Interview With a Real Pilot

Our colleagues from the World of Warplanes community team in Europe recently interviewed one of their local players, Peoples_Front_of_Judea (but not the Judean People’s Front, for the Monty Python fans out there) to see what he had to say about the experience of flying a plane, and how well World of Warplanes gameplay matches up!

Can you tell us about your experience as a pilot?

I started with a Tiger Cub and did about five hours. Then I had a gap of five years before I was invited to fly a Skyranger 912. I did about three hours, but after discovering the costs, I was persuaded to move over to ‘Flexwing’ aircraft. It took me three years to get my full license. During this time I flew a P&M Quik912, a P&M GT450 and a Quantum912. My licence lets me fly any Microlight/Ultralight aircraft with some conversion time, so I intend to buy a Groppo Trial soon.

What do you do when you are not flying?

I left school with only basic qualifications. They weren’t good enough to join the Royal Air Force (RAF), so I joined the Royal Navy instead. I spent five years going 'round the world so many times that I got dizzy! I left just before the Falklands War (1981), so I avoided getting shot at!

After leaving the Navy, I worked in my father’s print factory. I started as a printer, and over 28 years, I moved up to become a buyer, tendering contracts worth 1-2 million pounds a year! I now work with autistic adults, helping them to enjoy a good quality of life.

How did you become interested in flying?

When I was five years old, my father bought me an Airfix model of a Tiger Moth (although he managed to melt it in the oven when trying to dry the glue!). That summer, he took me to my first air show and I was hooked. Over the years, I would buy Airfix models of any kind and attend as many air shows as I could. I have seen some very rare aircraft… and watched them crash!

Tell us more about your pilot training.

I started with the ‘Cubby’ in 2004, but it was very sporadic. It took me a while to find a suitable instructor close enough to home. In 2007, I started my official training on ‘flexwing’ aircraft, and purchased my first plane – the Quantum912. It took me a few hours to adjust from the ‘stick’ control method to the reverse bar method for ‘flexwing’.

Due to the UK weather, it took me three years to get my license. My actual flying time was 26 hours with the instructor and eight hours solo.

The most memorable part of the training was after doing circuits (take off, circle the airfield and land) for a couple of weeks, I decided that I ‘had it nailed’. I eventually asked the instructor when I could fly solo, as I thought I was ready. He replied, "I have been waiting for the last few weeks for you to ask me, as I thought you were ready then. It’s for you to know when you are ready, so get going!" I don’t remember much of the actual flight except for climbing out of the thin cloud into the sun, and I cried my guts out! The view was indescribable, and it felt as if the one hour flight turned into one minute.

How did you get into ‘virtual’ piloting?

I started with the Amiga in the mid-1980s, but it wasn’t long before I had a 386 PC and a copy of "Secret Weapons of the Luftwaffe." Over the years I have bought many flight simulators, but I only played a few, as I generally find what I like and stick with it. Then came the Internet and online gaming. It’s a whole different world and each battle feels like a new game.

I discovered World of Warplanes while surfing the internet for rare warplane prints and was accepted into the Closed Beta.

What are your favorite planes in the game?

My favorites are the I-15, Ar 68, Bf 109 F and the A6M1 (although it’s too easy to die now!). These planes feel the most like the real thing for me, except for the stall. When a stall happens in real life, the nose doesn’t sit at 30 degrees angle and then drop. Instead, the aircraft judders and the nose drops like a brick! A pilot is trained to keep the aircraft flying during a stall, but I think from a ‘computer’ point of view, it’s okay… ish.

Do you get a similar feeling from piloting a real aircraft as from one of our virtual warbirds?

With the number of hours I have ‘flown’ in World of Warplanes, I am pretty confident I could fly them in real life! Bear in mind that all single-engine aircraft are much the same to fly – all you need to learn are the take-off and landing characteristics.

I am part of a small group of pilots who actually ‘dogfight’ over Romney Marsh in Kent, UK. One plane will be at 2,000 feet and another at 500 feet. We start together and then climb or descend to our relative altitudes. As this is happening, we lose sight of each other, and the idea is to get back to base without being ‘shot’.

What advice would you give to new players?

• Fly your plane until you know what it's good at and, more importantly, what it is not good at! Learn about your enemies as well
• Stay in groups – a lone target is easy prey
• Watch the minimap.
• Remember that it only takes one or two planes to shoot down an enemy, not five! This is where you will crash into each other
• There is no such thing as an overpowered plane – all can be shot down if you know how and have the right plane to do it

How realistic is World of Warplanes?

From a pilot’s point of view, the ‘flight model’ is very accurate. The perspective you get from flying over terrain is as near to the real thing as I have ever seen on a computer, simulator or game.

Motion at different heights, flying straight and level is very accurate. The biggest difference is only being able to look out of the front window and not the sides.

When a plane dives, the feeling of speed increases the closer you get to the ground, as gravity takes effect. You need to pull out of a dive halfway between the starting height and ground in order to allow for inertia. Somehow Wargaming have pulled this off with a very accurate and realistic effect.

If you could have three screens (front window, left and right looking over the wings), it would enhance the computer experience even further. This is something that Wargaming should look into if they truly want to make a realistic flying experience.

Another nice thing to add would be a ‘cockpit view’ position with the nose and propeller visible in front of you.

One difference between flying for real and in World of Warplanes is that the higher you go, the more ‘haze’ you get. In the game there is an element of haze that definitely adds more realism to the game, but it’s not so much that it obscures targets below you.

So to summarize, the main differences are:

• The single-window view
• The lack of gravitational forces on the aircraft body
• The performance of certain aircraft
• On a few aircraft, the lack of a realistic stall

On the whole though, the more I play the game, the more realistic I feel it is! I get a true sense of realism while playing and can quickly forget the unrealistic characteristics. I recommend that everyone on the development team takes flying lessons, just to see how close they are to real flying.

I can’t really comment on the realism of combat as I have never experienced it. However, in the mock dogfights with other pilots, you get terrible ‘rubbernecking’ when watching the skies for other aircraft. You really do need to wear a silk scarf!

We’d like to thank Peoples_Front_Of_Judea for the interview and his insight!