This remake of an Amiga classic has finally arrived on the GBA

User Rating: 7 | Wings GBA
By gamecubedave000 | Review Date:
The strafing missions are my favorite part of the game, as a fan of the Strike series of games, I felt right at home in these areas. The key difference between this gameplay style in Wings and the Strike games is the diverse selection of copters. While this might not seem like much of a change, it is. The copters enabled the player to do more in the game, they gave the player more freedom. However, the biplane in Wings is pretty limiting. You can shoot and move, and not much else. The objectives for these missions are the most complex of the bunch. You get a pretty strict guide of dos and don’ts before the mission, and if you fail to meet those requirements, you will be reprimanded. The graphics in these missions are pretty decent, certainly far better than I would expect from a remake, and they compliment the gameplay pretty well.

The dog fighting missions are my least favorite, and here’s why. The gameplay, while smooth as silk, simply doesn’t translate well to the GBA’s small screen. I found that too many things would be happening at once for the GBA’s screen to handle. It doesn’t help matters much due to about half of the screen being taken up by your character model, and the plane. Heaven help you if you want to use the HUD in the game, because that takes up even more screen space.

Now there is a solution to this problem, but it requires the game to lose much of the feel you get by being behind the controls of a biplane. You can simply toggle the character and biplane models on and off, however, this causes you to lose the view behind the cockpit, which adds quite a bit of atmosphere to the game. This also makes looking to the left and right a bit confusing as well because, since you can’t use the direction of the wings as guides, you’ve left to looking on your own and hoping that you don’t get confused. Given the fast-paced nature of dog fighting, and given that you don’t have any visual guide to help you out (the wings on the plane, for example) it’s easy to not know which way is right, and which way is left. This is definitely one aspect of the game that would be improved tenfold if it was played out on a larger screen. Here’s to hoping the GC/GBA Player can help remedy this problem. Sadly, these problems really hamper the gameplay. This is definitely one part of the game that was simply not meant to be played on a portable system.

The bombing missions are the simplest of the three, and they’re also some of the most fun. That is, until you come upon a mission in which you aren’t shown all of your targets before the flight. Now this is simply an inexcusable flaw, and it really hurts the flow of the missions. It causes needless death of a character (and since you only get one life, that’s kind of a bad thing.) Thankfully, these tainted missions are few and far between, but they simply shouldn’t exist in the first place. Excluding the screwy missions, these sections of the game are a blast. They’re simple, but effective. You can just fly around for a bit, observe the area, take in the sights and sounds, and drop bombs until your heart’s content. The simple graphics in these sections match the simple gameplay.

Other Helpful Reviews for Wings

  • Rating:8.6

    By nick394 | Review Date: Jan 21, 2004 | GBA

    When i first played this game, i was a little dissapointed and put it down. A few months later i got bored and picked it up again and boy am i glad i did. The few bad things about This game is that it's a little difficu... Read Full Review

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  • Rating:5.8

    Don't buy unless you have an intrest in WW1 Aviation

    By Denny_Carmassi | Review Date: Mar 05, 2006 | GBA

    I bought Wings because I like WW1 aviation and flight games. I made a bit of a mistake. Wings is O.K in some areas. The bombing missions are good. The Strafing missions are O.K and the dogfight missions are RUBBISH. They... Read Full Review

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