TGS 2008: Tom Clancy's HAWX Pilot Assistance Hands-On

Tom Clancy's HAWX has the look of a hardcore flight simulator. Everything is sharp and accurately modeled, from jets to buildings, terrain to clouds. But don't assume that you'll need a pilot's license to fly these planes; the fighters in HAWX eschew painstakingly realistic flight physics. Instead, these birds handle more like you'd want a real jet to handle in a video game: true enough to life to feel realistically challenging, but not so faithful that you can't pull off a sweet midair drift maneuver to outflank your opponents. In the spirit of this accessibility, HAWX includes an extensive pilot-assistance program that helps you tackle advanced flight missions even if you have little to no experience. We took a look at the latest build of HAWX at the 2008 Tokyo Game Show and got a tour of this helpful feature.

Flying is tough business. Pursuing midair targets at high speed can leave you with little chance to actually engage the enemy, and destroying ground targets can be tricky when you're screaming overhead at hundreds of miles per hour. Enter pilot assistance. As soon as you target an enemy, a line of neon triangles will appear onscreen. This line delineates the path you should take to best engage your foe. Not only does it show you the direction in which you should fly, but it also tells you when to pitch and yaw so you feel like you're really taking a keen approach. The same line will also appear when you've been targeted by an enemy missile, but it will show you the best evasion route rather than the best pursuit course. This is HAWX's way of making you a smarter pilot while still enabling you to succeed during missions.

Of course, given that flying really is tough business, there will come a point when you can no longer lean on pilot assistance. Enemy planes can jam your computer systems, causing you to lose not only your route prompts, but also your tactical map and close-up video window of the enemy plane. In these situations it's much harder to evade missiles and pursue foes, so you'll need to take a different approach. With a simple controller command, you can turn pilot assistance off and the camera will move from behind your plane to a third-person remove. This view will generally keep your plane in the center of the frame and will automatically shift to include pertinent targets, such as enemies and incoming missiles. There are no heads-up display elements to obstruct your view, so you're free to concentrate on your flight vectors.

Though you're on your own regarding where to fly next, there are some advantages to having assistance off. Without the electronic safeguards, you can push your jet's abilities to the limit. If you thought drifting was an action reserved for tuned Japanese street racers, think again. We managed to perform some pretty outrageous drift maneuvers that let us dodge attacks and get the drop on our enemies. Though some of the things you can do may seem a bit far-fetched, the intense action does its best to keep your attention rapt and disbelief suspended.

HAWX continues to impress us with fluid controls and beautiful visuals. The pilot-assistance feature seems to go a long way toward helping simulation-shy gamers get into the groove and then bust out of it and leave the training wheels behind. As mentioned in earlier previews, you will be able to fly both cooperative and competitive missions online with friends. There's also a free-fly mode to encourage any aspiring Blue Angels to try formation flying on for size, a mellow option that appealed to us after a few hectic dogfights. HAWX is slated to be released early next year, so keep an eye on GameSpot in the coming months for more on this high-flying game.