Gunship 2000

The Good
Saddle up, if you think Gunship was great, then prepare to be blown out of your boots with this one.

If you've read my review on Gunship, well let's just say nothing prepared for the sheer excitement the sequel had to offer! Gunship 2000 I repeat is the BEST modern combat simulation around, even by today's standards! (Unless they did come up with something good that I'm not aware of...let me know somebody!)

Everything in this version of Gunship is bigger in every element:

• New Choppers: Once you only had an Apache Longbow, now you have more than one Apache Longbow versions in addition to various other choppers like the Blackhawk, Cobra, etc. Different kinds of choppers provide various combinations of offense and defense (although at most occasions you'd prefer a whole bunch of Apache Longbow D choppers locked and loaded with Hellfire missiles!) Some missions such as rescue missions require you having one Blackhawk chopper for example.
• Wingmen: Once you were a lone pilot, now you can have 4 buddies guarding your behind and see the whole horizon filled up with Hellfire missiles...it really doesn't get any better than that! You wingmen and wingwomen even gain ranks and medals, so it's more character development for RPG fans!

Wow, my limited vocabulary level eludes me from explaining all the great stuff about the game. Every new mission is an anticipation of a new medal or a new rank. New ranks means new wing pilots or new choppers to fly.

This was also the first time I experience the sheer power of the Sound Blaster digital speech in a simulation game. Suddenly my wingman was crying out "Incoming left, right, front, back...dang it all over!" (dramatization). That just blew me away! (that and the sidewinder stuck at my aft!) The sound effects was a major element in this game. Missiles flying, tanks exploding, machine guns roaring...it did it all. Everything just became a little closer to reality, dang they did a great job on this game!

The Bad
So I only get 4 wingmen flying around, that ain't bad. Could use more, but that wouldn't be fun either wouldn't it? Hehe. Gotta find me a good emulator to play this game again.

The Bottom Line
This is totally simulation magic.

The Good
Ability to command more than one helicopter, a sense of strategy, ability to maintain a full squadron, full complement of choppers from scouts to transports to gunships, crew that improves as they do more, randomly generated missions so no two are ever the same, full mission recorder, ability to jump-in at any point and play it through again, full 3D terrain (not just a couple hills on flat land any more)

The Bad
Graphics aren't that flashy, enemies don't really move much if at all (except enemy gunships, which actively seeks you out), difficult to master, generated missions get repetitive after a while, no plot or backstory, just a plain mission briefing

The Bottom Line
Gunship 2000 is one of the best helicopter simulators ever, the only one where you can command a whole squadron of choppers while trying to achieve multiple objectives.

You start as a young warrant officer, only able to command a single chopper. When you get a promotion, you can start commanding more. The missions are randomly generated on a large map that ranges from scouting to search and destroy, from rescue to resupply, and more. You can run a single mission, or trying survive a campaign which will give you a series of missions until the limited war is over.

As a single-chopper sim, GS2K is faithful to all the choppers it simulates. From the ponderous Blackhawk to the nimble Defender and Commanche, to the gunships like Apache, Longbow, and Cobra, they all feel different and play different. However, that's not the best part.

When you get enough experience to command multiple choppers, this turns into the most amazing game. Imagine this... Your other choppers will perform the tasks you assign while you perform search and destroy on your own, or fly escort yourself and let the transport chopper drop off the supplies by itself... As the missions are random, there are infinite possibilities.

Missions range from scout to attack, from rescue to resupply, and everything in between. Bring the right chopper for the right job (for example, it wouldn't do to bring a gunship when you need to rescue stranded Rangers).

The crew (pilot and copilot/gunner per craft) under your command will gain skills as they fly. You can also award them medals and promotions if they did particularly well. Under your leadership, perhaps they will become an elite unit...

In their way will be a variety of enemies, from ground defenses to enemy choppers and jets. Yes, you will encounter enemy jets such as MiG-23's and Su-25's. While they are meant as ground-attack planes, that doesn't mean they don't want to score air kills when they can. Even ground threats aren't easy, with a wide variety of AAA and SAM arrayed against you.

But you got your own tricks too. Two of the choppers have "mast sights", which allow you to locate targets from behind a hill, safe from detection. You can use Sidearm missiles to destroy enemy radars. You got Stinger missiles against enemy aircrafts. You can use Longbow Hellfires to take out enemies from long range. Use rockets (3 types) to shred your enemies, or switch to your chaingun (if equipped) for up-close-and-personal work.

What's really even MORE amazing is the mission recorder. Did you lose one of your choppers? Not sure what happened? Fast forward the "tape" until the place you want and see. Every event is logged and you can see exactly what happened where. Even better, hit a button and you can fly the mission over from that exact point, and see if by doing something different, could you have changed the outcome! (though dead crew and lost chopper will not be restored, this is mainly a practice tool).

The weather is simulated as well, as a hot day can significantly reduce your payload capacity (weapons and fuel), esp. in hot climates.

You can be completely laid back, just drive a small chopper around and let your crew do the missions, or you can do the missions yourself and let your other defend you and clear out the surrounding. It is completely up to you. No other game offers you this much freedom!

This is one of the most amazing simulations ever created. You owe it to yourself to try it on a retro machine.

The Good
Microprose did its magic and produced a wonderful game, accessible by rookies and pros alike. Plenty of choppers to fly in randomly generated missions, progressive career with a squad to command and additional, more capable helos to unlock with coming promotions was a genious move that pushed you to play it more.

Various game modes were available - you could hone your skills during training, where you were invincible. Fly single missions in a selected theatre. After promotion to 2nd Lt you were given access to Flight type missions where you commanded 4 additional helicopters. Finally you would unlock Campaign mode which would take you for a series of missions in a single hotzone, where your goal was to win the war.

All this was dressed in a spectacular 2d artwork of airbase offices, command tents, arming helo pads you could navigate between the missions. The interface resembled a point-and-click adventure game. - it was a great way of increasing immersion.

The game was accompanied by a thick manual, with chapters describing how helicopters operate taken out of Bill Gunston's Modern Fighting Helicopters book. It was a great read for every aviation enthusiast.

The Bad
The flight model wasn't that realistic, on the "Realistic" setting it was more of a nuisance. Games like Longbow Apache from Digital Integration did this aspect way better. Apache Longbow cockpit could also be modernized with 2 MFDs, but that's just a small nitpick.

The Bottom Line
The greatest helicopter flight simulation game of its time. On PC it had a spiritual successor in form of Jane's Longbow series, on Amiga it was never topped by anything else.