Iron Draggon
01-18-2006, 09:39 AM
Guess this topic should've been posted in Classic Gaming instead of Modern Gaming, so trying it again here. If the mods would be so kind as to lock the other one, that would be great. Didn't seem to get much attention there.
http://www.digitpress.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=78317&highlight=wingnuts
Anyhow, I finally got about halfway through the game on the trivial level last night, which was still hard as a bitch as it progressed. On the easy level, I still haven't made it past level 3 yet. So I don't even want to know what a bitch it is on the diabolical level. I imagine it's pretty much impossible.
But if you are a fan of Time Pilot at all, you MUST play this game! You can try it free for 30 days I think, but after that if you want to keep playing it, you have to pay $20 for a registration code. So you have no excuse not to at least try it. It used to be available on CD, but now it's download only. I lucked out and got one of the last CD's on ebay.
OK, on to the gameplay. It starts out pretty much exactly like Time Pilot, but with much bigger levels and alot more levels. You have a simple single shot and 3 ships. You fly around and destroy all the planes, collect all the goodies you can, and you might get to power up your shot once to a kinda wavy single shot. Get shot down and you go back to your original single shot though, so weapon upgrades are only effective for the ship that collects them. No big explosion of goodies when you crash to help you power back up either, so survival is very important, especially with only 3 ships. There is no way to adjust the number of ships that you start out with, so you'll have to earn more.
After all the planes are destroyed, a huge boss plane will appear on your radar. Destroy it and an aircraft carrier for you to land on will appear on your radar. Land on it and the level is completed. By the way, you start off each level by taking off from an aircraft carrier too, which disappears after you take off. You also get a brief time of invincibility when you take off, to help you cut a path through the swarms of enemies, if they happen to be in the vicinity. Each level starts out randomly generated, so there may be a bunch of goodies nearby, or absolutely nothing in sight but miles of sea and clouds and islands here and there.
So off to the right, you have a radar screen to help you navigate, a weapons bay that shows what weapons you have and how many of each, and a shield level monitor. Yes you do have an automatic shield that allows you to take several hits before being shot down, and if you collect the goodie for it, you can increase it or replenish it. So keep an eye on how many hits you take as well, to see if you're in danger of being shot down. You have to watch everything.
As you progress, eventually you'll gain the ability to drop bombs. There's a crosshair directly in front of your plane to help you aim them at all times, even when you don't have any bombs. Press a seperate key to drop them, but keep an eye on how many you have, because you don't have an unlimited supply of them like you do with regular shots.
Bombs can be dropped on any target in the sea or on one of the islands. At first there will only be a few bunkers to take out on the islands. Later, a few bunkers will be in the sea as well. As the game progresses, there will be enemy ships in the water, but also civilian sailboats, so you have to be careful not to bomb civilians, or you'll be penalized.
If you continue to survive, eventually you'll gain the ability to fire guided missiles. You'll only have a limited supply of those too, and they are launched by pressing another key.
Missiles are highly effective against bosses. Save all you have and launch them all at a boss, and you'll either take it down or you'll be very close to taking it down with a just few more shots. If you get this far, you're really rockin'.
There are 30 levels in all, and I died on level 15. I would never have made it that far if I hadn't picked up some extra ships along the way, and I found that the best way to clear the levels and keep advancing is to just ignore all the bomb targets and avoid their fire. You don't have to clear out all the bomb targets to make the boss appear, only all the enemy aircraft. So after it got to a point where there were way too many bomb targets to even try destroying them all, I just concentrated on shooting down enemy planes and avoiding everything coming at me but the goodies.
Now talk about everything coming at you, SHEESH, if this game doesn't help you to become an ace at Time Pilot, there is something seriously wrong, or you just suck. And if you already are an ace at Time Pilot, this game will utterly humiliate you. I'm sure that you'd do alot better than I did, but there is still so much coming at you and so much to avoid, it makes Time Pilot look like a training course for this game. Besides enemy fire, there's stuff like air mines to avoid, and so many different types of enemy fire with different behaviors you'll be busy enough just trying to stay alive if you get far enough into the game to see it all.
Yeah, and I only made it HALFWAY through the game...
At some point, there will be helicopters in the air as well, and I forgot to mention that there will be zeppelins before that. I didn't live long enough to see any helicopters, but I know there will be some. The game progresses through the ages of aviation, just like Time Pilot does, but it takes alot longer to do it. So presumably at some point there will be some UFO's as well, but I'm only making that assumption based on Time Pilot. The developers claim that the game was inspired by Time Pilot (obviously) and 1942. So I don't know for sure that it has UFO's in it, but I'm hoping it does.
Anyway, you have to experience this game in person to fully appreciate it. It's actually a few years old now, as it was released in 2002, but I only recently discovered it. I first played it while waiting for a pizza at a Schlotzsky's that had a few MACS with it installed on them, and I was instantly hooked. So you can get it for the MAC or the PC, but it looks and plays about the same on either system.
Check it out here:
http://www.freeverse.com/wingnuts/
http://www.digitpress.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=78317&highlight=wingnuts
Anyhow, I finally got about halfway through the game on the trivial level last night, which was still hard as a bitch as it progressed. On the easy level, I still haven't made it past level 3 yet. So I don't even want to know what a bitch it is on the diabolical level. I imagine it's pretty much impossible.
But if you are a fan of Time Pilot at all, you MUST play this game! You can try it free for 30 days I think, but after that if you want to keep playing it, you have to pay $20 for a registration code. So you have no excuse not to at least try it. It used to be available on CD, but now it's download only. I lucked out and got one of the last CD's on ebay.
OK, on to the gameplay. It starts out pretty much exactly like Time Pilot, but with much bigger levels and alot more levels. You have a simple single shot and 3 ships. You fly around and destroy all the planes, collect all the goodies you can, and you might get to power up your shot once to a kinda wavy single shot. Get shot down and you go back to your original single shot though, so weapon upgrades are only effective for the ship that collects them. No big explosion of goodies when you crash to help you power back up either, so survival is very important, especially with only 3 ships. There is no way to adjust the number of ships that you start out with, so you'll have to earn more.
After all the planes are destroyed, a huge boss plane will appear on your radar. Destroy it and an aircraft carrier for you to land on will appear on your radar. Land on it and the level is completed. By the way, you start off each level by taking off from an aircraft carrier too, which disappears after you take off. You also get a brief time of invincibility when you take off, to help you cut a path through the swarms of enemies, if they happen to be in the vicinity. Each level starts out randomly generated, so there may be a bunch of goodies nearby, or absolutely nothing in sight but miles of sea and clouds and islands here and there.
So off to the right, you have a radar screen to help you navigate, a weapons bay that shows what weapons you have and how many of each, and a shield level monitor. Yes you do have an automatic shield that allows you to take several hits before being shot down, and if you collect the goodie for it, you can increase it or replenish it. So keep an eye on how many hits you take as well, to see if you're in danger of being shot down. You have to watch everything.
As you progress, eventually you'll gain the ability to drop bombs. There's a crosshair directly in front of your plane to help you aim them at all times, even when you don't have any bombs. Press a seperate key to drop them, but keep an eye on how many you have, because you don't have an unlimited supply of them like you do with regular shots.
Bombs can be dropped on any target in the sea or on one of the islands. At first there will only be a few bunkers to take out on the islands. Later, a few bunkers will be in the sea as well. As the game progresses, there will be enemy ships in the water, but also civilian sailboats, so you have to be careful not to bomb civilians, or you'll be penalized.
If you continue to survive, eventually you'll gain the ability to fire guided missiles. You'll only have a limited supply of those too, and they are launched by pressing another key.
Missiles are highly effective against bosses. Save all you have and launch them all at a boss, and you'll either take it down or you'll be very close to taking it down with a just few more shots. If you get this far, you're really rockin'.
There are 30 levels in all, and I died on level 15. I would never have made it that far if I hadn't picked up some extra ships along the way, and I found that the best way to clear the levels and keep advancing is to just ignore all the bomb targets and avoid their fire. You don't have to clear out all the bomb targets to make the boss appear, only all the enemy aircraft. So after it got to a point where there were way too many bomb targets to even try destroying them all, I just concentrated on shooting down enemy planes and avoiding everything coming at me but the goodies.
Now talk about everything coming at you, SHEESH, if this game doesn't help you to become an ace at Time Pilot, there is something seriously wrong, or you just suck. And if you already are an ace at Time Pilot, this game will utterly humiliate you. I'm sure that you'd do alot better than I did, but there is still so much coming at you and so much to avoid, it makes Time Pilot look like a training course for this game. Besides enemy fire, there's stuff like air mines to avoid, and so many different types of enemy fire with different behaviors you'll be busy enough just trying to stay alive if you get far enough into the game to see it all.
Yeah, and I only made it HALFWAY through the game...
At some point, there will be helicopters in the air as well, and I forgot to mention that there will be zeppelins before that. I didn't live long enough to see any helicopters, but I know there will be some. The game progresses through the ages of aviation, just like Time Pilot does, but it takes alot longer to do it. So presumably at some point there will be some UFO's as well, but I'm only making that assumption based on Time Pilot. The developers claim that the game was inspired by Time Pilot (obviously) and 1942. So I don't know for sure that it has UFO's in it, but I'm hoping it does.
Anyway, you have to experience this game in person to fully appreciate it. It's actually a few years old now, as it was released in 2002, but I only recently discovered it. I first played it while waiting for a pizza at a Schlotzsky's that had a few MACS with it installed on them, and I was instantly hooked. So you can get it for the MAC or the PC, but it looks and plays about the same on either system.
Check it out here:
http://www.freeverse.com/wingnuts/