Deimos has released a new aircraft the end of last year, the SU27 Flanker.
Unofficial Video courtesy of EasyNotSoEasy48:
Normally Arcady style jet fighters aren’t my thing but having been left behind in a few group flights I needed something a bit quicker. What better than a Mach 2.3 capable aircraft.
I’ve read mixed reviews about Deimos and certainly none of the prior offerings have been up my street but given this aircraft had 40% in the sale(approx £12) and Deimos only seems to sell via the Marketplace, it was worth a try.
After a quick 2 hour flight I’m very impressed and at this point have no regrets in the purchase.
At this price point I’ve found it more enjoyable and feature-rich than many of the equivalently priced famous Flyers/local legends from Asobo.
The good:
All major functions appear to work as as expected
Autopilot
Heads Up Display (if a little outside the correct space)
Change in sound when canopy is open
Drag Chute, Ladder, Chocks, RBF tags
Simulated air-to-air refuelling probe
Fun to Fly
It looks like a Flanker
The Bad
No ability to view/change flight plan in INS
I can make no comment on the how accurate this is. My only other source is from videos of the DCS FC3 version which is low fidelity by DCS standards.
I’d like to see more functionality added to the heads down display, a duplicate HUD isn’t that useful. The DCS version has a navigation mode so if that could be implemented (even if just inserting a garmin map, like done on the SU57) it would provide more functionality.
As I went into this with my expectations set pretty low, I’m certainly enjoying the flights so far.
Firstly that isn’t an official trailer so it can’t be blamed on the developer.
Second, there are plenty of other videos showing the aircraft interior (from Bretts Plays and Pilot 0082 as a couple of examples). It was only after watching them that I decided to purchase it.
Is it exceptional quality, absolutely not. But for £13.00 my first impressions are it’s better than some of the other aircraft I’ve paid more for.
I wasn’t expecting anything like the Heatblur Tomcat, JustFlight Hawk/Vulcan in comparison.
If you go into this expecting the quality of GotFriends (or dare I say it) even DC/SC designs, you likely will be disappointed but as mentioned in my initial post my expectations were low so I was pleasantly surprised.
Nothing wrong with that. I’m all for normalizing enjoying addons regardless of where they rank on the quality scale. Some of us are sticklers for quality, myself included, but even I will happily settle for a mid-tier addon if it makes me smile.
The better his planes the less marketing they got.
The A10 was a gigantic leap from really very low quality aircraft (Mig29, Su57) to very decent aircraft with plenty of funcionality and much better textures and graphics. Yet I’ve seen little or nothing about the A10.
Now the Su27 is released and there’s only this vid by Brett and it’s not even clear where to get the plane.
From the video it looks much better than most DC Designs planes and those get a lot of attention from the public yet they are very low quality in textures and graphics with shallow systems.
DC Designs planes are not good at all all they have is a lot of marketing.
After landing can’t get the aircraft to turn on the ground. Somehow the NWS has become disabled after takeoff. Not found the button in the cockpit to reenable and also is not shown on the HUD.
EDIT: Restarted and raised camera height slightly, HUD is now visible (if still out of the case) and also confirmed I wasn’t going mad about NWS:
After takeoff further details are available (e.g. mach) which then get hidden as before.
This is where manuals are very useful
EDIT: I tried a few more landings both on and off field and in most situations it seems NWS activates automatically. Not sure what happened the first time.
Still not got to the bottom of the NWS issue, seems like a fluke bug.
Whilst documenting a printable checklist, I have come across a few niggly (but non flight affecting) issues:
Checklist – Throttle Position, IDLE spelt wrong (IDEL)
Checklist – No entry to switch on Generators/Alternators post engine start. Experienced the HUD going off mid-flight due to battery going flat until I realised.
Covers knob barely moves - Hard to tell if on/off visually (unlike Ladder) and no tooltip text either, requires external look (tags can just be seen over left shoulder in cockpit)
Power appears to cut out (at least from the ATC window perspective) when gear is raised or APU is activated.
HUD Shows speed in Knots where as analogue gauge is in KPH
HUD shows altitude in feet but analogue gauge is in metres
Not Possible to set flaps to “LAND” as indicated in Checklist, only AUT and FLIGHT is switchable
Only 1 of the APU buttons (left) appears to be functional even though both are labelled.
Ladder, chocks and flags not visible when avionics master set to ON - From a realism perspective, I can think of situations where you’d want Radios etc on even though the ladder is still connected (ready 5 situations, etc) so this feature should not be linked to the avionics switch.
For 5 & 6 I’m assuming this is because Deimos has used the stock F/A18 HUD. Whilst it would probably be more realistic for the gauges to be in in Metres/KPH I’d prefer if both HUD and gauges were consistent.
Be good if all these can be fixed but they don’t prevent the aircraft being used/enjoyed.
Lastly, watching another YouTube video. In order for smoke to be usable it’s necessary to at 110LBS to the output pilots otherwise the switch does nothing. I’m not sure where this is noted. Weapons MOD is not required for this feature to work.
Hello @GrungeSlayer i replied to your mail, so sorry for delay!
Thanks so much for your reports ! i’ll go trow them in the next week … now i am working on last thinks for the release of the new plane !
BTW:
Checklist – Throttle Position, IDLE spelt wrong (IDEL) THANKS NOTED
Checklist – No entry to switch on Generators/Alternators post engine start. THANKS NOTED
Experienced the HUD going off mid-flight due to battery going flat until I realised. THANKS NOTED
Covers knob barely moves - Hard to tell if on/off visually (unlike Ladder) and no tooltip text either, requires external look (tags can just be seen over left shoulder in cockpit)THANKS NOTED
Power appears to cut out (at least from the ATC window perspective) when gear is raised or APU is activated. didnt get this, could you explain better (sorry for my bad english… you can also reply via pm
HUD Shows speed in Knots where as analogue gauge is in KPH
HUD shows altitude in feet but analogue gauge is in metres
Not Possible to set flaps to “LAND” as indicated in Checklist, only AUT and FLIGHT is switchable (Flaps are just automatic on my Su27)
Only 1 of the APU buttons (left) appears to be functional even though both are labelled. THANKS NOTED, i’ll double check, both should work
Ladder, chocks and flags not visible when avionics master set to ON - From a realism perspective, I can think of situations where you’d want Radios etc on even though the ladder is still connected (ready 5 situations, etc) so this feature should not be linked to the avionics switch.**THANKS NOTED, i’ll see what i can do **
Thanks again for your constructive findings ! for any other report or question do not esitate to write me !
If it wasn’t for the Heads Down Display also being inconsistent, I could live with just switching the HUD off. Either Metric or Imperial works for me, please just have it the same.
For the APU, I think it may now just be a label issue. Pressing the right APU button and waiting a little bit longer it did spin up but the label even after hiding and hovering again, still showed OFF
Tried a longer flight this time and so far the aircraft doesn’t live up to the advertised specifications. I’m not expecting an accurate flight model (I wouldn’t know if it was or not).
The aircraft is supposed to be Mach 2.3 capable but even after doing a few parabolas (darkstar style) at approx 40,000 feet the most I could get was about Mach 1.6 in a dive. This was running with few clouds preset. Also I was only able to get to about 60000 feet before it was struggling to maintain lift, this is probably close enough to the advertised 62000 feet.
As for the HUD, I still standby it needs rework. Having connected my head tracker again moving up and down does allow the blocked elements to be shown but it also moves around too much making accurate tracking during landings difficult. I thought the SU27 was too old for a head mounted display (like the F35’s) so I don’t understand why it has to move at all. Will need to check how the default FA18 does it, I’m used to the HUD being static regardless of head position.
In the end I resorted to switching off position tracking and adjusting the camera zoom to about 75% and height to about 60%. This makes the HUD mostly visible if with a very forward looking view. On the plus side it does hide the inconsistencies with the analogue gauges.
Deimos did respond to my emailing it HUD has been setup for VR users but I’m not entirely clearly how that how that differs from normal use (or Eye Tracking). As far as I see it the HUD still gets cut off regardless of head position (with or without Eye Tracking). Anyone with VR got any ideas?
All being said it’s still a fun aircraft to fly but as it’s priced at the equivalent price point of the DCS SU-27 which whilst not all point-and-clicky (I use key/control binds as much as possible in both sims anyway) the DCS one have a lot more going for it even though is a lot older.
I’m not expecting all the combat or other non-implemented features to work but I don’t think it’s unreasonable to expect the features that are implemented to work in a predictable and consistent way (HUD and Gauges being the current grating points for me).
It has to be said though it’s does look rather pretty
Is there any navigation capability in this plane, like showing where your next waypoint is, ILS etc.? There’s the electronic display on the right but I don’t think you can get any kind of map on it?
This review shows a lot of buttons on the right hand side (Wingman, BIT, Target etc.) and they don’t show INOP, is there any video or review showing what they do in the sim?
I kind of wish if Deimos was going for a civilian version that instead of the pointless duplicate HUD they had just put a GNS430 sort of like some of the Asobo L39s.
I currently use either the PMS50 or Sky4sim on PC to get a map display.
The buttons you refer to I don’t believe do anything. BIT for example would I guess be for a built in test.
I was just watching the preview video of the XF11 from flying fries. In that the tablet provides both switchable GPS and gauges in MPH/Knots.
Can’t be too hard for a similar thing to be implemented in this too (even just a toggle switch somewhere rather than a tablet which I’d prefer anyway).
Unlike their Scrapyard Monster the XF11 will be payware so I will be curious to see how it matches price wise but it does mean Xbox users can enjoy FFs work and it’s another competitor to Deimos and other more cost effective minded developers.
Final observation for now, the interior lighting also needs work.
Both Panel Lights and Instrument Lights switches have a tool tip of “Panel Lights” so not sure which is doing what. Both switches do not seem to move correct to their position (Panel Lights goes low and Instrument Lights seems to be in reverse).
The Left and Right Panel Lights seem to work as expected but as soon as the Map Brightness (Flood Light) is set below 50% the entire cockpit goes dark. I believe there should be a way of illuminating just the central cockpit for “stealth” night flying with just the main instruments visible.
If there’s a button to do that let me know but I’d have thought that was what the “Instrument Lights” switch was for.
I also noticed at time the entire cockpit would go dark almost like the same time the strobe is flashing. I switched both that and the NAV lights off but it was still happening.
What’s my summary after about a week?
If you want a fun aircraft for a quick buzz around or perhaps you need something different to a western fighter jet for a cinematic video, this isn’t bad.
If however you are wanting more then I’d say avoid for now until the issues I’ve highlighted are fixed. That poorly aligned HUD and the mismatching gauges really puts me off flying the bird as that’s what I’m looking at most of the time.
I have recently bought his Su-27, as well as his Mig29 (… and the Felon, and the A-10…)…
However I didn’t have the time to try them yet.
What’s the issue with the HUD ? On your screenshots, isn’t your head position a bit too high ?
Latest screenshots have the camera height set at about 80 as I’ve been fiddling for the best setting.
See the screenshots from about 3 days ago where it was set about 50 and you’ll notice anything below the NWS indicator gets cut off.
Not only that but the width of the HUD is to wide leading to things down the R when using the radar altimeter being cut off.
Deimos used the stock F/A18 HUD for this so no work was put in to customise it to be more accurate for the SU-27. The least that could be done is make it all fit in.
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