World War II. Europe. 1943. The
Allies front line pushes forward into Europe, challenging the Axis hold on
precious strategic positions. This war is waged primarily in the air, as dogfights streak
the sky with large-caliber bullets and the yellow sizzle of tracer rounds. Your overtaxed
engine whines as you pull off a last-minute maneuver to get the German ace into your
sights. Just before you pull the trigger, your children ask about dinner, and the phone
rings. Reluctantly, you realize its time to emerge from the most detailed and
immersive World War II PC combat flight simulator ever.
Microsoft launches
you into the skies with MS Combat Flight Simulator III. But the emphasis in this version,
ironically, is taking players down to earth, as the tree line and the ground have become
much more detailed. Northern Europes farmland is visible down to the rocks in the
fields, and you can almost smell the pinesap in those trees. Anti-aircraft guns will also
make an appearance, mixing up strategy and threatening to ruin your day. On the inside
youre protected by a fully rendered cockpit--complete with rudder pedals and control
sticks that move as directed. Bombers feature a glass floor for watching the rolling green
hills and enemy installations slide by. A heads-up display features flight instruments and
a targeting cone to help keep you on the right track. And if things get too hairy, you can
soar into the clouds and take a moment in their hazy white cover. Of course, so can your
enemies.
In this release,
your pilots will operate on a sliding scale of attributes detailing their gravity-force
resistance and eyesight. As they fly more missions, their g-force resistance increases,
but as they age their eyesight weakens. In order to compensate you can bring in
reinforcements by having friends fly with your squadron or man your planes guns or
bomb bays, via internet or LAN.
Mission styles
include air superiority, close air support, and tactical bombing. However, the most
exciting aspect of CFS3 is its interactive, non-linear missions that change every time
theyre played, so that no mission is ever the same twice. Enemies attack from
different directions at different times. Subsequent missions regulate themselves according
to the players skill in previous missions, so that novice players face easier
missions than skilled players in the same campaign, and missions are always challenging
without lapsing into the impossible. Moreover, the campaign isnt just a linear
collection of missionsits your whole tactical strategy. AI-controlled allied
planes fly simultaneous missions in other parts of the map, or your friends fly those
missions in multiplayer, so that the front, and the whole war effort, progresses at once,
with differing results each time. The game just keeps recreating itself, making
replayability virtually infinite.
There are more
than thirty different airplanes to choose from, all of them faithfully created from the
original specifications. Also included is a simulation of an airplane that never really
existed. At the end of the war, allies discovered German plans to build a flying-wing
style plane. While theres no evidence that the plane was ever built, CFS3 made those
plans a virtual reality. Now you can sit in a pilots seat the German air force could
only imagine.
Start limbering up that trigger fingertakeoff is scheduled for this fall.