[Official Discussion] Top Gun: Maverick DLC

OK, here’s how I do it:

  • Take off with full throttle + afterburner (I don’t even touch the throttle afterwards to be honest)
  • Climb at 10 degrees up to around 30-35000 ft
  • Slowly push the nose down to -20 degrees and start descending down to about 20000 ft
  • Very slowly raise the nose and climb at 10 degrees again
  • The aircraft should have no problem reaching Mach 3 (the higher you climb the faster the Mach will go up)
  • At Mach 3, turn the scramjet batteries on and enable the scramjet. It will spool up, kick in and kick the vehicle out into oblivion (the regular turbines will stop working above 50,000 ft)

I think the key is that you have to be gentle when putting the plane to descent and then climb again. If you do it too quickly then the plane will slow down and won’t have enough momentum to reach scramjet speeds. Also, when you do have the scramjet kick, be careful not to overshoot the operational ceiling which is about 150,000 ft. I am most comfortable at around 130-140,000 ft with around Mach 8-8.5.

10 Likes

I figured it out! So you have to

take off, full power and afterburner, climb to about 30-34,000 ft.

Then you tilt you plane slightly down in order to pick up speed all the way to mach 3.

When you hit Mach 3 tilt upwards about 30 degs, then you have to turn on the fuel cell button in the center console and activate the “Scram Enable” switch on the upper left dash.

This will switch on your scram jets. Make sure right before you do this sequence you pull up to above 30 degs (so u don’t overspeed). Then proceed to climb above 100,000. :smiley:

When you are going to land make sure you switch off your scram jets below 50,000.


3 Likes

I don’t know if there’s a bug or not but sometimes my scram jet doesn’t engage over mach 3 and still get a warning beeping noise.

Thanks guys, it worked!!! The climb profile in the computer of the Dark Star just doesn’t work.

I just got the “Frequent Flyer Miles” achievement using the Darkstar. Glad I waited :smiley:

It’s kind of crazy to think about the breadth of available experiences in MSFS now. Flying around half the world in a really cool fictional hyper sonic experimental, flying across the channel with a Spitfire, taking your yoke training maneuvers in a nice Piper Warrior, doing some bush flying in a Kodiak, flying around in one of the study-level airliners or the vintage DC-6, gliding around in the Discus 2, training autorotation with the Bell from Flyinside. And all of this with the best graphics we’ve ever known in flight sims.
When MSFS works, it really does. Amazing.

14 Likes

:joy:
Imagine if you have lost sight of products from other manufacturers in recent years…

2 Likes

Has MSFS still not fixed the 44000 ft altitude bug?? They should hotfix that NOW if that has persisted since SU7.

The Dark Star is really good fun. Been a bit frustrating getting it going this evening but its a really new and unique experience in the sim. Just took it for a ‘quick spin’ out of Edinburgh up over Iceland.




5 Likes

That looks fun! What has been “frustrating” about it? Any tips on how to fly it? How does it handle? Hard to takeoff and/or land - long runways needed?

Lol i actually love it, not only that, but it’s free to🤷🏾‍♂️. Any and every other developer would have likely released this for sale, and not for free. It’s all about perspective.

6 Likes

I noticed you didn’t say where you landed :eyes::rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl:

1 Like

I don’t know why your comment was flagged. It’s a genuine opinion for which I agree. Considering this was originally supposed to be released last year, it’s quite surprising the number of problems people are reporting.

1 Like

I mean, it’s hard to complain when we got 2 free aircraft. But that delay wasn’t to make things better… It was because the movie was delayed. Best believe that the product we are touching is the same one that was supposed to be released half a year ago :man_shrugging:t5:.

found the the Discus 2 !!

1 Like

Well, what an unusual update this was. I didn’t expect much and overall there’s not a lot to keep my interest long term, but a good few ‘first experiences’ in there. My last 90 mins in a nutshell:

  • Carrier landing challenge is well implemented, even if I’ll be sticking to DCS for my Hornet experiences in general.
  • Timed low-level flying is similarly well put together, quite polished, should be good in VR.
  • First time I’ve ever flown with a ground speed of 5800kts! :exploding_head: The Darkstar was actually a fun experience, even if it is gimicky. But as a glimpse of potential future aviation, it was a better one-time experience than I expected.
  • First time getting lots of stutters and freezes in MSFS since release. Only when flying at Mach 9. I think my ageing PC was struggling to keep up with the terrain and texture loading demands.

The sim looks beautiful from up high, especially over the western US. As a mainly GA flyer, I rarely go above 10,000ft. So a nice change of view. The shockwave/sonic boom effects when moving the camera around and the narrowing cone of audio behind the aircraft were pleasant surprises too. (I suppose they were there with the F/A-18 before but I hadn’t flown it outside the Miramar landing challenge.)

3 Likes

I’m not sure how it’s underwhelming?? How are ppl forgetting that this was A MOVIE tie-in. The fact that we got 2 planes should more than enough. It’s comments like these that make the ppl who make that choice less likely to do anything in the future, no lie.

EDIT: Also, the reason Jorg was likely excited is because he was happy to give something to fans for free… It’s not that hard to understand.

11 Likes

I reached 27500 Ft at Mach 10.00. The nose, engines and the tails turn orange. In game Instructions do not mention activating the Fuel Cell, thanks for bringing that up in your comments.

2 Likes

One tip I would give - full stick deflection doesn’t do much at high speed, but if you hold the trim you’ll soon be pulling some decent G’s! :laughing:

It’s one of those old simulator quirks that we’ve had for years, where trimming can sometimes have more effect than the primary control surfaces… :man_shrugging:

No problem, glad you got it going!

The Darkstar is quite easy to fly I would say. Controls well and doesn’t need very long runways as it’s a relatively small military aircraft. Take-off / landing speed is around 180-200 kts and it’s responsive at those speeds.

1 Like