Jane's USNF'97 • Kuril Islands Campaign Mission 1. S.O.S.

Since my original Marine Fighters Playthrough was played in US Navy Fighters Gold version, and all but the first mission were recorded in poor quality, I decided to do a second playthrough - this time in updated version - USNF'97 recorded in 1080p.

The differences between early USNF versions (1.0, 1.1, Gold -1.2) and the USNF'97 (1.3, 1.4) are quite substancial. Even between 1.0 and 1.2 - like the range at which TWS radar mode in the Hornet changes to RWS (in which you can no longer designate targets) was initially 25nm. In 1.2 it was increased to 50nm. Or the pilots statistics / records - in first release you could only see pilots medals, there were no info about destroyed targets, evaded missiles etc. it was only added in since version 1.2.

There are also plenty of changes to aircraft loadouts and weapons statistics. But the biggest offender in the early USNF was really buggy damage calculation made for dumb bombs. You could often drop the MK-84 which would deal no damage to targets in proximity of impact point and even those hit directly. In USNF'97 it was properly fixed, and making runs with MK-84s was devastating. This alone makes some missions play out quite differently due to extended options in loadout selection - before you would basically carry Mavericks for moving mud, now dumb bombs are often better option.

I'm quite interested how this campaing will play out in USNF'97. In Gold version it was really challenging, possibly the hardest campaign from the six official ones that comes with Fighters Anthology, though in FA you could use the in-flight map and data-link for air and ground targets which you can't here, though USNF'97 introduced the ability to receive a verbal BRA call from AWACS to the nearest bandit. Technically in USNF you could use the cheat option that would do the same (CTRL-Z for nearest bandit, CTRL-X for nearest ground target and CTRL-A for nearest allied aircraft).

So lets kick off this campaign with the first mission which already gets quite challenging. The key to winning missions in this campaign is to properly utilize your wingmen. Thankfuly this game has great wingman AI and wingman control options. Also don't mind my first approach to landing - I was trying to do proper VL but it seems that my weight was too much to mantain a hover.

Jane's USNF'97 playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLIku_oD9y-RBx-qva-vtVXS18Sh_fuAAs

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