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Microsoft Combat Flight Simulator 3 Review - PC

The shrill of the air raid siren breaks the uneasy quiet of the mid afternoon. Organised chaos breaks out as 8 pilots race to there battle worn spit fires. The sound of 8 Merlin engines rumbling to life as you jump into the cockpit looking around the instrument panel you do a cursory start up check and kick the engine to life. Looking to the ground crew you see the signal for chocks clear and it is full throttle. The whole cockpit rumbles with the thumping Merlin engine. You know your life depends on getting the drop on the enemy, now it is a battle to gain altitude. Passing 8,000 ft you notice a glint of sunlight above and ahead. Swearing into the oxygen mask you know this isn’t going to be a good start. What was just a speck against the sky quickly grows and shows the outline of 8 Bf 109’s. In seconds you give the orders for the first wing to break and continue climbing, while your wing is to attack from below knowing it is likely that any attack from below is a fight for survival from the start.

Can you make the decisions to send men to there death and ensure victory? Do you have the skills to dogfight in the skies over England and bomb the enemy to the next stone age. This is what faces you in the third installment of Mircosoft’s combat flight simulator.

Gameplay

This is Microsoft’s third installment in there Combat Flight Simulator Series and this time they have combined the campaign strategy of the second world war to the flight simulator genre where the choice and success of your mission will determine the battle front and overall victory.

The first impression that I got from MSFCS 3 was from the highly detailed aircraft models that they have replicated. Jumping straight into Quick combat you get a full feel of the detail that has gone into the simulation aspect of the game from the detailed aircraft models to the faithful reproduction of the flight characteristics of each aircraft.

You can pilot any of the 18 aircraft from America, England and Germany, which are on your flight line. You can truly get the feel of the awesome power of the P-51, the manoeuvrability of the Spitfire and feel the tension of flying slow and vulnerable bombers. However key bombers are missing, such as the heavy bombers like the B-17, B-24, and Lancaster, which were key to this period of the war. MSCFS3 does support third-party add-on aircraft, so it will be likely that these will be added later.

The game play of the simulator part is typically what you would expect of a flight sim is meant to be. It is very realistic in replicating the flight characteristics of these WWII aircraft, no longer can you scream ... (continued next page)