PSA: Combat Air Patrol 2

[fearlessfrog]

We will have a Mudspike review of this title, but as this title is in Early Access it will be a week or two until it is ready to publish on the main article site. You can check out some early play testing in our Screens & AARs section here:

Combat Air Patrol 2. First few flights

Alright, first few flights are in! Let’s see what the experience was like. [image] Finding my way into the options to set up my controls. I pump the graphic preset and kick in some anti-aliasing and things like that. Even despite that the game is not on par with some of the products we are used to. I’m personally not bothered so much by that. [image] Some Blufor and Opfor aircraft keeps the background active. I found this MiG-21/J7 a bit weird. It looks untextured, and it seems to be carry…

We don’t want to rush out a quick reaction, especially where reviews stay around on the internet for a long time and games get patched and added to. It’s not fair to anyone.

On a good couple of hours of play testing so far I did so far I do though want to stress one thing - this game really is in beta. If you get annoyed by things not working, things not finished or looking for any polish then you’re going to have a bad time. If you don’t want a beta title then wait. It really is early access time.

Having said that, it looks like the developer is going to be really active and involved with updates, so over the next couple of weeks the title will get better and better. I just didn’t want to wait until the review not saying anything if people picked it up on screen shots alone and expected a finished game.

Here’s the latest developer ‘to do’ list to give an idea of what’s coming up:

Like a Phoenix....

So endeth this Public Service Announcement.

[Fridge]

I appreciate this. Early access is no time to rush a review on a product that has potential, even if that potential might not be immediately obvious. I like to stay away from the knee-jerk reactions.

[Koriel]

Got it last night… it’s not even beta imo. This is what I posted on Steam:

In this review I mention quite a few areas where CAP2 needs a lot of TLC, a LOT. I do recommend buying it however, but you have to realise that this game is far from being ready.

Simmer since ZX-81 Spektrum. Have flown nearly everything since I started simming. Loved Harrier Assualt VGA version back in the dos days. It features a campaign (with editor) I was/am hoping CAP2 will be it’s 2016 counterpart.

YouTube™ Video: Super-VGA Harrier on DosBox
Views: 8,369
This is an old classic fligh sim / strategy game from early 90’s by Domark/Simis. Running on DosBox 0.72, cycles locked at 20000 for correct playing speed.

Currently active in DCS, X-Plane and P3D apart from my day job where I fly planes too… I have flown a lot of different types with 0 up to 4 engines.

With a just a little in game time I must get a few little things of my chest.

Views:
Switching views, especially getting back in the cockpit… please get rid of the animation. If I need to be back in the pit, I want it to be instantaneous.
Also using outside (F2) view, make it so I can zoom in, circle etc.
TrackIr limits… There are none… Please implement limts. Turn wise, and lateral wise. I can turn my head at least 3 times! (New profile have to tweak it down… I know), And I can also move sideways outside the pit.

Graphics:
Too bland and dark.
Scenery is cartoon like with very large buildings and such.
Inside cockpit looks again very bland and some parts like the canopy are outright ugly and very low res.

Other points concerning settings have been mentioned by other people. I agree with them. I have not experienced any ctd’s of the kind, settings remain saved. Game starts very quick.

Flight Model… . Considering this is meant to be a very accessible light sim, It’s not bad at all. I would suggest increasing the fidelity a notch up to a “realistic” setting. Flying a Harrier is not easy at all. So flying at a hard setting shouldn’t be easy either, right now it definately is. Pitch authority and response seems a but low at times. I do like the way inertia is done, but here it needs a bit of dumbing down.

I will give it a thumbs up, jus because I love flying and think this sim has potential. I would however recommend that in the description some sort of percentage would be mentioned… “This game is XX% complete”. After a good nights sleep and some more flights I will update my review.