Jane's USAF - PCGamingWiki PCGW (2024)

Jane's USAF
Developers

	Pixel Multimedia
Publishers
	Electronic Arts
Release dates
Windows	October 19, 1999
Taxonomy
Monetization	One-time game purchase
Modes	Singleplayer, Multiplayer
Pacing	Real-time
Perspectives	First-person, Third-person
Controls	Direct control, Voice control
Genres	Action, Vehicle combat
Vehicles	Flight
Art styles	Realistic
Themes	Europe, Middle East, Cold War, Contemporary, Historical
Series	Jane's Combat Simulations


⤏ Go to series page
US Navy Fighters	1994
Jane's Advanced Tactical Fighters	1996
Jane's AH-64D Longbow	1996
Jane's US Navy Fighters '97	1996
Jane's Longbow Gold	1997
688(I) Hunter/Killer	1997
Jane's Fighters Anthology	1997
Jane's Longbow 2	1997
Jane's WWII Fighters	1998
Jane's F-15	1998
Jane's Israeli Air Force	1998
Jane's Fleet Command	1999
Jane's USAF	1999
Jane's F/A-18	2000
Jane's Attack Squadron	2002
Jane's Advanced Strike Fighters	2011

1 Availability
- 1.1 Demo
2 Essential improvements
- 2.1 Official patch
- 2.2 Tackleberry's patch
- 2.3 WineD3D renderer
- 2.4 Thunderbirds Missions
3 Game data
- 3.1 Configuration file(s) location
- 3.2 Save game data location
4 Video
5 Input
6 Audio
- 6.1 Localizations
7 Network
- 7.1 Multiplayer types
8 Issues unresolved
- 8.1 Multiplayer menu crashes the game
9 Issues resolved
- 9.1 Flickering in gameplay, black screen in menus
10 Other information
- 10.1 API
11 System requirements
12 Notes
13 References

Warnings

SafeDisc retail DRM does not work on Windows Vista and later (see Availability for affected versions).

Jane's USAF is a singleplayer and multiplayer first-person and third-person action and vehicle combat gamein the Jane's Combat Simulations series.

As of Windows XP, the game has had severe compatibility issues ranging from unresponsive menus and rendering problems. Tackleberry's patch is required to properly run the game on modern systems, at the cost of multiplayer mode no longer working.

Availability

Source	DRM	Notes	Keys	OS
Retail		Comes on two CD-ROMs. Disk 1 is required for playing without Tackleberry's Patch due to SafeDisc DRM^{[Note 1]}.

SafeDisc retail DRM does not work on Windows Vista and later (see above for affected versions).

Demo

A free demo version is available from GameFront.

Essential improvements

Official patch

The version 1.02 patch provides graphical optimizations, improvements and fixes to gameplay. It can be found Bob's Your Uncle or GameFront.

Tackleberry's patch

Latest version (which includes the WineD3D renderer, see below) can be found here.^[3]

A common 2015 version can be found here for troubleshooting purposes.

Tackleberry's patch removes the disc check, fixes all images including bitmaps (.BMPs), ranks, and scroll menus, and fixes support for Windows Vista and newer.

Multiplayer does not work.

Even with this patch applied, USAF.exe will remain with compatibility settings on. All of them except "Run as administrator" need to be deactivated to ensure stable gameplay.

WineD3D renderer

Download link

Reliable graphics renderer which supports widescreen resolutions

It has to be selected in the USAFConfig.exe application.

Requires a registry entry in HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Wine\AppDefaults\USAF.exe\Direct3D (handled by running wine.reg in latest Tackleberry patch):

"VideoMemorySize"="64""OffscreenRenderingMode"="backbuffer"

Thunderbirds Missions

Thunderbirds Missions is a free official add-on which adds three new missions and a special F-16C model.

Game data

Configuration file(s) location

System	Location
Windows	<path-to-game>\Pilots\*.ini^{[Note 2]} <path-to-game>\Pilots\Master\Player.ini^{[Note 2]}

Save game data location

System	Location
Windows	<path-to-game>\Pilots^{[Note 2]}

Video

Graphics feature	State	Notes
Widescreen resolution		Menus are 800x600, but the simulation is widescreen. Supports all resolutions listed in Windows. co*ckpit is stretched.
Multi-monitor
Ultra-widescreen
4K Ultra HD
Field of view (FOV)		FOV increases with resolution. No custom FOV.
Windowed		See the glossary page for potential workarounds.
Borderless fullscreen windowed		See the glossary page for potential workarounds.
Anisotropic filtering (AF)		Supports bilinear and trilinear filtering.
Anti-aliasing (AA)		See the glossary page for potential workarounds.
High-fidelity upscaling		See the glossary page for potential workarounds.
Vertical sync (Vsync)
60 FPS and 120+ FPS
High dynamic range display (HDR)

Graphics settings (1/4)
Graphics settings (2/4)
Graphics settings (3/4)
Graphics settings (4/4)

Input

Joystick calibration application (JoystickSetting.exe)

Keyboard and mouse	State	Notes
Remapping
Mouse acceleration		No acceleration.
Mouse sensitivity
Mouse input in menus		Mouse works in menus and is used to toggle co*ckpit buttons in simulation. No turning with mouse.
Mouse Y-axis inversion		Mouse does not control any looking in game.
Controller
Controller support		Joysticks are supported. Unknown if gamepads are.
Full controller support		Menus require the mouse.
Controller remapping		Joystick is fully remappable.
Controller sensitivity
Controller Y-axis inversion

Controller types

XInput-compatible controllers

PlayStation controllers

Generic/other controllers

Additional information
Controller hotplugging
Haptic feedback
Digital movement supported
Simultaneous controller+KB/M

Audio

Sound settings

Audio feature	State	Notes
Separate volume controls		Speech, engine, background, and effects volume can be toggled separately. A master controller is also available. Volume changes do not occur in real time; changes have to be accepted to be applied.
Surround sound
Subtitles
Closed captions
Mute on focus lost
Royalty free audio

Localizations

Language	UI	Audio	Sub	Notes
English
Hebrew
Spanish

Network

Multiplayer types

Type	Native	Players	Notes
LAN play		16
Online play		8	JanesCombatNet servers have been shut down.

Issues unresolved

Multiplayer menu crashes the game

With Tackleberry's patch, clicking on the multiplayer menu will crash the game to desktop.

Issues resolved

Flickering in gameplay, black screen in menus

Disable compatibility settings
Right-click on `USAF.exe`, and choose Properties. In the Compatibility tab, uncheck all options except "Run as administrator" Click on Apply, then OK.

Other information

API

Technical specs	Supported	Notes
Direct3D	6

Executable	32-bit	64-bit	Notes
Windows

System requirements

Windows
	Minimum	Recommended
Operating system (OS)	95, 98
Processor (CPU)	Intel Pentium II 266 MHz	Intel Pentium II 350 MHz
System memory (RAM)	64 MB
Hard disk drive (HDD)	600 MB	1.2 GB
Video card (GPU)	DirectX 6.1 compatible

Notes

↑ SafeDisc retail DRM does not work on Windows 10^[1] or Windows 11 and is disabled by default on Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8, and Windows 8.1 when the KB3086255 update is installed.^[2]
↑ ^2.0 ^2.1 ^2.2 When running this game without elevated privileges (Run as administrator option), write operations against a location below %PROGRAMFILES%, %PROGRAMDATA%, or %WINDIR% might be redirected to %LOCALAPPDATA%\VirtualStore on Windows Vista and later (more details).

References

↑ Not Loading in Windows 10; this will break thousands of - Microsoft Community - last accessed on 2017-01-16
↑ Microsoft - MS15-097: Description of the security update for the graphics component in Windows: September 8, 2015 - last accessed on 2018-02-16
↑ Jane's USAF by Tcklbrry - SimHQ Forums - last accessed on May 2023