Microsoft Combat Flight Simulator 2: Pacific Theater

After choosing to fly for the Japanese or American forces, you can pick from a selection of seven ultrarealistic aircraft. Experienced flight sim fans will drool over the plane models, accurate down to the number of rivets. Newbies will appreciate the excellent flight and landing tutorials.

There are over 100 missions to fly, many based on historic missions from the war. This unusual level of realism and attention to detail comes from the game developers' personal love of flight: many members of the CFS2 team are pilots. Their extensive research included interviews with Japanese and U.S. aces from the real war in the Pacific. The missions themselves are lengthy and often complex, and are just as accurate as the planes; players take part in history, but cannot change the outcomes of battles.

Because the action takes place in the South Pacific don't expect to see a wide variety of ground scenery. Not that you'll miss it: the water, small islands, planes, aircraft carriers, and battleships are always very sharp and detailed. However, if you expect to play with the graphics at their best settings, be aware that you'll need a blazing fast machine with a fast video card. On lesser computers, the graphics in Combat Flight Simulator 2 start to degrade from stunning to merely ordinary.

The between-mission story arc is told through 1940s-style comic book panels. The artwork does a good job of moving the story along while giving the feeling that your character and his fellow flyboys are aware they're never far from instant death. That the game also allows you to fly the full Japanese side of the campaign gives the player an interesting glimpse at the Japanese perspective of the war.

While the game does include such famous planes as the U.S. Corsair, Wildcat, P38F Lightning, and Japanese Zero, its mere total of seven craft left us wanting more. We were impressed with the vastly different handling of each plane, but the lack of variety is disappointing.

But this is a relatively small shortcoming in an otherwise deep and involving game. If you have a powerful enough PC, Combat Flight Simulator 2 is a delight, and is sure to please both war historians and flight sim enthusiasts.--Mark Brooks

Pros:

• Easy to get into, but can be adjusted to become very difficult and realistic
• On highest-quality graphics settings, the game is simply gorgeous
• Plenty of missions and great tutorials
• Full Japanese campaign adds depth and historical balance

• Only seven flyable aircraft
• Steep system requirements