Personal Computer News


Flight Simulation
By Myrddin
Amstrad CPC464

 
Published in Personal Computer News #105

FLIGHT SIMULATION

This is the first of its kind, so you have to look at it in a particular light. There are many other flight simulators (especially one for the IBM PC, which seems to have become a yardstick) but they don't run on the CPC464, so they're irrelevant.

Or are they? Since Neil Armstrong crashed a mock-up of the lunar module the game has moved on.

The myrddin flight simulation has limitations: the 3D ground-plan is rudimentary, the view forward flickers unpleasantly, and you won't be able to practise much in the way of aerobatics. On the plus side the simulator is easy to get to grips with, performs logically, and has a decent range of performance levels determined largely by the speed you select.

Flight Simulator

The windscreen and instrument panel are drawn painfully slowly but once you're rolling the dials move smoothly. Take-off is a straightforward matter of opening the throttle and taking off the brakes - landing needs more care, but Myrddin has written in a kind of Immelmann turn whereby touching the ! key switches you abruptly through 180 degrees, so that you can practise landing immediately after take-off.

Besides a manual, the game comes with a map of the terrain - try to cross the edges of the flight simulator's universe and you're bounced back.

With limitations on speed and altitude, and with the ability to execute only a fairly shallow turn, the package is more a test of navigation than of piloting skills. The terrain gives you three runways to try out, but you have to find them first. The landmarks are colour-coded line drawings with token perspective. The controls are simple and easily memorised, but some are like a steering wheel with too much free play.

There will surely be better flight simulators for the Amstrad than this, but as the first of its kind considered in isolation it's an entertaining piece of software.

David Guest

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