Blazing Angels: Squadrons of WWII - Review
Added April 20th, 2006 by Kisan Parikh
Introduction:
Blazing Angels: Squadrons of WWII takes flight on the Xbox 360 as the first flight combat game for the console. Ubisoft’s title throws you into some of the most memorable air battles of WWII as you lead an elite flying unit named the Blazing Angels. The game has a lot of promise, but is it really worth your purchase?
Gameplay:
The single player campaign of Blazing Angels will take you into a number of battles on various fronts. You begin the campaign as an American pilot sent to help the British forces. Soon after learning the ropes, you are sent off on your way to help win battles around the world. You will fly through London, navigate the deserts of North Africa, and battle the Japanese fleets in the Pacific.
Blazing Angels: Squadrons of WWII takes flight on the Xbox 360 as the first flight combat game for the console. Ubisoft’s title throws you into some of the most memorable air battles of WWII as you lead an elite flying unit named the Blazing Angels. The game has a lot of promise, but is it really worth your purchase?
Gameplay:
The single player campaign of Blazing Angels will take you into a number of battles on various fronts. You begin the campaign as an American pilot sent to help the British forces. Soon after learning the ropes, you are sent off on your way to help win battles around the world. You will fly through London, navigate the deserts of North Africa, and battle the Japanese fleets in the Pacific.
Your squad of elite pilots consists of three characters that remain constant throughout the game. These pilots each have different strengths that they bring to the table. Tom is your loud-mouthed companion with the special ability of Taunt. If you order Tom to taunt, he will attract enemy attention and take fire away from you or other objectives. Frank is your most skilled attacker, and ordering him to execute an Ace Attack will have Frank going out of formation to take down targets at will. Joe is the third pilot, and he will allow you to repair your plane with a simple button combo.
Your unit is easily controlled using the D-Pad. Each of the special abilities is assigned a direction. Additionally, you can control your formation by pressing up on the D-Pad. You can be in a standard formation, an attacking formation, or a defensive formation. It’s nice to have your team around to help you through missions, but they make the game a bit too easy. They never die, and you can utilize their special abilities as many times as you wish.
You and your squad will be faced with a decent variety of mission types throughout the campaign. You will be tasked with destroying enemy planes, destroying ground targets, protecting your own bombers, protecting ground forces, and even scouting locations. Each of theses mission types will have you equipped with different planes and weapon types. For instance, the scouting mission has you equipped with only a camera and radio as you search for enemy positions. This variety helps keep the campaign somewhat fresh, because the action can quickly become very repetitive.
The action in Blazing Angels can be intense at times and tedious at others. Missions that have you warding off wave after wave of enemy planes fall into the tedious category. This is simply because the combat in the game is a bit too easy. You simply have to swing around the enemy formation and wipe them out as you pass and swing back around if you missed any. Your plane is virtually invincible whenever you have Joe around, so you don’t even have to worry about taking fire. Don’t get me wrong, though. Some missions are excellent and feature a great deal of variety between taking out ground and air targets.
Overall, the campaign of Blazing Angels really doesn’t stand out. Sure there are some great moments such as London 1940 and The Midway, but it becomes repetitive regardless of the different objective types. The single player campaign of Blazing Angels, Squadrons of WWII is as average as it gets.
Graphics:
The visuals in Blazing Angels are a mixed bag; some aspects are superb and some aren’t. For instance, environments like London are highly detailed with recognizable structures such as the London Bridge. Smoke piles out of damaged buildings into the sky and detailed planes catch fire and descend towards the ground. These aspects make the environments visually breathtaking at times, but there are other graphical aspects that don’t look as good. For instance, ground forces such as tanks look terrible, and some buildings aren’t at the same level as others. Additionally, the screen is littered with red and green markings to show the different forces.
Your unit is easily controlled using the D-Pad. Each of the special abilities is assigned a direction. Additionally, you can control your formation by pressing up on the D-Pad. You can be in a standard formation, an attacking formation, or a defensive formation. It’s nice to have your team around to help you through missions, but they make the game a bit too easy. They never die, and you can utilize their special abilities as many times as you wish.
You and your squad will be faced with a decent variety of mission types throughout the campaign. You will be tasked with destroying enemy planes, destroying ground targets, protecting your own bombers, protecting ground forces, and even scouting locations. Each of theses mission types will have you equipped with different planes and weapon types. For instance, the scouting mission has you equipped with only a camera and radio as you search for enemy positions. This variety helps keep the campaign somewhat fresh, because the action can quickly become very repetitive.
The action in Blazing Angels can be intense at times and tedious at others. Missions that have you warding off wave after wave of enemy planes fall into the tedious category. This is simply because the combat in the game is a bit too easy. You simply have to swing around the enemy formation and wipe them out as you pass and swing back around if you missed any. Your plane is virtually invincible whenever you have Joe around, so you don’t even have to worry about taking fire. Don’t get me wrong, though. Some missions are excellent and feature a great deal of variety between taking out ground and air targets.
Overall, the campaign of Blazing Angels really doesn’t stand out. Sure there are some great moments such as London 1940 and The Midway, but it becomes repetitive regardless of the different objective types. The single player campaign of Blazing Angels, Squadrons of WWII is as average as it gets.
Graphics:
The visuals in Blazing Angels are a mixed bag; some aspects are superb and some aren’t. For instance, environments like London are highly detailed with recognizable structures such as the London Bridge. Smoke piles out of damaged buildings into the sky and detailed planes catch fire and descend towards the ground. These aspects make the environments visually breathtaking at times, but there are other graphical aspects that don’t look as good. For instance, ground forces such as tanks look terrible, and some buildings aren’t at the same level as others. Additionally, the screen is littered with red and green markings to show the different forces.
For the most part, the visuals are great. The smoke and plane detail are outstanding, and really add to the game. The few problems are annoying but don’t particularly detract from the experience.
Audio:
The audio in Blazing Angles is one of the game’s best aspects. The sounds of machine gun fire, bombs exploding, and planes whizzing around each other really give you the impression of being right there in the middle of the action. The orchestral score fits right into the game’s action. However, the voice acting is downright terrible. You have your three squad members who give you all kinds of unintelligent sarcasm. Then, you have the enemies who all have generic German or Japanese accents. They chirp about how you are going to die and more of the same kind of thing. You even have German pilots yelling ‘The Führer will be disappointed’ after you shoot them down. While the voice acting is incredibly lame, most of the sound is great and really brings you into the game.
Controls:
The controls are very easy to pick up and should take under 30 minutes to master. The planes throttle is controlled using the right thumbstick, and elevation and turning are controlled with the left thumbstick. You can activate the follow camera by holding the left trigger, and that’s about all you really need to know. The controls are simple to learn and use, and as mentioned, the game is fairly easy to master. This makes Blazing Angels a great title to pick up and play.
Replay:
Aside from the repetitive campaign you are offered several other singleplayer game modes. You can participate in a mini-campaign with approximately 12 different missions to complete. The next mode is arcade mode where you fight alone against waves of enemies. As you beat them, you gain health bonuses to continue playing- your goal is to achieve the highest score. Ace Duel is the remaining single player mode, in which you fight a single enemy who pilots the same plane as you. This mode is rather easy, but you can unlock new paint jobs for your planes by playing it.
Multiplayer is the best way to experience Blazing Angles. You have a pretty good variety of Solo, Co-op, and Squadron game types, including such game modes as Dogfight, Aces High, Seek and Destroy, Onslaught, Bombing Run, Kamikaze, Historical Battles, and Capture the Base.
Dogfight is the equivalent of Deathmatch and is the most basic gametype. Aces High involves one player being the Aces while the others attempt to kill him. Holding the ace position for the longest time will gain you a victory. Onslaught is a co-op mode that involves fighting off waves of enemies with your teammates. Bombing Run involves destroying the other team’s base before yours is destroyed, and Kamikaze has one team playing as attackers and the other defending. Each of these modes is fun to play, and as expected, Xbox Live is the ideal way to play this game. Finding a game isn’t too difficult, and once you're in-game you can expect intense dogfights.
Audio:
The audio in Blazing Angles is one of the game’s best aspects. The sounds of machine gun fire, bombs exploding, and planes whizzing around each other really give you the impression of being right there in the middle of the action. The orchestral score fits right into the game’s action. However, the voice acting is downright terrible. You have your three squad members who give you all kinds of unintelligent sarcasm. Then, you have the enemies who all have generic German or Japanese accents. They chirp about how you are going to die and more of the same kind of thing. You even have German pilots yelling ‘The Führer will be disappointed’ after you shoot them down. While the voice acting is incredibly lame, most of the sound is great and really brings you into the game.
Controls:
The controls are very easy to pick up and should take under 30 minutes to master. The planes throttle is controlled using the right thumbstick, and elevation and turning are controlled with the left thumbstick. You can activate the follow camera by holding the left trigger, and that’s about all you really need to know. The controls are simple to learn and use, and as mentioned, the game is fairly easy to master. This makes Blazing Angels a great title to pick up and play.
Replay:
Aside from the repetitive campaign you are offered several other singleplayer game modes. You can participate in a mini-campaign with approximately 12 different missions to complete. The next mode is arcade mode where you fight alone against waves of enemies. As you beat them, you gain health bonuses to continue playing- your goal is to achieve the highest score. Ace Duel is the remaining single player mode, in which you fight a single enemy who pilots the same plane as you. This mode is rather easy, but you can unlock new paint jobs for your planes by playing it.
Multiplayer is the best way to experience Blazing Angles. You have a pretty good variety of Solo, Co-op, and Squadron game types, including such game modes as Dogfight, Aces High, Seek and Destroy, Onslaught, Bombing Run, Kamikaze, Historical Battles, and Capture the Base.
Dogfight is the equivalent of Deathmatch and is the most basic gametype. Aces High involves one player being the Aces while the others attempt to kill him. Holding the ace position for the longest time will gain you a victory. Onslaught is a co-op mode that involves fighting off waves of enemies with your teammates. Bombing Run involves destroying the other team’s base before yours is destroyed, and Kamikaze has one team playing as attackers and the other defending. Each of these modes is fun to play, and as expected, Xbox Live is the ideal way to play this game. Finding a game isn’t too difficult, and once you're in-game you can expect intense dogfights.
Summary:
Blazing Angels: Squadrons of WWII is a pretty average game. You have fairly simple combat with a few nice graphical touches. Nothing really stands out as overtly good or bad, and everything here has pretty much been seen before in some form or fashion. This said, this game is currently the only flight combat game on the console, so fans of this genre could probably justify a rental at the very least.
Blazing Angels: Squadrons of WWII is a pretty average game. You have fairly simple combat with a few nice graphical touches. Nothing really stands out as overtly good or bad, and everything here has pretty much been seen before in some form or fashion. This said, this game is currently the only flight combat game on the console, so fans of this genre could probably justify a rental at the very least.
