Tiny Combat Arena is a labor-of-love combat flight simulator that aims to strike the perfect balance between a simulator and an approachable, customizable, air combat experience. All executed in a stylized look representing a fictional Cold War-era conflict.

Tiny Combat Arena is an approachable combat flight simulator sporting a stylized look and various game modes. Dogfight your way in the Arena and in Quick Action or craft your own scenarios and take part in a vast war with objectives and friendly armies to support.

Tiny Combat Arena is all about the fun factor of flying, dogfighting, and close air support. Simulation elements are added to the game in service of creating engaging and deep gameplay, never just for the sake of realism. Simulation inspired mechanics, such as boosting a missile's range by launching from above your target, create a new range of tactics for you to explore.

It's your job to arm your jet. Missiles, cannons, bombs; choose your specific loadout for every mission.

Tiny Combat Arena is coming to Steam Early Access on February 22, 2022.

Tiny Combat Arena is a labor of love of a single developer who is very active and open about his development process. This Early Access version is an invitation to all the fans to follow and contribute to the project. Specifics about the tasks and the priorities have even been shared on Trello and constant updates are also published on Twitter.

After the release of Early Access, fans can expect a steady stream of updates.

Tiny Combat Arena Early Access Release Feature List

Menu

• View/read changelog
• Links to MicroProse Discord and development Trello board

Flyable Aircraft

• AV8B - Fictional variant of the AV8 series of aircraft with a more powerful engine and small multi-mode radar. It is capable of vertical takeoffs and landings by angling the engine nozzles, but lacks an afterburner for supersonic flight.
• The AV8B features a fully 3D cockpit with working steam gauges and non-interactive digital displays.

AI Aircraft

The AI in Tiny Combat Arena currently flies a small selection of tactical fighters.

• F-5E Tiger
• F-4E Phantom
• MiG-21bis
• MiG-23MLA
• AV8B

AI Ground Vehicles

The following is the list of ground vehicles that can be found in Tiny Combat. Vehicles operate in formations and will either move to objectives, or seek out other vehicles formations to destroy depending on their type.

• M60A1
• M1
• M1A1
• M113
• T-62 Mod.62
• T-80B
• M113
• BTR-70
• M163
• Shilka M3

Munitions

Bolded are munitions that the player’s AV8B can carry. The others can be carried by both friendly and enemy aircraft.

• AIM-7E / AIM-7F
• AIM-9C / AIM-9L
• AIM-82B
• R-3R / R-3S
• R-23R / R-23T / R-24R / R-24T
• R-60
• AGM-65D
• Mk82 / Mk83 / Mk84
• Mk20 Rockeye

Audio

• Complex jet engine audio that alters the heard sound depending on distance, angle, throttle, and special audio specifically on flybys modulated by camera position and aircraft speed.
• When inside the cockpit, audio heard from outside the cockpit is filtered to simulate being heard through the cockpit, and sounds different from an outside perspective.
  • The strength of this effect can be adjusted in the settings menu
• Speed of sound delay simulation for various explosive effects

Configurable Gameplay Options

• Like many classic flight sims, various options related to gameplay can be tweaked to fine tune the experience to the player’s sensibilities.
• Damage - Player aircraft can be made more durable or invulnerable
• Fuel consumption - Fuel consumption can be reduced or disabled entirely
• Gun ammo - Infinite ammo
• Stores weight - The weight and maneuvering penalty for carrying stores can be toggled
• G-Forces - When pulling G with tight turns, the player will blackout/redout

Controls

• Fully rebindable controls
• TrackIR head tracking fully supported for cameras in flight
• Support for HOTAS and gamepad during flight
• Mouse controls can be configured with different methods of movement for each axis
  • One style is “continuous” which is similar to a virtual joystick and allows for continuous smooth turns
  • Another is “momentary” which is similar to mouse look/FPS style controls where the mouse only momentarily turns the plane

Database

• View all aircraft, vehicles, and weapons up close in a smooth 3D view.
• Performance and statistics numbers are on display, along with descriptions and tactical information for how they fight

Quick Mission Builder

• Choose between three different mission types for instant action
  • Free Flight
  • Dogfight
  • Strike
• Select time of day
• Free Flight lets you pick any map and airfield with choice of airstart, runway start, or ramp start to practice flying and explore unimpeded.
• Configure a team versus team Dogfight with the following options:
  • Allied and enemy squadrons
  • Loadout presets
  • Situation
  • Altitude
• Attack an enemy installation in Strike with the following options:
  • Factions
  • Distance to target
  • Target
  • Allied and enemy vehicle formations
  • Allied and enemy Aircraft squadrons

Arena

The Arena mode is heavily WIP and will be the primary focus of early access development. As such, its current feature set is limited.

• Faction vs faction large scale battle to take control of the map
• Strategic targets are locations on the map which can be captured by both the player’s faction and the AI’s
• Mechanized formations will automatically approach and attempt to capture any enemy strategic targets
• Armored formations will engage mechanized formations and other armored formations
• AI squadrons patrolling their faction’s bases

Flight Model

Tiny Combat Arena’s flight model is designed to hit a sweet spot of realism and accessibility where there are enough simulation inspired elements to add depth and interest, but it’s still kept controllable and streamlined to eliminate tedium and unnecessary complexity.

• Everything is physics based! From the wings, to collisions, and landing gear.
• Ground handling and landings feature bouncy and satisfying suspension and tires
• Thrust vectoring allows for vertical take offs and landings, as well as cheeky tricks like switching to a hover in the middle of a fight
• Wings and control surfaces can be destroyed from collisions and gunfire, resulting in aircraft becoming severely off-balance and spinning
• Loss of control surfaces has a significant impact on handling
• Wind and turbulence add difficulty to low speed maneuvering
• Loaded stores and fuel affect weight and handling
• Fuel consumption places a limit on the length of your sortie, and is affected by throttle settings and altitude

Combat

Like the flight model, the mechanics that dictate the combat in Tiny Combat Arena draw from reality where it adds interest and depth to the gameplay, but is still designed to be easy to pick up and learn for anybody interested in aviation.

• Radars have a limited range and field of view and can only target things that appear on the radar scope
• Passive threat warning detector shows all aircraft who have their radars pointed at you. You’ll always know something is out there before you appear on their scope and can be targeted.
• All aircraft, vehicles, and structures have varying infrared, radar, and visual signatures where the larger the signature the further it can be detected or locked onto by a weapon
• Against aircraft, infrared signatures vary depending on the distance, aspect angle, and state of the engine
• Radar signatures vary depending on the target’s size and aspect angle
• Missiles have their own physics and a finite burning motor, giving them a kinematic maximum range
• Flares can be deployed to spoof infrared dogfight missiles, with their efficacy being affected by aspect and engine state
• UD provides a guided gunsight

Tiny Combat Arena lets you jump in and fly by quickly assembling various types of missions. Take a placid stroll around beautiful scenery, configure a team vs team dogfight against aircraft of your choosing, or strike objectives with ground units to attack and support.

Plan your moves on the strategic map; pick objectives, identify threats, choose which units to support, and where to make a difference. There is a war going on around you, and your participation will affect its outcome.

The in-game database provides players with not only detailed statistics on vehicles, aircraft, and weapons, but also to give tactical guidance on how to approach different aircraft and respond to different threats.

Tiny Combat Arena is in development for PC (Steam).