Precocious, pondering, prattish younger me used to stand in game shops holding Jane’s Combat Simulation games, marveling at the heft of the box, the grandeur of the screens, imagining Jane at her desk, making a game and being so proud she’d put her name to it. I was stupid. Now I know better: Jane is the second name of military enthusiast Fred T. Jane, and he died in 1916. He didn’t make those games, although given that they were basically manuals made into gaming form, with his love of detailing military hardware he’d probably have enjoyed their elegant air battles and cockpit rendering. As for the latest incarnation, Jane’s Advanced Strike Fighters, being released a full decade after the last one, I’m pondering how he’d react. The video below looks fun, sure, but I’m sensing developers Evolved Games have taken a bit of a diversion around realism.(more…)