Jet Fighter IV: Fortress America Review (no fat)

Game Description

Every once in a while, people seem to get tired of realism in games. After all, this is why they are called games, and this is why we also have a reality. The usual Tolkienism is one way to get away from reality. What we have here is another.

Jet Fighter IV: Fortress America - US and them

Everything in the Jetfighter IV universe seems to be a little strange. The plot on which the game is loosely based involves a strange alliance between Russia, China and North Korea, an alliance referred to as the Coalition. The Coalition against USA is an immediate danger, and their first big plan is an attack on California. At this point, you probably understand who has to stop them.

What happens next depends on you, an American pilot. Jetfighter IV: Fortress America doesn't let you pick any faction but the US, giving you the choice of three planes: the F/A-18 Hornet, the F-14 Tomcat and the F-22 Raptor. The choice of planes is accompanied by a quite comprehensive fact sheet for each of them, a veritable documentary for those who actually know something about planes.

The game itself takes place around a quite lengthy and challenging campaign, with several theaters of operation involved. The missions involve several types of actions: some of them will require you to intercept an enemy convoy, others require bombing, and still others involve just typical dogfights. The developers did a pretty good job with mission design: no two missions will be the same. There are even some nocturne dogfights, a nice twist on the usual chase-the-guy's-tail.

After fulfilling the initial mission objectives, you have two options. You may either execute a sweet return to base, or simply choose the newly introduced option of just ending it from the menu. However, you should keep in mind that while returning to base, some bonus objectives may appear.

Jet Fighter IV: Fortress America Gameplay

Goodbye, blue sky

The gameplay in Jetfighter IV continues the tradition of the Jetfighter games. The accent falls on the combat itself, and a lot has been done to provide a simpler simulation. Unfortunately, many players, and not just hardcore simulation fans, will feel that Mission Studios took this a little bit too far.

What will annoy you most will probably be the game’s physics engine. It goes without saying that the physics in Jetfighter IV are not a complete representation of what happens in reality. However, trying to provide as much dynamism as possible, the designers sort of missed the point. The plane doesn't really feel like flying. In fact, as you move along and do more complicated tricks, you will almost feel it's a submarine and it's actually submerged in an ocean you can't see. In addition to this, despite having three different planes at disposal, you won't feel any difference between them. This will be very obvious even to those who don't know much about planes: the big fat F-14, which is essentially a plane for interception and ground attack, handles just like the much slimmer Hornet.

The gameplay itself is fun though, despite the flaws of the physics engine. It takes a while to get used to the fact you don't really feel like flying, but after that, everything works like a charm. Many of you will feel pleased to see that they can easily make complicated maneuvers and deal with adrenaline-filled dogfights without having to digest a whole tome of keystrokes and tactics. Boring traveling can be solved with time compression or the Landscape Traversal mode. The latter does seem a little bit useless, because it only speeds up the plane, not the simulation, so it's available only in Free Flight mode.

However, there are two things that taint the gameplay. The first problem is the relatively steep difficulty curve involved in the campaigns. In their latest stages, the campaigns feel a little bit unrealistic. Anyone with at least minor military experience would realize that no mentally sane general would stack up the troops you encounter, unless his espionage works so well that he reads the enemy's orders instead of his newspaper while having breakfast. This makes the operations seem rather artificial. The second problem is that the AI is not exactly brilliant. In fact, while there would be some good things to say about your enemies' AI (their squadrons even have some interesting maneuvers which sometimes end up having one or two enemies on your tail), your wingmen will sometimes make you prefer you were alone. However, this is easily solved because they are a rather easy target for your enemies.

In addition to this, the game's replay value is seriously affected by the lack of a good set of single player missions. The developers did include a random mission generator, but just like with the physics engine, it's just more random than it should be. Many of the randomly generated missions will drop you in some plane's cockpit with a missile already locked on you!

There is also a multiplayer mode available, which was subject to some slack in the original version, because the multiplayer setup screen was available, but the mode itself was not. This was later solved by a patch, and now you can join a free-for-all 16-player match.

Jet Fighter IV: Fortress America Graphics and Sound

Actually we don't know where you've been, but if you have ever been in a plane above San Francisco, you may recognize it. Even the default scenery is very detailed, and there is a set of higher-resolution textures available on the second CD.

There's actually quite a lot to see in Jetfighter IV. The planes are nicely detailed and the graphics effects themselves are fine, without stressing out the CPU too much. The audio tracks selection is quite interesting too, somewhat reminiscent of the old Raptor, if anyone remembers it.

Jet Fighter IV: Fortress America Cost

Jet Fighter IV: Fortress America retails at 24.99$

itself takes place around a quite lengthy and challenging campaign, with several theaters of operation involved. The missions involve several types of actions: some of them will require you to intercept an enemy convoy, others require bombing, others involve just typical dogfights. The developers did a pretty good job with mission design: no two missions will be the same. There are even some nocturne dogfights, a nice twist on the usual chase-the-guy's-tail.

After fulfilling the initial mission objectives, you have two options. You may either execute a sweet return to base, or simply choose the newly introduced option of just ending it from the menu. However, you should keep in mind that while returning to base, some bonus objectives may appear.

Goodbye, blue sky

The gameplay in Jetfighter IV continues the tradition of the Jetfighter games. The accent falls on the combat itself, and as much as possible has been done to provide a simpler simulation. Unfortunately, many players, and not just hardcore sim fans, will feel that Mission Studios took this a little bit too far.

What will annoy you most will probably be the physics engine. It goes without saying that the physics in Jetfighter IV are not a complete representation of what happens in reality. However, trying to provide as much dynamism as possible, the designers sort of missed the point. The plane doesn't really feel like flying. In fact, as you move along and do more complicated tricks, you will almost feel it's a submarine and it's actually submerged in an ocean you can't see. In addition to this, despite having three different planes at disposal, you won't feel any difference between them. This will be very obvious even to those who don't know much about planes: the big fat F-14, which is essentially a plane for interception and ground attack, handles just like the much slimmer F/A-18.

The gameplay itself is very fun though, despite what we mentioned about the physics engine. It takes a while to get used to the fact you don't really feel like flying, but after that, everything works like a charm. Many of you will feel pleased to see that they can easily make complicated maneuvers and deal with adrenaline-filled dogfights without having to digest a whole tome of keystrokes and tactics. Boring traveling can be solved with time compression or the Landscape Traversal mode. The latter does seem a little bit useless, because it only speeds up the plane, not the simulation, so it's available only in Free Flight mode.

However, there are two things that taint the gameplay. The first problem is the relatively steep difficulty curve involved in the campaigns. In their latest stages, the campaigns feel a little bit unrealistic. Anyone with at least minor military experience would realize that no mentally sane general would stack up the troops you encounter, unless his espionage works so well that he reads the enemy's orders instead of his newspaper while having breakfast. This makes the operations seem rather artificial. The second problem is that the AI is not exactly brilliant. In fact, while there would be some good things to say about your enemies' AI (their squadrons even have some interesting maneuvers which sometimes end up having one or two enemies on your tail), your wingmen will sometimes make you prefer you were alone. In fact this is easily solved, because they are a rather easy target for you enemise.

In addition to this, the game's replayability is seriously affected by the lack of a good set of single player missions. The developers did include a random mission generator, but just like with the physics engine, it's just more random than it should be. Many of the randomly generated missions will drop you in some plane's cockpit with a missile already locked on you.

There is also a multiplayer mode available, which was subject to some laughing in the original version, because the multiplayer setup screen was available, but the mode itself was not. This was later solved by a patch, and now you can join a free-for-all 16-player match.

Don't worry, we know where you've been

Actually we don't know where you've been, but if you have ever been in a plane above San Francisco, you may recognize it. Even the default scenery is very detailed, and there is a set of higher-resolution textures available on the second CD.

There's actually quite a lot to see in Jetfighter IV. The planes are nicely detailed and the graphics effects themselves are fine, without stressing out the CPU too much. The audio tracks selection is quite interesting too, somewhat reminiscent of the old Raptor, if anyone remembers it.

Price

Those of you who have some luck can still find a copy of Jetfighter IV. The game was initially sold for 24.99$ but you should be able to find cheaper copies at the moment. It's a good investment, especially if your PC is not exactly up to date.