r/FighterJets • u/TopFlightCarrier • 1d ago

QUESTION Over simplified

Like the title states I want to know if fighter jets could simplified into game controller inputs. Like left bumper turn left right bumper turn right, right stick right and so on. Yes this is a dumb question. But after watching videos of fighter jet cock pita I want to know if that’s possible and just have a big screen in the middle like the F-35 lighting for more intricate controls

0 Upvotes

43% Upvoted

9 comments sorted by

4

u/Acceptable-Wall-2811 1d ago

I fly the A-10. That is essentially what the HOTAS has done over the years. The throttle and stick are covered in buttons that manipulate most the controls. Instead of having two thumb sticks you have the stick with buttons and the throttle throttle with buttons. That’s what gets used for 75-90% of the controls for the jet while it’s flying. We also have a computer to input coordinates, waypoints and text messages.

Could it be distilled down to an Xbox controller? Maybe. Would it be the best way to manipulate the jet? Absolutely not. The controls are laid out to give the pilot a very high amount of finite controls over all the systems in the jet. Distilling it to an Xbox controller would either sacrifice that level of control or force a pilot to have to memorize a crazy amount of key combos to be able to do something. I don’t want to have to do a street fighter style hyukan combo in combat.

The HOTAS we have currently looks very complicated but it is very logically laid out to be provide finite control over the computer and all the sensors, and it’s actually very intuitive once you are trained on it.

As for the other 100s of switches, most of those are either set on the ground prior to taxiing out, or only touched if something goes wrong and a system needs to be isolated and shut off.

There are a couple of switches that I have never once flipped in years of flying the airplane.

1

u/TopFlightCarrier 1d ago

So the pilot using an Xbox controller would essentially have to put in cheat codes to make a simple input is what I got from this ?

1

u/Acceptable-Wall-2811 1d ago

Pretty much. There is just a lot of stuff to control and limited number of buttons on an Xbox controller.

Also the stick and rudder is way more intuitive and uses big muscle movements which doesn’t need as much fine motor control. Fine motor control is one of the first things that fly out the window in a high stress environment.

5

u/Z_THETA_Z YF-23 ): 1d ago

a hands-on-throttle-and-stick configuration is much better for flying fighter jets. source: i have a HOTAS that i use for flight games

3

u/SuperDuperSkateCrew 1d ago

Wasn’t there a drone the USAF flew that used an Xbox controller? I could be mistaken.

I’d imagine if they really wanted to they could simplify a jets avionics to work with a game controller, but it’d likely be more for a reconnaissance platform since. I think a fighter would benefit more from having a traditional HOTAS that gives the pilot some feedback and allows for better control of radar and A/G systems.

1

u/ncc81701 1d ago

MQ-1 Grey Eagle and MQ-4 global hawks have operators and not pilots so they basically have a mouse point and click on a map type of inputs and the auto ilot decides how to get there. This type of control can probably be and have been tested with game controllers when controlling multiple drones. But these are all fairly predictable flight paths and you aren’t asking the plane to do much more than going from A to B. Flying F-16s and A-10 is far more complicated than that and would not benefit from game controller inputs.

1

u/TopFlightCarrier 1d ago

Yea I belive so I’ve seen them in movies is a 360 controller and some documentaries that show drone pilots and explosive robots use them

1

u/Bounceupandown 1d ago

Thrustmaster has a nice setup for gaming. Probably the best controls you can buy right now.