Knite
03-23-2006, 06:07 AM
So last night the Blazing Angels demo was released onto the marketplace. This is a game I was HIGHLY anticipating (moreso than Burnout, Oblivion, or even GRAW until recently). Luckily, I got out of class early, got home, and immediately started the download.
Blazing Angels, for those who aren't in the know, is a World War II aircraft themed flight game. It is definitely a flight GAME and nowhere near a flight sim. If you were looking for a game in which to adjust trim, feather your prop, of adjust fuel mixture, this is totally not for you. For those who just love WWII aircraft, and want to blow stuff up, it may be.
Graphically, this game is pretty. Very pretty. The art direction really had their heads together and made something beautiful. While Call of Duty 2's visual style reflected more of the Band of Brothers / Saving Private Ryan style of lighting and destruction, this game feels more to me like a Vietnam movie. It's dark, dingy, dirty, smoky, hazy, etc. That's not a BAD thing. The smoke effects on downing an aircraft are fantastic. The aircraft models themselves are also quite good, although sometimes look a hair too "smooth". Ailerons, Elevators, and even flaps all move in expected manners, and are a nice detail. When you speed up, you get a motion blur around the edges of the screen, and when firing your machine guns in a long burst, it begins to darken at the edges of the screen. But the best is the ground. Wow did they do a number here. London stretches as far as the eye can see, and viewing distance is more than acceptable. Flying over the beach at Dunkirk, you can actually see as men scramble across the beach to awaiting retreating ships. Ships firing shells make splashes of water all around, and the explosions of shell hits are quite nice. You can actually see jeeps, people, etc all in motion while flying up above.
Sound wise, this demo is good. Perhaps that's not fair to say. The sounds are all clean, crisp, and clear. The music is quite good for what I heard/noticed. The only thing I was a little dissapointed in was that I was hoping for a little more "punch", but that may have just been me and my system. The surround effects seem to work very well and you can hear engines and bullets wizzing by in all sorts of directions. One thing I LOVE is all of the radio chatter you hear. You can hear the German pilots baiting you to fight, as well as screaming when they die, and the British/Yank pilots yelling about 6s needing clearing and such. Very nice touch. =)
Gameplay and controls... This game is arcade through and through. But it does work pretty well. The demo was a little easy, but hopefully the full game will have scalable difficulty. Planes do handle differently, albiet, not anywhere close to realistically. I've seen stall notices, but never stalled out. You can turn and turn forever. The closest comparison I can make is the gameplay of Crimson Skies, with a hint of a Brothers in Arms perhaps. You take off from your airfield, get assigned missions, and do your deed, which is typically blowing stuff up. Later in the demo you get a couple of wingmen which you can order to be agressive, passive, or defensive. They each have special abilities that recharge as well, including repair (which induces a sort of button matching mini-game), massive attack (one of the aircraft just starts shredding the enemy), and defense (one of the aircraft makes sure to keep your 6 cleared as best as possible). These specials DO impact the game, and can make a big difference. The controls are where I have the biggest beef. I can fully understand and respect that this is an arcade game, I really can. But does that mean I MUST play with dumbed down controls too? You hit up/down on the left stick to go down/up, left and right to TURN left and right. On the right stick, up and down is throttle, left and right is roll. Personally, I find this to be very limiting, and will often get turned upside down or completely the wrong direction because of it. I would have much prefered a left stick up/down/roll left/roll right and right stick faster/slower/rudderleft/rudderright control scheme, but there wasn't a way of changing in the demo. Here's hoping for that possibility in the full game. There is also not really any way of changing the camera angle, except for a "padlock" view which BA calls "Follow cam". Basically whatever target you are looking at, a pull of the left trigger will turn your head and follow that target wherever they go. Makes for some really cool as hell views actually. I kinda like it. The right trigger fires guns. Left bumper lowers and raises landing gear. A button switches targets. Clicking in the right stick drops bombs. When you are targeted on a ground target, you get a glowing red "bomb target" below you, showing where the bombs will land. Easy and fun =)
Overall I am still definitely looking to purchase this as when it all boils down to it, the game is just fun.
Blazing Angels, for those who aren't in the know, is a World War II aircraft themed flight game. It is definitely a flight GAME and nowhere near a flight sim. If you were looking for a game in which to adjust trim, feather your prop, of adjust fuel mixture, this is totally not for you. For those who just love WWII aircraft, and want to blow stuff up, it may be.
Graphically, this game is pretty. Very pretty. The art direction really had their heads together and made something beautiful. While Call of Duty 2's visual style reflected more of the Band of Brothers / Saving Private Ryan style of lighting and destruction, this game feels more to me like a Vietnam movie. It's dark, dingy, dirty, smoky, hazy, etc. That's not a BAD thing. The smoke effects on downing an aircraft are fantastic. The aircraft models themselves are also quite good, although sometimes look a hair too "smooth". Ailerons, Elevators, and even flaps all move in expected manners, and are a nice detail. When you speed up, you get a motion blur around the edges of the screen, and when firing your machine guns in a long burst, it begins to darken at the edges of the screen. But the best is the ground. Wow did they do a number here. London stretches as far as the eye can see, and viewing distance is more than acceptable. Flying over the beach at Dunkirk, you can actually see as men scramble across the beach to awaiting retreating ships. Ships firing shells make splashes of water all around, and the explosions of shell hits are quite nice. You can actually see jeeps, people, etc all in motion while flying up above.
Sound wise, this demo is good. Perhaps that's not fair to say. The sounds are all clean, crisp, and clear. The music is quite good for what I heard/noticed. The only thing I was a little dissapointed in was that I was hoping for a little more "punch", but that may have just been me and my system. The surround effects seem to work very well and you can hear engines and bullets wizzing by in all sorts of directions. One thing I LOVE is all of the radio chatter you hear. You can hear the German pilots baiting you to fight, as well as screaming when they die, and the British/Yank pilots yelling about 6s needing clearing and such. Very nice touch. =)
Gameplay and controls... This game is arcade through and through. But it does work pretty well. The demo was a little easy, but hopefully the full game will have scalable difficulty. Planes do handle differently, albiet, not anywhere close to realistically. I've seen stall notices, but never stalled out. You can turn and turn forever. The closest comparison I can make is the gameplay of Crimson Skies, with a hint of a Brothers in Arms perhaps. You take off from your airfield, get assigned missions, and do your deed, which is typically blowing stuff up. Later in the demo you get a couple of wingmen which you can order to be agressive, passive, or defensive. They each have special abilities that recharge as well, including repair (which induces a sort of button matching mini-game), massive attack (one of the aircraft just starts shredding the enemy), and defense (one of the aircraft makes sure to keep your 6 cleared as best as possible). These specials DO impact the game, and can make a big difference. The controls are where I have the biggest beef. I can fully understand and respect that this is an arcade game, I really can. But does that mean I MUST play with dumbed down controls too? You hit up/down on the left stick to go down/up, left and right to TURN left and right. On the right stick, up and down is throttle, left and right is roll. Personally, I find this to be very limiting, and will often get turned upside down or completely the wrong direction because of it. I would have much prefered a left stick up/down/roll left/roll right and right stick faster/slower/rudderleft/rudderright control scheme, but there wasn't a way of changing in the demo. Here's hoping for that possibility in the full game. There is also not really any way of changing the camera angle, except for a "padlock" view which BA calls "Follow cam". Basically whatever target you are looking at, a pull of the left trigger will turn your head and follow that target wherever they go. Makes for some really cool as hell views actually. I kinda like it. The right trigger fires guns. Left bumper lowers and raises landing gear. A button switches targets. Clicking in the right stick drops bombs. When you are targeted on a ground target, you get a glowing red "bomb target" below you, showing where the bombs will land. Easy and fun =)
Overall I am still definitely looking to purchase this as when it all boils down to it, the game is just fun.