Red Baron Review

Anannya Sen’s Review

Take to the skies in this 3D flying romp.

Red Baron is set during the Great War (WWI for non history buffs). In it you pilot a biplane I think and have various missions where you have to gun down enemy planes, survive a certain time limit or bomb an enemy base.

The graphics are in 3D and look lovely in the opening scene. They are not quite like this in the game although they are still pretty decent. You get a really nice perspective on some of the buildings below which stretches depending on how you fly over them. The actual planes themselves are well detailed if a little small at times. You can tell the enemy as their planes are grey and have the enemy symbol on it. The different seasons are also depticted really nicely and there are some night missions! The backgrounds are full of nice details, but what really makes this game nice from a graphical point of view is the animation on the barrel rolls and loop the loops. You get a nice sense of actual movement. Sound isn't bad, although not amazing as you only get a nice intro tune and some tunes when you get a victory in the game. I would have liked to have had some of the sound effects of the planes during the game as well as the sound of gunfire as this would have given it a really nice atmosphere.

The controls are not bad, use the D or key pad to rotate the plane. Pressing up with speed the plane up and down will slow it down. The main button or 5 will fire and you can perform aerial manoeuvers with 7 for a barrel roll, and 9 for a loop the loop. Oh, if you want to drop bombs then press the 3 button.

The game is a lot of fun to play. I might be a little biassed as I love flying games and even though you play the part of a French pilot, I imagined myslef as Captain Flashheart from Blackadder Goes Forth. Woof!! Anyway, it's great fund flying around in the sky and tailing an enemy plane while trying to gun it down. The enemy planes do move around a bit, but they are fairly easy to track, it's only when you have multiple ones that it gets a little tricky. You can refuel and stock up on bombs by flying back to your base and there are a number of different missions in the story mode. Clocking each one will bring up that landscape for the dogfight mode, and maybe it was the version I was playing, but there were no additional planes to unlock. It's also a great feeling when a plane is on your tail and you loop the loop to end up behind them and then gun them down yourself. Shades of Top Gun. One gripe I do have is that with a small keypad, flying around and also dropping bombs at the same time was a little tricky as the bomb button was 3. This meant it was a little difficult to get my hands in the right place so for accuracy's sake I ended up flying with my left hand and pressing the button with my right only when I wanted to drop bombs otherwise I kept running out of them because I was missing the target. There are a number of different missions and you actually face off against real pilots from history including the infamous Red Baron himself!!

Lastability isn't bad, although not as great as playability. There are 9 missions in campaign mode and therefore 9 stages to unlock in dogfight mode. The game will save your progress and the missions get tougher. The objectives are varied too, sometimes you have to survive within a time limit, others you have to take out enemy installations and then you have the basic destroy all the planes scenario. In addition to the campaign mode you also have a dogfight mode where you can just have fun by engaging in pure battle. There are three scenarios such as "kill them all" and "battle with an enemy ace" and you can choose the season, time of day and number of opponents to fight. It's a lot of fun flying around and the graphics and animation make this game pretty enjoyable.

Worth a look if you like these sorts of games!