilot Team You can Discuss this Developer Diary HERE. 59 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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