Gunship (published 2000)

When I finally picked up Gunship in August 2001 I really didn't expect much performance out of my Celeron-466with a Creative 3D Blaster Banshee graphics accelerator.

This was before I upgraded my RAM, so I only had 64 MEG which was really a bare minimum for gaming even in 2000 when the sim was released.

I was amazed to see the sim run smooth as silk with all the graphic sliders maxed out! And the graphics are GOOD. Very good. At low level the terrain gives you a real rush. You can actually fly between stands of trees and use them effectively for masking.

I also had the sim running at 1024 x 768 and the frame rate remained silky.

This sim is geared for quick action with the emphasis on tactical flying and fighting rather than button pushing. It's a blast!

The terrain was the most realistic of any sim in 2000. Fly up a road at 50 feet with the transparent cockpit on and prepare to be amazed.

Hitting enemy armour doesn't necessarily stop it dead - often it will keep rolling and smoking until a final explosion flings off the turret and leaves it literally rocking in it's tracks. Sometimes crew will bail out and engage you with shoulder launched missiles.

Between the trees, terrain, SAMs, AAA and enemy choppers I found staying alive damn difficult. Difficult but fun.

Just flying around in Gunship is fun and it doesn't require a monster machine.

An excellent 3rd part to the venerable Gunship series!