Heroes of the Pacific, Airborne ass-kickery! Options

[DazDaMan]

The first I heard about this game was a tiny snippet in the Daily Star saying that, because the flying portions and ocean graphics were so realistic, it carried a health warning as it could induce motion sickness!! Intrigued, I Googled for more info.

What I found was a console-based flight-sim that lets you take part in the fierce battles between the Allies and the Japanese over the Pacific Ocean from 1941-45. Further Googling found fantastic screenshots and a short video file showing the various aircraft in action – and it looked pretty bloody sweet! So, without further ado, I bought the game on the way home from work. The shop monkey told me that he’d heard a customer raving about it – “basically just point and shoot” – and copies of it had been literally flying off the shelves. Already my excitement was building – I just hoped it wouldn’t seriously suck!!

First thing I did was have a bash at the tutorial stages – always a good idea so that you know how to handle your fighter in a combat situation. You start off flying from Hickham Field, in Hawaii, near the famous Pearl Harbor. What struck me straight away was how realistic the scenery was – it could have come straight out of a photo album! Using the “professional” set of controls allows you to perform manoeuvres that are more useful in a dogfight. The “arcade” setting simply allows you to bank and climb or dive, although using the right-hand mushroom (which also acts as your throttle) does allow you to roll the plane – this gets too confusing, and also is more likely to get you annihilated! Yep, go the “professional” way when selecting your control option, and you can’t go far wrong!

Now, into the missions. First off: defend Pearl Harbor. Shoot down incoming bombers and fighters etc. The movies make it look too easy! This is where HotP’s strengths lie – the dogfights are very realistic! Japanese Zero fighters, Val dive-bombers and Kate torpedo bombers all coming whizzing towards you at high speed, guns a-blazin’. You’ll be amazed at how a simple interception mission can quickly become a twisted, turning, rolling dogfight very quickly. The enemy aircraft’s AI is pretty impressive. Sneaking up on them from below is guaranteed to get results, but get spotted and you’ll find a dozen pissed-off Zeros heading your way!

Later missions involve a fair amount of ground attack, bombing, rocketing and strafing enemy boats and vehicles as they try to invade islands, or your own forces try to invade while you wipe out the defending Japs. Again, the realism. Bringing your P-40 Kittyhawk (or whichever plane you have selected) down low and letting loose with your .50in machine-guns brings forth spurting sand, raining shell-cases, and shockwaves from exploding vehicles. As you zoom heavenwards, anti-aircraft guns blast away with convincing ferocity (which makes me wonder what this baby would sound like on a good sound system!).

As you progress through the game, you are told the story of the war in the Pacific, giving it extra purpose for being a flight-sim. You’ll fight your way through something like 26 missions during the campaign, unlocking numerous playable aircraft from both sides of the conflict, which can also be upgraded depending on how many points you receive for completing a mission. Some fighters are available, despite not actually being involved in this part of the war!

There are four difficulty settings – rookie, pilot, veteran, and ace. Naturally, for each one there will be more bandits than you can shake a stick at, so be advised to start off gently, no matter how good you think you are!

Graphics for the game are excellent. As has been expressed before, the realism is outstanding, even for the PS2 version, and scenery could have come straight from a photo album. The planes are very realistically rendered, although a little care could have been taken to mark the US fighters properly (the star-and-bar is only visible on the upper surface of the port wing, and the under surface of the starboard – it’s not hard to get right!). Another niggle I have is that the Seafire III (the naval variant of the Spitfire, and another of the fighters you can unlock) has a weird gun model – it should have its cannon and machine-guns spaced out along the wings, not all clumped together! Grrrr!! The other two variants are spot on, although there was no MkVII version (I know, I know, stop being pedantic!).

Sound-wise, as I have said, I would love to hear this baby on a good stereo system, as the sound effects are very realistic! When attacking enemy ships, for example, and getting everything but the kitchen sink flung at you, you can hear your plane being pummelled by the anti-aircraft fire in a way that I’ve never heard before!

Providing you set the control option to “Professional”, you will probably survive better than if you used the “Arcade” setting. If your plane is armed with bombs, a view through a bombsight is provided so that you can line up and release your ordnance. While this would be fine and dandy if it was a bomber (which aren’t really available for some reason – and the PBY Catalina is NOT a bomber!), for a fighter it’s pretty naff. While the bombers (!) have remotely-controlled defensive guns, the fighters do not, and I find it better to make repeated attacks on a target, such as a ship, with numerous dive-bombing runs. Sitting still like that over the target area whilst trying to drop your bombs is a bloody silly idea! Although you do get designated dive-bombers in the game, for both sides, I find that the job can be done just as well with a fighter-bomber with a little practice and numerous attempts.

During the game, you get opportunities to test your mettle against the Japanese fighter aces. Get your tactics right, and the resulting battles will be quite quick and less stressful.

I finished the game in just under a fortnight, which averaged about two missions a night (or one if it was a particularly difficult mission). The last mission, for me, was a bit of a let-down, as it seemed too easy to finish on the rookie setting. If I go back and try it on the harder settings, I’ll probably change my tune!

A solid 9 out of ten for this game! Why should you get it?

A) You might like old warplanes.
B) You might like to blow shit up.
C) Both A & B!!