“Identical Houses, Lawns, Dinnerware, and F-16’s (Oh That 50’s Charm!)” Review

“Identical Houses, Lawns, Dinnerware, and F-16’s (Oh That 50’s Charm!)”

This game is for all of you who like your hamburgers medium. Not medium rare,

not medium well, not rare, and certainty not well done. This is for all of you

average Joe’s out there. All of you who like the looks of our Nation’s deadly

flying machines but don’t have the patience nor the inclination to fly one,

or even to attempt to play a hyper-realistic simulation of one.

This

for all of you who like the sleek, sexy, fuselage… but hate the long, aloof

manuals that usually accompany them. F-16 MultiRole Fighter from NovaLogic

is the latest fruit of the partnership between NovaLogic and aircraft maker

Lockheed Martin. Ironically, the pairing of those two companies was supposedly

done in order for flight sims with daddy’s stamp of approval to be released

for the critical masses. Instead (Here is the irony: Get ready) the union has

produced many an unrealistic, albeit enjoyable, game. Not really any simulations,

just games, good ones.

Appropriate games for average Joe and Jill “Cleaver” and their little patriotic

boy and girl scout kids.

Before mentioning anything else about this game, the graphics must get their

due credit. F-16 MF is a gorgeous game. The texture maps on all of the planes

are very highly detailed, the terrain is attractive and exaggerated in height

so that its more fun to fly low on your ingress to target. Your own plane is

a sight to see. I have not ever seen planes looking this good in a sim before.

The texture mapping is damned near photorealistic.

The planes also feature little touches like the ability to see yourself through

the canopy of the cockpit. Best off all, the inside of the F-16 features the

most amazing 3-D virtual cockpit ever seen in a flight sim. It actually looks

better than some 2-D cockpits in sims like Jane’s F-15. F-16 MF

even reflects the control panels on the canopy. In addition, the game runs at

a very high framerate despite its beauty, seriously embarrassing CPU hogging

sims like the aforementioned F-15, or Longbow 2.

A 3DFX is close to a requirement for this one though.

Once you pick your mouth up off of the floor you might also begin to notice

the gameplay present in F-16 MF. Its fun. Most other sims usually elicit

a somewhat more complex, err… different reaction. In F-16 its just… fun. The

gameplay feels very reminiscent of Mission Studios Jetfighter 3 or FullBurn,

without the narrative depth. Slightly aracadish, accessible, in general a fun

little firefight. Aw heck, this game is really rehash of F-22 Lighting 2,

Novalogic’s first polygonal 3D sim.

The planes don’t move completely unrealistically and generally have a moderately

believable feel to them. The difference between MiG-29 and more complex sims

is simple:. You can jump in to this game, familiarize yourself with a few controls,

and kick afterburner within a few minutes, unlike more complex simulations which

require hours of study and an advanced degree in Aeronautical Engineering.

Most avionics

systems are controlled automatically. The plane automatically creates a shoot

list for you that may be cycled through, you actually never have to use you

radar for targeting or identification, its all done for you. Hell, your wheels

even automatically retract after you take off. The designers of this game realized

that they were making an arcadish “simulation” and designed missions that, assuming

you succeed, would make you a triple ace after 20 minutes of game time.

It really is not hard to kill your enemies; missiles usually work unusually

well (the reverse of which being that they are very hard to evade yourself),

and getting kills with the cannon is almost laughably to easy once you get in

range. The lack of realism really shows through in landings and takeoffs. You

have a very, very easy time placing your F-16 back on terra firma. A lot of

this is due to the fact that you can take off and maintain flight at velocities

usually associated with falling like a brick.

But, whether or not this is a realistic or believable simulation of what it

is actually like to fly an F-16, it is still his an enjoyable romp through them

wild white clouds and the dainty blue sky.

Speaking of clouds; F-16 MF features the thickest cloud level in recorded computer

history, a trait inherited from F-22 Lightning II, F-16’s predecessor.

Actually, the engine featured in F-16 MF and MiG

29 Fulcrum (It’s sister game, released simultaneously) is simply an updated

version of the F-22 L2 engine.

Sound is good. There ain’t nothing spectacular in the audio department but

there is nothing wrong there either. Much like the rest of the game the sound

satisfies but doesn’t warrant a letter home to your dead hamsters and other

assorted pets.

The one really superb feature of the game is the included NovaWorld internet

gaming service. Using NovaWorld, internet multiplayer was smooth as silk even

using an older 28.8 modem. It was painless to set up and get into as well.

So, in the overall estimation there isn’t to much to scream in pain about,

and certainly nothing to moan in pleasure about. The game simply elicits a pleasant

grin. Basically it all comes down to this: F-16 MF is a good game for anyone

who has never played a flight sim before but fancies themselves zipping along

at mach 2.5 launching Sidewinders and preserving democracy. On the proverbial

other hand, if you are a flight sim freak, you’d do better to look elsewhere

for you hyper-realistic aerodynamic fix. F-16 Multirole is a solid game with

great graphics, perfect for the Average Joe.