The DCS World modules seem to be flowing freely right now with Polychop announcing that they too are planning a release in the May-June time period. Work is apparently complete on their DCS: OH-58D Kiowa Warrior project and they are ready to release it to the public. Here are some of the things that we’ve learned!
Features, release dates, and more
The lengthy Q&A video is an hour and a half long and it covers quite a bit. I’ll summarize some of the key points below but if you want the whole thing I encourage you to listen in.
The first big piece of information that you probably want to know is release date. Polychop have indicated that their window for release is the end of May or June. That’s big news for the long in development helicopter! They are not planning for this to be considered an early access release but rather a fully realized module. That doesn’t mean that there won’t be updates or support post launch but Polychop sound confident that this is essentially a finished product. A rarity for DCS modules.
Kiowa is going to come packed with features including the ability to use the type’s Mast Mounted Sight (MMS) and then broadcast the sight picture to other Kiowas. You can also use L2MUM which enables Kiowa crews to see the feed off of a nearby drone. Interesting stuff! Pilot AI has already been implemented while a co-pilot AI system is planned post launch. The pilot AI will be useful for doing things like performing hover holds and mild left/right/back/forward translation for single pilots who are then jumping into the left seat to operate some of the helicopters sensors. In effect, an auto hover system of sorts.
Interactive elements in the cockpit will include the M4 (with mouse and VR hand controls) and various coloured smoke grenades that are animated and can be thrown out the door by the left-seat player.
Training and reference materials will be available on launch with 13 or 14 training missions and a manual available. Several training videos are planned too which will cover the how-to on how to fly the helicopter and how to use the helicopter with some gameplay too.
60-liveries are also going to be available at launch so it sounds like we’ll have no shortage of ways to dress up our OH-58s!
Gazelle got a mention too with word that quite a bit has been done behind the scenes in parallel. We will see some things from Kiowa that will come to Gazelle later too.
The helicopter will be up for sale on both the Eagle Dynamics webstore and on Steam as expected.
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