Comanche (PC) Preview

The Comanche program was a program by the United States Army to develop a new helicopter that possessed superior technology. It produced a sleek looking helicopter, and unlike any of the old designs, it looked far more futuristic and cool. The program was unfortunately scrapped and the helicopter lives on only in sci-fi or video games. Comanche the game, feels like any modern-day Call of Duty or Ace Combat, with its heavy military plot of being in the middle of some emerging conflict.

Given the close air support of helicopters, missions focus on being near the ground fighting enemies. Ace Combat tried this, but the series was mainly all about bombing a few targets and that was that. In comparison this game is a lot cooler with flying near the enemy targets. The first level opens up with flying through a canyon and finding a special operations boat that had been attacked and trying to find the crew. Flying through the spires, following across the rivers, and dodging the twists and turns was a solid opening impression.

For the state of the game (at the time of review the version was 0.1) it played well and showed clear potential. The graphics were more than good enough, and the story and gameplay felt comparable to high-end titles. There was only one level to play at this time, but it was still a surprising experience. Before going over to the major problem, it should be noted that there are still glitchy aspects that need addressing. One that comes to mind is how early on the player has to access a black box from a boat, and it can take a few minutes flying near it before the tooltip finally triggers to move onto the next part.

One of the only major problems was that the controls felt a little wonky. There are three different selections from beginner to pro, and having played a lot of helicopters in games before, the 'pro' felt more natural. There are a lot of options to adjust, and unfortunately, the tooltips are not active for most of them. Spending a lot of time in the options to adjust everything would likely fix the problem, but for the preview there were still times where the helicopter behaved in ways unexpected. So even though this is still early, the package overall was surprisingly competent. There are definitely beta games and outright fully released titles that are less polished than this. For shooter fans that want something new, fans of flying sims, or just plain helicopter fans, this is one to keep an eye on.