After numerous requests I am posting a mini-review on MiG Alley. I had
hoped to have the boxed copy by now, but I do not. With all the
curiosity, however, and the need for an opinion and a recommendation,
I'm diving in at the deep end.
In spite of not having received the patched version, I have
about twenty five hours in MiG Alley. Most of that time was in June and
July, with another few hours this past weekend. I've received some mail
that my first review (after having heard that MiG went gold and that
the code I had was final, which turned out not to be the case) was
discouraging. Time to make a clear statement. What is the bottom line
for MiG Alley?
Now you know that when you ask a journalist for an opinion you
are going to get an ear full, along with a lot of qualifications. Need
I say that MiG isn't perfect? Have you ever received the first edition
of any sim that was?
Knowing what I know about MiG, would I go out and buy it? Yes. In fact, I would run out and buy it. Let me tell you why.
Sabres and MiGs
Where else in the PC world can you hop in and dogfight MiGs in
F86 Sabres, escort B29s into North Korea, pound the ground in Korea in
an F51 or F80, or fly CAP in an F84? Let's face it, I could stop right
there and many would feel they were in heaven.
But that ain't all that is here. You can even fly a MiG 15. And you
can do all this in a fully dynamic campaign setting that rivals the
best out there (Note: Only the fifth campaign is fully dynamic.)
Not sweet enough yet? How about a full featured COMMS ability
to command your squadron, and wingmen that more reliable than most of
the sims out there?
A tough customer, huh? What about an integrated ground war where
resource and supply is critical, the ability to control and alter the
campaign according to your own strategic priorities, and the ability to
plan each mission including loadout for the flights? The mission
planning ability in MiG surpasses that of Falcon 4.
"Enough," you say! "I'll buy it already!" You should. MiG is a hardcore
simulation that will grow with you. The configuration options will
allow you to enter at a level where you are comfortable, and you can
crank up the realism as you learn. Better still, you don't have to plan
a single mission if you prefer not to. But when you have the time or
the motivation, you can delve into the strategic game and really have
some fun!
"Alright," you say, "You've almost got me sold. But what about
the flight modeling? What about the graphics? I've read on the forums
that it ain't that great. Give me some specifics." Read on. I'm
breaking with our tradition here for a mini review and scoring each
area out of TEN.
Down and Dirty
There are two lessons that you need to learn before sticking
your neck into Usenet or the COMBATSIM.COM™ forums. Lesson one is
"everyone is an expert." No, they aren't, but they think they are.
Don't take Joe TopGun's word that there is something wrong with the
flight model. He probably has never flown an F86 Sabre and he heard
someone else who has never flown one complain about the modeling. He
has no idea.
Lesson two follows from Lesson One. "One man's treasure is
another man's poison." Just because Joe Topgun doesn't like MiG Alley
doesn't mean you will agree. If you don't try it for yourself you risk
missing another great stop on the sim highway through life. MiG is not
a sim that a serious sim player should pass by.
Tell Me More
Okay, some specifics. I have it on good authority that the
flight model is very good. The authority is a man with some solid air
time in USAF fighters. His main complaint related to overcontrol, but
his joystick was the Microsoft Sidewinder Pro. Unfortunately, the
initial resistance when moving from the dead zone is so great that fine
control is very difficult. The situation is improved by changing the
dead zone to large in MiG PREFS, but this is still not a great stick
with MiG.
Reality check. The FM is very good. There are buffet and stalls
and even flame-outs. You won't get the most from this sim without force
feedback, it really helps both for SA and for immersion. Down side: not
enough variation from the F86 to the F84 and F80. 8/10.
Graphics
This is very subjective. Most of my hours in MiG were on an AMD K6-3
450 with 128 MB RAM. So long as I emptied SYS-TRAY I had no problem
running at 1024x768 with all realism and graphic options to MAX.
At these settings I enjoy the graphics in MiG. Some have complained
about both object appearance and ground textures. Sorry. I cannot
relate. You can get some idea from the fifty or so screen shots in the
preview articles we have run, but screen shots never look quite as good
as moving reality. The lighting on aircraft skins is cool. And you can
customize your nose art in the paint shop.
The terrain could have been better. There are two cloud layers, not
quite state of the art, however. I like the cockpits, at 1024x768 they
are very good, and complete with reflections. (In fact, your first sign
of bandits nearby may be a
reflection from their
canopies, just as noted by pilots of the time.) You can even zoom out
the cockpit using CTL +/- (I think it is.) Graphics are 8/10.
AI
Now we are talking. For me personally there is a graphics
threshold beyond which graphics fade out of my awareness and I can then
be free to enjoy a sim. MiG is beyond that threshold and gameplay
issues are more important to me. I would not hesitate to invest in MiG
because of graphics issues.
The AI is very good. A dogfight in MiG, if you have chosen
complex AI, will leave you sweating. If you lock on the tail of a MiG
for too long his wingman will chew yours off. You want a record of your
flight? The gun cam works great, you can view the film later.
Your wingmen will support you in a fight. They don't call for
help unless they need it, and when you are outnumbered, they will need
it. The chatter in a dogfight will get your adrenaline flowing. The
COMMS system is quite good. Get yourself Game Commander for voice comms
and lose the keyboard.
Better still, I love the padlock system. If you ever flew
Flying Corps Gold you already know the padlock options. The view system
is challenging but flexible and the Info bar is back. Read our previews
for more detail. AI is 8/10.
I like it. Fairly robust, nice engine sounds, great voices. It's
immersive. No A3d or EAX support, just DirectSound but they handled it
well. You guessed it, 8/10.
Damage and Physics Modeling
I was surprised to find that damage affects the flight model
significantly. Take hits to your wing and lose lift on that side. You
are now much more susceptible to loss of control or a spin. Lose an
aileron and suddenly turns become arduous. The graphics that show
bullet holes in your fuselage are always the same, but at least they
modeled the hits!
I was on the tail of a MiG recently who lost control and went
into a spin. I hit the air brakes and followed him down. Just as he
regained control I let fly and tore his wing off. I watched him careen
into the ground below. I've taken out MiGs while they were on the
runway, and even killed a pilot outright with a high angle off the tail
shot on a high speed pass. Very nice!
Don't get too close when you take your shot, however, or the
aircraft fragments can kill you. I almost lost my engine to a fragment
on a campaign mission and limped along until my engine simply quit.
Explosions and flame in the air are quite dramatic, not quite as great
on the ground. Ready for take off? Spool up is NOT instant in MiG. 9/10
for damage and physics, 8/10 for effects.
Does MiG have wind and weather? Yes, you'll see rain but not
snow flakes. Not everyone likes the fog effects, but you can adjust
horizon distance in the PREFS.
I enjoy a good dogfight or even a successful escort mission, but for me
MiG comes alive in the campaign. Forget allowing the AI to determine
targets and strategy, I like to take control!
MiG has five mini campaigns, so you can start in wherever you like.
Like F4 this is an integrated air/ground war, which is near to heaven
for some of us. It's well executed, although not as active or intense
as the ground war in F4. But there is hoards of information offered,
allowing you to make reasonable selections of target based on current
enemy activity and status.
You can build the flights according to your own preference and
even choose loadout. You want a P80 escort for the B29s instead of F86?
If you have the aircraft, you can use 'em. You can transfer your
squadron, and on any particular strike you can choose which element to
fly and command. Briefings and debriefings are decent and include
detailed damage reports on your target.
The planning interface is nicely done over all. There is the odd bug in
the interface, however, and changing loadouts has taken some players to
the Windows desktop.
My other disclaimer for MiG arrives in this section. Rating the
campaign alone I give MiG a 10/10. Yep, I love this part. But there is
no way to get vectors between waypoints from the planner screens, and
once in flight there is no way to toggle waypoints in flight without
exiting to the map screen. Perhaps this has changed for v1.2. The
planner itself gets only 9/10.
Finally, printed documentation is not great. Like many
developers Rowan is relying on online help, and with a campaign and
planner this deep virtual pilots will have to dig to find the gold. The
manual offers no instruction on using the planner features in the
campaign, transferring squadrons or building missions.
To their credit, Rowan does include a document by a British pilot created for the RAF Fighter Establishment entitled The F86 vs the Mig 15 based on RAF flights with the USAF to observe the MiG and NK tactics.
