F-15 Strike Eagle II

The Good
Lots of action, lots of planes to kill, plenty of targets to hit, lots of things happening around you

The Bad
Too simplified, recycled F-19 graphics engine, director's mode interrupts the flight, enemies just keep coming with no end, almost no friendlies around, enemy SAM sites near your airbase

The Bottom Line
F-15 SE2 is the sequel to the classic, and this time they recycled the F-19 sim engine, with modified missions and vastly simplified the interface. Instead of lots of different missiles and bombs to drop and shoot, you're limited to just gun, Sidewinder, AMRAAM, and Maverick (which works on everything, contrary to reality). While this simplifies the action, it also makes the battles very repetitive, as the battle basically becomes a battle of endurance, as you try to stretch out your fuel and ordnance to get as many kills as possible after completing both primary and secondary objectives, in order to get a high score. When you run out... You're mobbed by the enemy, as it's not possible to dodge missiles coming from all sides... Then you try to make it home before you fall out of the sky. Not exactly a fun game after you "got" the idea.

The Good
Well the ease of control and play was fun and exciting. This is a great game to break into flight sims. It doesnt take that much time to get a feeling of the controls and start playing. I just loved simulating the attacks in Western Europe. Great weapon selection and mission brefing. Excelent replayability. I would still play this title if the graphics didnt look like a joke.

The Bad
Well this is really a acrade game. It is not a sim per say but in my book its all right with me.

The Bottom Line
Was a great game for its day, but you REALLY have to have a low graphics tollerance to play it today. (not to mention a slow machine)

Still Two joysticks up.... I mean thumbs.

The Good
"Atmospheric Haze"

The Bad
It was the F-19 engine with a different aircraft. Althought they said they wanted to "emphasise an more arcade-like experience", well, F-19 was already very easy. This added nothing.

Worse, I bought it with a box that had a big red "Understanding Desert Storm" sticker on it. "Great!" I thought "They've added Desert Storm Scenarios." No, they hadn't. Same old (non-Iraqi) scenarios.

I think I played this for less than an hour.

The Bottom Line
Shameless, and it was one of Microprose's failings. Too often they'd take a game engine and slap umpteen "new" games out of it. They should have been breaking new ground (and by that, I don't mean investing in arcade machines which ended up sending the company broke).