I had high hopes for this; being both a fan of the Tom Clancy games (especially since I was one of the few people who bought EndWar on day one, it seems) and of less-than-sim flight games, this was potentially a match made in heaven. I also managed to play this title at the EG EXPO in London last year, so I had a hands on pretty early on in the development cycle.
So let’s start off with the obvious. The visuals are gorgeous, almost to the point where they seem too good to be real; beyond realistic if you will. It has the Tom Clancy style to it, and when you look at the sprawling city down below you as you have a small reprieve before dogfighting, it looks amazing. Above you is as equally impressive, and the sight of your plane going through the clouds in Assistance OFF is really something to behold. The detail to the planes themselves is just enough to avoid being noticed as bad, but planes other than yours do not have the same level of high-quality textures, and that’s good. After all, who cares how many polygons a plane 3000m+ away from you has? All you’re meant to care about is the missile you fire, the lock it has, and the satisfyingly impressive explosion when you take it down.
The sound is also top notch, and trumps it’s closest rival (Ace Combat 6) in every aspect apart from the Voice Actors. They just feel stereotypical. You have your Commander, the bad-ass rough talking Ground Commander, the Smooth talking, almost smarmy wingmen; all of which you will immediately associate the voices with the task they perform. This isn’t a bad thing, since you don’t expect to look in the top right corner for every video transmission, but I expected more from a titled series that is well known for it’s well developed characters. The planes, the gunfire, the missiles, even the sound of the air rushing past, is excellent and, at the defaults at least, the volumes are perfect and immerse you within a minute, to the point of hearing missiles rushing past.
The controls are where Ubisoft have deviated from the standard mantras of a flight game, and this is to it’s credit, as it creates more of an arcade-like feel to the game, as it is much faster paced (enhanced by the voices) than dogfighting games I have played. Essentially, you have two modes. Assistance ON, and Assistance OFF. With Assistance ON, you get the ERS, which is ‘fly through this path to win’, and is used in interception, ground attack, and dodging missiles. It’s an interesting way of doing things, and it keeps in tune with the near future universe (that features Ghost Recon, and EndWar) of technological assistance to aide the pilot/soldier in his duties.
The Assistance OFF mode is where things get weird, though. By tapping either LT or RT twice (Or saying ‘Assistance OFF’ with your headset on and the Voice Commands on), you enter a different view where the central focal point is the gap between you and your target, with you on one side of the screen and your lock on the other. You have to line your plane up, get close enough, and fire, but the sense of perspective is lost. However, I feel this is intentional, since Assistance OFF gives you full control of the plane to compensate. The manoeuvres that were mentioned in THIS article (also from us good folks at GamesAreEvil) can only be performed in this mode, and it is satisfying to execute these to dodge missiles, or lock onto your opponent.
I think with this game, you’re either going to love it or hate it, depending on whether you have played any flight games before, and how accurate and sim-esque they were. Some will love the assistance, some will hate it. But it does create a unique feel, and sets it out as a Tom Clancy game, unifying it with the near-future universe the titled series has created.
Tom Clancy’s H.A.W.X. Demo is available now on Xbox Live, and will be available to PS3 owners on February 13. H.A.W.X. will be released on Xbox 360 and PS3 on March 6 for both PAL and NA regions, on the PC on March 13, with a Wii version yet to be dated.
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