F is for Flying pencils added to Scramble. Slitherine’s thoroughly 3D BoB wargame has some Schnellbombers at long last. While the new Do 17s must run the gauntlet of player-controlled Spits and Hurricanes, there’s no danger of them suffering the fate Feldwebel Johannes Petersen’s Do 17 suffered on August 18, 1940. During an attack on Kenley, Petersen’s flying pencil had a fatal encounter with a Z Battery, one of WW2’s most outlandish anti-aircraft weapons.

G is for Granular damage control

Talking of Hurricanes, Naval Hurricane’s damage control dimension has just undergone a major overhaul. In addition to rethinking his approach and interface, Efril has added additional floodable compartments to ships in order to make counterflooding choices more subtle and realistic.

H is for History book

I hope one or two serious computer wargames and simulations get mentioned in this upcoming book on history-steeped games by Adrian Burrows and Jim Hargreaves. While glam chart-toppers such as Total War, Call of Duty, and Assassin’s Creed, might be great at recreating the sights and sounds of the past, in my experience it’s often games designed specifically for desktop generals and armchair pilots that provide the most illuminating insights.

I is for I’d have preferred Ireland

J is for Just you

By the sound of it, pilots in Dancing Wings – The Aerobatic Simulator will fashion multi-ship displays by flying within old replays à la YSFlight. That seems somewhat half-arsed to me. Even Red Arrows and Blue Angels, two of the very first aerobatic flight sims, featured AI wingmen.

K is for Keep digging, you slackers

Released yesterday, the Dig In demo looks worth investigating. All Quiet in the Trenches meets Armored Battle Crew (?), it casts you as a British company commander tasked with defending a short section of the Western Front in 1914. Trench networks must be designed and dug, men and resources managed, and German attacks repulsed.