This should not have the Jane's Name attached to it. "Advanced Strike Fighters" would be a better name as it is an arcade like flight simulator, nothing like the in-depth realism of the other Jane's titles. I am going to reccomend this game, but for a very specific reason, skip to the last paragraph if you want that break down. The rest of this review will be focusing on all the problems with the game.

The game has some serious flaws. The most jarring is the voice acting. It's horrible. The voice actors don't know what accent they are trying to replicate, and the end result is that 'control' (the guy giving you missions) sounds like a caricature of a middle eastern terrorist, your allies all sound either Russian (maybe) French (sometimes) or just stupid (almost always). And then there is the main character you play, 'Razor', who has less personality then a cardboard box. There is also the stupid decision to reveal major plot points while you are dogfighting multiple enemies. I've screamed 'Shut up control! KIND OF BUSY!" while the middle eastern terrorist is rambling about president Karzei or Dimitriev. Shutting the radio off is probably a good idea in this game, because it will be less frustrating. And the plot is generic and bad anyway, make up your own story as you shoot down enemies.

Moving on, the gameplay. It's not great. Enemy fighter planes spawn and then go after you like a cruise missile. The force balance is blatantly unfair as well, enemy fighters swarm you very quickly, and 10 on 1 furballs are never very fun. Enemy missiles track rather well, and your countermeasures are basically only good for one missile. If you have three flares, and you pop them, the game stops the tracking on three missiles (not all 12 headed at you) so again, not really realistic. AAA fire can't shoot at you until you are within 2 miles, but can then track and hit you constantly (even through mountains) until you are 10 miles away. Enemy SAMs always outrange ground munitions, so wild weasel can be interesting. Now one by one, all of these enemy elements can be dealt with, but usually the game spawns 10 fighters, 4 sams, and an AAA site all at once and tells you 'GOOD LUCK!'. This can be extremely frustrating at times. I played one game where I died five times, but at the end, I had 94 ground kills and 138 air kills, achieveing a kill ratio that would be envied by any air force. But to beat the level, there was no way you could do it on a single life, and this is a gameplay decision that bothers me. Skill should be a factor here.

So that's enemies, what about your plane? Well there is a good selection of aircraft, and they are all sort of rendered nicely. I mean, the graphics in this game are not that great, but they get the job done. One jarring thing for people who like planes, is that when maneuvering the planes surfaces do not move properly. The ailerons and elevators and rudders all work, like on a Cessna, but these are Fly by wire aircraft. Elevators work in tandem to roll planes along with elevators, flaps and ailerons should deploy to aid elevators in pitch maneuvers, rudders function as pitch and yaw assist on most aircraft as well. This is not modeled, unlike say Ace Combat, where the planes are basically pornography. Your weapon selection could best be described as generic. There are no real munitions in this game, all the munitions are made up names with different capabilities. You only really need three to win at this game, the Shrike, Eagle, and Basilisk. The Shrike is a AA-11/sidewinder equivalent, the Eagle lets you pop enemy planes at long range (20 k in this game...) and the Basilisk is a cruise missile with submuntions. You can't loadout your aircraft with anything other then pre-set loadouts, so I'll just tell you that the SU-35BM has this loadout in a 4/4/4 config. Use it the moment you unlock it for every mission. So your weapons are pretty generic and the explosions/missile traces are boring.

Ok, so why am I listing this game as recommended. Well I am saying it is worth buying if it is on sale for only one reason. It is fun to play Co-op. Single player this game is dissapointing, but every mission in the game can be played on co-op mode, and you can have a lot of friends in a single session. The enemy count doesn't change, so the game actually becomes more fair when you fly with wingman, about the only concession to reality the game makes. If you have some friends to fly with, this game is pretty fun to play and the aircraft selection means you can all be flying your favourite modern jet. If you don't intend to play co-op, stay away from it.

This should not have the Jane's Name attached to it. "Advanced Strike Fighters" would be a better name as it is an arcade like flight simulator, nothing like the in-depth realism of the other Jane's titles. I am going to reccomend this game, but for a very specific reason, skip to the last paragraph if you want that break down. The rest of this review will be focusing on all the problems with the game. The game has some serious flaws. The most jarring is the voice acting. It's horrible. The voice actors don't know what accent they are trying to replicate, and the end result is that 'control' (the guy giving you missions) sounds like a caricature of a middle eastern terrorist, your allies all sound either Russian (maybe) French (sometimes) or just stupid (almost always). And then there is the main character you play, 'Razor', who has less personality then a cardboard box. There is also the stupid decision to reveal major plot points while you are dogfighting multiple enemies. I've screamed 'Shut up control! KIND OF BUSY!" while the middle eastern terrorist is rambling about president Karzei or Dimitriev. Shutting the radio off is probably a good idea in this game, because it will be less frustrating. And the plot is generic and bad anyway, make up your own story as you shoot down enemies. Moving on, the gameplay. It's not great. Enemy fighter planes spawn and then go after you like a cruise missile. The force balance is blatantly unfair as well, enemy fighters swarm you very quickly, and 10 on 1 furballs are never very fun. Enemy missiles track rather well, and your countermeasures are basically only good for one missile. If you have three flares, and you pop them, the game stops the tracking on three missiles (not all 12 headed at you) so again, not really realistic. AAA fire can't shoot at you until you are within 2 miles, but can then track and hit you constantly (even through mountains) until you are 10 miles away. Enemy SAMs always outrange ground munitions, so wild weasel can be interesting. Now one by one, all of these enemy elements can be dealt with, but usually the game spawns 10 fighters, 4 sams, and an AAA site all at once and tells you 'GOOD LUCK!'. This can be extremely frustrating at times. I played one game where I died five times, but at the end, I had 94 ground kills and 138 air kills, achieveing a kill ratio that would be envied by any air force. But to beat the level, there was no way you could do it on a single life, and this is a gameplay decision that bothers me. Skill should be a factor here. So that's enemies, what about your plane? Well there is a good selection of aircraft, and they are all sort of rendered nicely. I mean, the graphics in this game are not that great, but they get the job done. One jarring thing for people who like planes, is that when maneuvering the planes surfaces do not move properly. The ailerons and elevators and rudders all work, like on a Cessna, but these are Fly by wire aircraft. Elevators work in tandem to roll planes along with elevators, flaps and ailerons should deploy to aid elevators in pitch maneuvers, rudders function as pitch and yaw assist on most aircraft as well. This is not modeled, unlike say Ace Combat, where the planes are basically pornography. Your weapon selection could best be described as generic. There are no real munitions in this game, all the munitions are made up names with different capabilities. You only really need three to win at this game, the Shrike, Eagle, and Basilisk. The Shrike is a AA-11/sidewinder equivalent, the Eagle lets you pop enemy planes at long range (20 k in this game...) and the Basilisk is a cruise missile with submuntions. You can't loadout your aircraft with anything other then pre-set loadouts, so I'll just tell you that the SU-35BM has this loadout in a 4/4/4 config. Use it the moment you unlock it for every mission. So your weapons are pretty generic and the explosions/missile traces are boring. Ok, so why am I listing this game as recommended. Well I am saying it is worth buying if it is on sale for only one reason. It is fun to play Co-op. Single player this game is dissapointing, but every mission in the game can be played on co-op mode, and you can have a lot of friends in a single session. The enemy count doesn't change, so the game actually becomes more fair when you fly with wingman, about the only concession to reality the game makes. If you have some friends to fly with, this game is pretty fun to play and the aircraft selection means you can all be flying your favourite modern jet. If you don't intend to play co-op, stay away from it.