by a decent partner (or, more accurately, wingman) AI. But that’s where the imbalance comes in; allies in this game are a little dense. In fact, occasions when the player is desperately trying to evade a particularly persistent enemy while their allies are flying around the other side of the map in apparent sight-seeing formation occur just a little too often in the game. Sure, it’s great to feel like a hero and take out tons of enemies, but dying a lot and spending ages trying to work your way through a handful of bad guys water the achievement down a bit. And, while the removal of the insane stunts seen in the first game adds a bit of realism, it would be nice to do the aeronautical version of a hand-brake turn to get rid of these enemies, like we could before. The game also enjoys punishing the player from time to time. Dying in some places means a whole lot of stuff that needs to be repeated. The checkpoint saving system could have been a little more generous. Other more realistic elements have been added to the game. The camera, for example, now sits tight on the back of the player’s plane. While the player can move it around
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a bit, to check out the surroundings, the extreme range external camera of the first game, which took on a fixed position and let the player fly around in a non-third-person view is gone. Take-off and landing has also been added, with the occasional mid-mission refuelling and re-arming required by the game. There are even occasions when midair refuelling is required. The saving grace of this game is the four player co-op multiplayer mode. It’s the best thing to do in H.A.W.X 2, without a doubt. This is a fun title, and is a lot more realistic than the previous H.A.W.X game. But there are more than a few issues that players may find annoying. It doesn’t manage to ascend past the limits of arcade sim, either, even with the added realism. The game features some unreasonable difficulty spikes too, but offers many varied activities (including gunnery from a Goliath and stealthy UAV missions). In the end, this one will really come down to what the player wants to get out of it. Forgiving gamers who are looking for a good arcade sim will draw the most benefit from H.A.W.X 2. g
gamecca review • issue 16 • October 2010