Hacker Chronicles 2/HACKER2.BIN/1808.JETF2.REV

Text File | 1991-06-29 | 8KB | 148 lines

 JETFIGHTER II

 From the moment you leave the ground in JETFIGHTER II, you can't help
but be impressed by the smooth frame rate and sensation of speed when
flying close to the ground. This sequel to the original JETFIGHTER, by
Velocity Development for the IBM, certainly gets high marks for the frame
rate and 256-color graphics. Unfortunately the air combat portion of the
simulation doesn't rate as well.

 JETFIGHTER II simulates 4 different fighters: the F/A-18, F-14, F-16,
and F-23 Advanced Tactical Fighter. Velocity guessed wrong about the
AFT...the F-23 lost its bid to be the next next generation fighter for
the Air Force, but it's still a worthy choice for a simulation. The AFT
cockpit has state of the art multi-function displays (MFD's). A more
conventional cockpit is used for the other three planes. The exterior
appearance is different for all 4 aircraft.

 The 256 color graphics are very good. With the full detail options, you
get a gradient sky and ground haze effect. The sky cycles through
different colors, all the way through to a deep violet at night. The sun
and moon rise and set, depending on the hour. About half the combat
missions take place at night.

 The forward view covers a very large area of the screen. Many
simulations reduce the outside view to keep the frame rate high.
JETFIGHTER II manages to get a very good frame rate and still animate a
large area of view.

 There isn't much ground detail. You can see a few fields and roads, and
occasionally, small groups of office buildings or farm buildings. The
only available area for flying is California, and San Francisco is shown
in good detail. Windows in the smaller buildings light up at night - a
neat touch. Dots appear on the ground at low altitude to help you judge
your height.

 I was very impressed by the sensation of speed. Most simulations have an
unrealistically slow motion when near the ground. JETFIGHTER II, while
still nowhere near the relative speed of the real thing, does much
better than most flight simulations in conveying a sense of high speed
near the ground.

 Less attention was paid to the flight model. The plane handles well, and
there's a good sense of inertia when changing your flight path, but
that's about it on the positive side. The aircraft does not lose
altitude in a tight bank at slow speed, and turns are the same radius at
all airspeeds. When throttling back from afterburner or full throttle,
the aircraft loses speed much too quickly... it's as if you popped a
drogue chute every time you chop the throttle. Stalls are unrealistically
forgiving, but the slow speed performance during landing is good.

 The missions all start at a home air base or aircraft carrier. A free
flight mode lets you check out the aircraft and practice landings. The
carrier catapult is good, if a little weak in the sound department. The
carrier recovery is outstanding... the best I've seen so far in a flight
sim, mostly do to the impression of speed. An ILS system helps line you
up on approach, and then disappears from your HUD at the last second so
you get a clear view of the carrier deck. At night the sea and carrier
are both very dark, which gives you a realistic adrenaline rush when
landing. The only thing missing is a "meatball" on the carrier to indicate
approach angle... you'll have to use the ILS and your eyes on final
approach.

 Adlib/Soundblaster effects are hit and miss. The engine sound is muffled.
It almost sounds like an airliner cabin, but it's not bad. For some reason
the sound gets quieter when you light the afterburners. The wheel chirp
when landing sounds realistic. There's a very good explosion sound when you
auger in, but no sound at all for bombs or enemy plane explosions.

 The 124 page manual describes the basic operation of the aircraft, but
does a poor job of explaining the weapon systems. Advanced hyper-velocity
missiles are available on the AFT but are barely mentioned in the manual.

 The game includes a joystick calibration routine which you do once, then
you save the parameters to disk. The joystick control is very good, with
no tendency to drift. A keyboard control option is available, but a mouse
may only be used for menu selection, not controlling the plane.

 The scenario for the combat missions is right out of a Dale Brown
novel. Latin American rebel drug dealers have invaded California, backed
up by private air force of high-end Soviet aircraft. Maybe this is a
good excuse for using the San Francisco scenery database from the
original JETFIGHTER game, but I would have preferred a more realistic
scenario.

 The game has 120 different missions. You can select them individually
or play in "Adventure" mode, which simulates the course of a war against
the rebels. Your success or failure then determines which missions you
get and how the war progresses, but the game is still selecting from the
same list of canned missions.

 I was very disappointed in the actual combat missions. They follow
the same general format - you're usually given three ground targets,
and there are two or three enemy planes in the air. A single SAM is
fired at you soon after takeoff, which you can shake easily by dropping
flares and chaff. That's the last you'll see of enemy ground fire except
for a decorative but harmless flak burst effect every now and then.
Ground targets are completely undefended - you waltz right in and bomb
them without being shot at once. After you take out the two or three
enemy planes in the air, the program generates no new ones.

 The enemy planes are not very aggressive in the majority of the
missions... you can circle lazily and they often won't even shoot at
you. In the higher numbered missions they are more likely to shoot
back, but still curiously unaggressive compared to other air combat
sims. At the highest numbered missions you'll sometimes get one that
will climb on your tail and be almost impossible to shake. At one point
I throttled down to 150 KTS, and saw from the target display on the MFD
that the MiG right behind me was doing 500 KTS but still not passing me
(or shooting).

 Some of the missions are very strange from a design standpoint, like the
one that has you blow away three unarmed, unescorted transport planes.
That kind of thing may happen in war, but I felt more like a terrorist
than a combat pilot while flying that mission. All of this is especially
frustrating because there are no difficulty levels to set. It's all at
the same easy level.

 Weapons are the usual range of air to air missiles, but the only
available air to ground ordinance is iron bombs. No Mavericks, no
Paveways, no Rockeyes... none of the "smart bomb" technology you would
expect on an advanced fighter. There is no computerized delivery system.
A target designator lights up on the HUD but there is no other assist
for bombing - you just eyeball it.

 JETFIGHTER II lacks any other features that would help sustain interest.
There is no custom mission builder, and no camera replay. So the main draw
is the smooth frame rate and slick 256 color graphics. A confirmed flight
simulation fanatic might want it just for the carrier landing - that part
really is very good. A beginner at air combat sims might appreciate the low
threat level of the missions. But most fans of air combat simulations are
used to being shot at now and then, and having to fight their way in to a
target. For them, JETFIGHTER II is a pretty shell with no real substance.

 I experienced lockups on three of the missions. Velocity has released
a patch to correct these bugs, and it's available for downloading in the
Compuserve GAMPUB forum. The game will not run under the QEMM memory
manager, you must boot from a Dos floppy to run it. An update is available
to correct this too, but it requires contacting Velocity and mailing in
your original game disk for a replacement.

 There is no copy protection. Velocity deserves credit for helping
support the trend away from copy protection.

 JETFIGHTER II is published and distributed by Velocity Development.