INTERCEPT Journal Tornado review

[Frankie]

Intercept the flight simulation magazine was the 1992 brainchild of Eric "Reckless" Pearson. By 1995, his magazine had 2,500 subscribers who paid USD20 a year. The mean reader age then was 37 with 34% serving in the military.

Pearson worked 60 hours a week at his real job, as a quality-assurance engineer for a plastics company. His wife, Elaine (Amazon) Zacharczenko, was a pharmacist. Together, they published six Intercept issues a year from their Kingston, N.Y., home. To write an in-depth review, Pearson’ would put in a minimum of 50 hours of late-night playing time in his home cockpit, fashioned from a Subaru sports car seat.

“I occasionally get into a flight suit when I’m having trouble with motivation,” Pearson said.

His wife, Zacharczenko, made a name for herself as a sort of amateur psychologist. Her column, “Words of Wizzo-dom,” won a sizeable following among sim widows. In one, she identified the warning signs that a maiden was dating a serious hobbyist: "He owns a flight jacket, flight gloves, aviator sunglasses and a pair of silk boxers with jet fighters on them. She herself was alerted by her husband’s license plate frame: 'Too close for missiles. Switch to guns!'".

Source: https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1995-01-06-mn-16924-story.html

When you read Eric's review of Tornado, you will not fail to notice how different it is from the other magazine reviews of the day. Eric pulls no punches and discusses the strengths and weaknesses of DI's flagship flight simulator. if there is one chink in the armor in his review that I can point out, it is that Eric does not mention the glaring omission of the plane's shadow. in my humble opinion, a shadow for the Tornado, and for all aircraft, would have greatly enhanced the 3D realism and effect of the sim. One does get a sense of dedication and love for flight simulation when reading Eric's review. It is no surprise that Eric also published a book titled "Dynamix Great War Planes: The Ultimate Strategy Guide Paperback – Nov. 1 1992" on Amazon, featuring three of Dynamix's famous flight simulators - A10 Tank Killer, Aces of the Pacific and Red Baron.

Lastly, a million thanks to Kevin Bezant (UK) for the scanned images. Kevin was Digital Integration's lead programmer for the Tornado project (1991-1993). He also coded Tornado's 3D engine in 16-bit ASM assembly language. Do enjoy reading Eric "Reckless" Pearson's review of Digital Integration's Tornado.


Cheers
Frankie Kam

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