Military aircraft fans will want to have a close look at the development of this new aircraft for Microsoft Flight Simulator. Just Flight have just announced that their next in-house military aircraft project is intended to be the classic Tornado low-level strike fighter. This is what we know so far!
First screenshots
Just Flight appear to be working their way through the RAF aircraft inventory as they announce their next big project. Following on from their well received Hawk T1/A Advanced Trainer comes the Tornado GR1.
The GR1 was part of the Tornado IDS (interdictor/strike) and was primarily aimed at conducting low level strike missions in Europe. The GR1 was never used in this role, however, it did see service in a number of other conflicts including during Desert Storm in 1991, the Kosovo campaign in 1999 and over Iraq and Afghanistan in the 2000s. The GR1 was later modified into the more advanced and just recently retired GR4.
Just Flight’s recreation of this aircraft is, according to their announcement note on Facebook, being called ‘study level’ so expect a high degree of system fidelity to go along with this. They have also noted that the aircraft will make use of 8K resolution textures so it should look sharp too.
Several screenshots have been released and Just Flight is expecting to update their in-development section of their website soon with more images and more details in the coming weeks and months.
Tornado makes two!
Just Flight is the second developer to throw their hat into the ring for developing a Tornado with IndiaFoxtEcho also announcing in May that they were working on a Tornado as well. Two Tornado options should make for plenty who are fans of the aircraft.
Now… if we could just convince someone to do a DCS World version…
Stormbirds 
First day purchase for sure….in DCS. In MSFS not so much.
I still have fond memories of low level attacks in the 1993 Amiga game…
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Hmmm, let’s see…
A Mach 2 aircraft that can land on a 1500 foot runway. I wonder if I could figure out how to have any fun with that in MSFS…? YES!
The good news is they’ve already done an IDS and ADV for P3D, so this effort will benefit similar to Hawk & BAe 146 for P3D, as well.
If those “ports” are any indication, this will be a fine addition to any military aviation enthusiasts hangar – regardless of simulator.
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“EtA”: given how good the Hawk is in MSFS, Tornado will instantly become The Best military aircraft available for MSFS.
Be interesting to see how it stacks up against IFT. Their history in FSX/P3D/MSFS is “Good but not Great”. We’ll see, and I wish them well1
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Yeah very fortunately not their first “kick at the can” so to speak. Should be interesting!
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Late GR.1 by the looks of it, maybe GR.1B?
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I’m not as familiar with Tornado subvariants so I’m not sure. What are the distinguishing differences? As I understand it, most of the differences are at the avionics level.
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My bad it is an A. The Ferranti laser designator was on both – the B being anti-shipping
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If it is in keeping with Just Flight’s Hawk T.1 I will welcome this with open arms. The Hawk T.1 is a superb model and I fly it often in MSFS. I’ll get their Tornado for sure.
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This is a surprise. Not sure if I’m really interested, but I’ll be happy to read the reviews.
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Ok. I’m going to say it: DCS produces superb study level simulations. It’s business model seems to churn them out one after the other in a relentless steam of modules. The Tornado is yet another example of these superb modules. Which is fine. A plethora of different planes to fill your stable. Great.
But don’t you reckon it would be better if they instead concentrated as a business strategy a bit more on creating more fleshed out environments that one can fly these modules in? I also note here that multiplayer is very much further developed with excellent servers and missions for most, if not all, planes. My remarks are for we who for one reason or another hesitate to commit to multiplayer and dwell in single player universe.
I mean we have the WW2 modules but less than fully fleshed out environments in which to fly them, both from a mission/campaign point of view (yes, I know they have one or two linear linked missions for each module, not withstanding nothing yet for the superb Mosquito module). You just can’t do a lot with, for example, the Mosquito except fly it around a largely sterile landscape. No dynamic campaign to give meaning to your largely disconnected and pointless individual mission experiences. And I could go on.
The point is I’d rather see a bit more development focussed on creating better, more meaningful environments in which to fly these high fidelity modules to have a more integrated experience single player than simply pumping out plane after plane.
Views? Anzac
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Hi Tony. I don’t think there’s anything you’ve written there that I would disagree with. DCS’ strength is in the aircraft that they and their third parties have produced and their weakness is in some of the elements surrounding them.
There are some excellent single player and multiplayer experiences that you can have with them as well so its not all bad there. But I know what you mean as there are a lot of things that I’d like to see come along (wingman coms, ATC, a better mission generator, etc.). They know and I’m glad to see them working on them but we’re all human and just a little impatient and I think we’d all like to see this move along a little more quickly.
Also worth pointing out that this Tornado project is a MSFS product by JustFlight and has no DCS connection. I’d love to see it though! 🙂
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IMHO, Eagle Dynamics is trapped by their business model. The only way they make money is by selling modules, so that’s where they’re forced to spend their time.
To be fair, that gives us splendidly detailed and accurate modules that are easily at par with (and usually exceeding) the best addons available for other sims.
Interestingly, multiplayer is not the fun fest it’s made out to be as many servers turn into somewhat pointless blood-sport death matches. But your point that it would be great to see some of the MP server environments natively available for SP is well made.
Many folks, myself included, continue to express similar sentiments, and again, in fairness, ED is advancing the simulator (which is, unlike any other, Free to Play) such that I prefer flying in DCS’ geographically limited world more than I do in X-Plane or P3D, even if it’s just for “sightseeing”. That’s no small feat, and I’m glad for the progress there.
And the dirty little secret that never seems to get talked about is that flying Single Player in other simulators is just as sterile, if not more so!
Anyhow, good points and agreed AND I still prefer DCS for most of my flying.
AND I’ll still buy Just Flight’s military aircraft just for the sheer enjoyment of being able to explore them while I explore the sims they’re available within 🙂
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Shamrockonefive, quite right! Attention to detail: not for DCS but MSFS. I confused it because I seemed to recall there was talk of a similar module for DCS being muted. Actually, it would be fantastic to see such a study level sim for the Tornado in DCS. I’m not sure what the point is for MSFS except to fly it, given you can’t really have the military sim experience in MSFS, can you?
But anyway….comments still stand for DCS if you’ll allow me to raise in this forum. Sure, you are right; it is slowly getting better for missions for individual DCS modules, no doubt about it….especially by third party mission makers. Baltic Dragon springs immediately to mind.
The one thing that I think would be a game changer for DCS is a dynamic campaign experience and it is heartening to see them apparently working on it. Meanwhile, there are also a couple of third party apps out there that do provide a sort of dynamic campaign experience while wait. This I goodness for all those talented people!
Tony
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As a combat flight simmer, I definitely understand the questioning around flying military aircraft in a civil sim but I can tell you that the market for this is there. MSFS is massive (Jorg Neumann just said the other day that their audience has quadrupled since launch and it was a HUGE launch) and folks are buying up new content all over the place. Jet fighters are popular additions just for the performance.
I highly recommend Liberation campaign for DCS. It’s not perfect and it reveals why Eagle Dynamics need to do a lot of work to make their dynamic campaign system work but in the meantime its a fantastic community addition.
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Hi. Great points. Well, I’m not surprised re the market around MSFS; that weather generator alone is incredible. It’s like a weather simulator all on its own. One day I hope military sims could put as much effort into the flying environment as civilian sims do. One day!
Liberation campaign? Yes, I have that and it’s superb. I don’t know if can use many WW2 modules properly in it but I hope it gets there.
Thanks for great comments.
Tony
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Having worked on Tornado at RAF Honington, RAF Bruggen and RAF Cottesmore I look forward top seeing how study level they make this, hopefully the wait won’t be too long!!
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Sounds awesome. I flew the ADS simulator once at Leuchas in the 1990s
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