I’m finished with ‘Leisure Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards’ and loved it. I played the VGA version first and then ran through the EGA version – both were very simular from a game-play perspective but of course the chicks were much hotter in VGA 😈
Next up is Red Baron, a game I’ve been meaning to play for a while. This was a CGW game of the year and it was still being talked about and selling well in ’93 (it was released in ’90), so it was a very successful game at the time. I have it as part of a ‘Sierra award winners’ compilation, as selected by CGW! The documentation is fantastic and provides some good background on WW1 air combat, which lead me to some further reading. At the start of the war the planes were extremely basic – the Wright Brothers were still experimenting with powered flight up until about 1910, and WW1 of course began mid 1914, so that gives an indication of how primitive the machinery was. Early on, flight was used for reconnaissance only, with enemy pilots doing nothing more than exchange a friendly wave if they encountered each other. Then they started shooting at each other with handguns, and before long they had mounted machine guns and Ace pilots started racking up the kills.
Red Baron (the game) uses the simplicity of the aircraft to its advantage – flying an aeroplane is actually very easy in this sim, but actually shooting the enemy down requires practice because the aeroplanes are so slow to manoeuvre and the weaponry is so primitive. The enemy AI is very good too, so they’re all over your tail before you know what hit you. It could be frustrating, but it’s actually very addictive and rewarding, and on top of a the fun flight mechanic there’s a variety of mission types and an almost RPG-like career mode in which you take a rookie all the way through the war (if he survives). New planes are available as they’re developed (all historically accurate), and as you rise the ranks you can request transfers to other air bases, get challenged by other Aces, etc. There’s way more to this game than meets the eye and I’m loving it so far.
I started playing it on a 386DX40 which I thought would handle it fine, but with all the settings cranked up it was struggling a bit, so I’ve broken out a 486DX2 66 instead. The 486 is perfect for the job and the graphics are pretty spectacular for such an old game. Sound Blaster is supported but sounds pretty average – I think it’s using FM only. Fortunately the MT-32 is also supported and the sound effects and music are really quite amazing on the Roland. Before getting an MT-32 I’d assumed that it would only play music, but of course games can load up their own sounds which allows the MT-32 to do machine gun fire, etc. My MT-32 is being driven by a Pro Audio Studio’s MPU041 via the joystick port – this is the first time I’ve tried this and it works well.
For a joystick I’ve gone with a CH Flightstick, which is a great stick 2 button stick. I haven’t used a joystick in a long while and was finding the ergonomics of it very uncomfortable, so I made myself an arm rest (the ironing board looking thing in the below photo) and it’s much better – being an Ace pilot is a young mans’ game apparently!
Red Baron 2 was pretty disappointing from what I’ve read, but are there any other good WW1 flight sims? The game-play or Red Baron combined with a more modern graphics engine would be pretty god damn fun.
Life? Don't talk to me about life.
