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Falcon 4.0 is a multiplayer air combat simulation set in the
Korean peninsula with a real-time war in which you take the role
of a single pilot in an F-16 jet fighter. Falcon 4.0's
photo-realistic, texture-ped graphics and detailed models of
the F-16 provide one of the most realistic combat flight
simulations available.
From the Manufacturer
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Falcon 4.0 breaks the -and-sound barrier with its
cutting-edge graphics, realism, dynamic campaigns, and
multiplayer game play. Only Microprose could offer accurate
topographical terrain, detailed radar, and hyper-realistic
flight. Falcon 4.0 is a multiplayer air combat simulation set in
the Korean peninsula with a real-time war in progress in which
you take the role of a single pilot in an F-16 jet fighter.
Falcon 4.0's superb 3-D photo-realistic, texture-ped graphics,
and detailed models of F-16 avionics, weapons, and threats
provide the most realistic combat flight simulation available.
The ongoing simulation of a complex air/land/sea battle, called
the Campaign Manager, creates all the tension, chaos, and
adventure that exist in modern air combat, immersing you within
the game as no other flight simulation has done before.
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Review
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Nearly five years in development, the Falcon 4.0 that finally
hit shelves in December is a bit of a dichotomy. At times, it's
arguably the most detailed, ambitious, and realistic depiction of
modern air war ever attempted. It's a sim that's so full of
details you'll spend weeks making awed discoveries of new
capabilities, of minute aspects of war never before re-created in
a flight sim. At other times, Falcon 4.0 feels like it's more
potential, more promise, than anything else. Bugs, glitches, and
performance problems pop up all too often in some areas of the
sim, a clear indication that even after all that time, the sim
was slipped out the door without enough testing.
So is Falcon 4.0 the second coming of flight simulation or a
buggy mess? Alas, it's a bit of both. Sim pilots willing to
explore the plethora of options in Falcon 4.0 that do work fairly
well, while awaiting the inevitable patches, are likely to find
dozens of hours of play here. But gamers who want to be able to
try any feature and be assured that it will work properly will
want to wait and be sure that MicroProse comes through with its
promised patches.
The promise of the sim is evident when you first open Falcon
4.0's package and are greeted by a monster manual packing
approximately 600 pages. The more methodical players will want to
start with the excellent tutorial section, which features 31
missions designed by F-16 pilot Pete Bonanni.
Of course, if you're more the instant-gratification type, you
can skim the concise Cadet's Guide booklet, jump into the setup
section, activate the easy flight model, simplified avionics, and
exaggerated weapons effects, and dive right into the
instant-action mode. With a variety of realism options, Falcon
4.0 is one of those magic designs that can ease a gamer from
novice to expert, little by little. (Contrast this to Jane's
F-15, which had arcade and expert modes, with little in the way
of intermediate settings.)
Along with training and instant-action modes, you'll find
dogfight mode, which lets you set up aerial encounters between up
to four flights of aircraft. There's also a mission builder for
creating your own missions. The heart of the sim, however, is the
dynamic campaign. It's here that you may find one of the most
engrossing, immersive simulated combat experiences ever.
Unfortunately, it's in the campaign that you'll run across most
of the sim's current problems.
Falcon 4.0's campaign is set in Korea, with three scenarios that
start you with your forces ahead, at a stalemate, or in danger of
defeat. The missions here aren't scripted but rather are
generated on the fly by the dynamic-campaign engine. This tracks
not only the entire air war, but the ground war as well. You'll
see (and hear, on the radio) combat in the skies and on the
ground around you. That's a big part of the sense of immersion -
as you head towards your own target, ground battles are going on
around you, contrails are above you, and air defenses are firing
at flights miles away. Your actions do affect the outcome of the
campaign, but not to an inappropriate degree. Overall, this is
easily the most comprehensive dynamic campaign yet attempted, and
the missions come across in a very realistic way.Much of what
you'll see here will blow you away: surface-to-air missile sites
unleashing volleys of SA-6s at attacking F-4 Phantoms, MiG-29s
engaging F-15s in realistic air-combat maneuvering, and artillery
shelling distant ground forces. Unfortunately, even with the
latest patch, you'll also see wingmen returning to base
immediately after takeoff, AWACS controllers sending you to
intercept enemy planes hundreds of miles off your course,
inaccurate post-mission success ratings, and the rare but
annoying c back to the Windows desktop. In fact, if you're
going to be playing the single-player campaign, you're better off
not installing the initial patch, as the program is more stable
and the AI more intelligent without it.
Where the patch does help is in multiplayer mode. In the initial
release, it was difficult to make a successful multiplayer
connection. With the patch, you're treated to a peek at what has
the potential be an amazing multiplayer experience - once the sim
is tweaked. Not only can you set up multiplayer single missions
and melee dogfights, but you can also have multiple human players
take part in the campaign. Players can enter and leave the
simulation at will, so those with permanent Net connections can
leave the sim up and running as a continuous sever.
Unfortunately, there's no matchmaking server available for
finding other Falcon players.
The sim does excel in flight and systems modeling. The plane
handles in an extremely authentic manner, from the realms of
basic maneuvering through the deadly F-16 deep stall. Be warned
that with all realism options on, Falcon 4.0 should pose some new
challenges for even experienced PC pilots. In fact, despite
15-plus years of sim experience, I broke the landing gear off my
F-16 on seven of my first eight landings. All pertinent cockpit
systems and switches are modeled, with a full suite of air-to-air
and air-to-ground radar modes. The 2D cockpit is "active," so
instead of memorizing dozens of keypresses, you can actually
manipulate the controls on the panel.
Falcon 4.0 features detailed and convincing graphics, sounds,
and special effects. The Korean terrain isn't flashy or vibrant
in color, but if you compare the somewhat hazy look with what you
see out the window on your next civilian aircraft flight, you'll
find the effect is very accurate. Details such as explosions and
burning targets (especially impressive during night missions),
contrails at altitude, and smoke from factories out the
environment. Only the occasional appearance of obviously
polygonal fragments or bizarre purple sparks detract from the
environment.
Be warned that Falcon 4.0 has sent many gamers scurrying to
their local computer stores to buy souped-up hardware. The single
and training missions and instant action and dogfight modes will
run fairly smoothly on a fast Pentium with 64MB of RAM. But the
campaign mode is capable of bringing the fastest system to its
knees when visual details and simulation modeling are cranked up.
My P2/400 system ranged between 10 and 21 frames per second in
campaign mode, compared with 25 to 41fps in dogfight mode. With
less than 128MB of RAM, you're likely to see slight pauses during
campaign missions as data is swapped to the hard drive.
So is Falcon 4.0 for you? Despite the bugs and broken features,
I've been game-locked on this simulation since the day I booted
it, forsaking even the WWII sims I'd waited so long for. No other
sim has come so close to re-creating the feel of my one flight in
a jet fighter. If you stick to the sections that are fairly solid
- the training missions, instant action, and dogfights - you'll
keep yourself busy for quite a while. And hopefully, by the time
you master the plane's systems there, the next patch will be out,
and the campaign glitches will be ironed out. (MicroProse's
Gilman Louie has committed not only to patching all the major
bugs, but also to keeping a team working on the program for up to
six months after release to add user-requested enhancements.) But
if you're the type of gamer who gets really frustrated when
things don't work as they should, you'll want to wait until the
bugs are ironed out. --Denny Atkin
--Copyright ©1998 GameSpot Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction
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