Takes flight in historical style
Put me in front of a flight sim, you’ll usually get possibly the most macabre black comedy of the century. I have about the same level of co-ordination as a gnat in a tumble dryer, consistently forcing locals to scrape my remains of their rooftops ten times over. With its piles of planes, massive aerial battles and historical aesthetic that would put many war historians to shame, Birds Of Steel seems like exactly the type of game I should steer away from. Knowing my luck I’d just end up tearing through a child’s face if I dared embrace it, but with acres of tutorials and tons of rewards to unlock, Birds Of Steel is determined to embody you in its aviation admiration. Birds Of Steel comes from the same developers that brought us IL-2 Sturmovik:Birds Of Prey, focusing on the aerial warfare of the Americans and the Japanese during the Pacific War. Getting both perspectives of battles such as the infamous Pearl Harbour, you’ll be delving into various different conflicts throughout the single player campaign. If you enter Birds of Steel with little to no historical knowledge, then it’s determined to make you learn about the games grandeur setting, and it’ll deliver lessons you’re sure to listen to. Sitting in on jittery black and white stock footage may not be the most dynamic means to develop a backstory on, but with informilacious narration delivered by Stephen Fry backing them up your ears are sure to be hooked. It’s a shame the voiceovers from your fellow pilots are more annoying. My experience with flight sims is shoddy at best, not down to poor design but more my horrible tendency to kamikaze forests against my will. Birds of Steel, however, catered for my ignorant lacklustre perception with difficulty modes that ease newcomers and challenge the experienced. The spatially daft can conventionally lower the difficulty as well as dumb down the controls and putting limits on ammo and petrol. No matter what difficulty you pick however, comprehensive tutorials slowly ease you into the pilot seat before launching you into the middle of battles, and with each aircraft equipped with tight and responsive controls, you’re sure to fly safely…whilst being barraged with bullets. 
No matter how blisteringly harsh you want your experience to be, a majority of campaign missions have a rather poor approach to pacing. Enemies damage the ego a fair bit by setting up formations miles away like I have B.O. that matches the aftermath of Chernobyl. Secondary missions are optional, but if you choose to undertake them, they usually consist of attempting to land the plane on an air-strip that seems to exist in an unnamed galaxy. Campaign missions occasionally feel like they’re built to challenge patience more than skill, which is a shame as dogfights can be exceptionally tense.
A game crafted with plenty of love and attention
Every time the campaign is in danger of nose diving straight into boredom, however, it picks up again with its massive battles and extensive single and multi-player options. The campaign may feel shorter than the tutorials that brought you up to speed, but that allows you to dig into the real meat of the game. A bevy of online options spoil players with loads of missions and tons of ways to play them. Dynamic campaigns allow you to initiate dogfights online and rewrite history, again allowing you to twist multiple variables until they hit just the right difficulty for you. Mission editors undergo the same amount of multiple options to cater to your desires, offering up loads of different ways to undertake dogfights and challenge your skills. It’s the amount of choices open to you that potentially make Birds Of Steel an incredibly addictive flight simulator. Beginners will be eased so well into proceedings that once they’ve mastered the aerodynamic beasts, there’s always a burning desire to step the difficulty up a notch to see just how far you’ve improved, or rewrite your dynamic campaigns by altering the rules. The views you’ll witness from the clouds can be dazzling, pulling out all the stops to flirt with your eye when you’re receiving heavy fire for all sides. The ocean looks all the more appealing to die in with its glistening, but land mass looks pretty darn plain from no matter what angle you observe it. However, as Birds Of Steel focuses its passions on its planes, each aircraft is beautifully modelled with striking attention to detail in each model. It’s impressive enough that the amount of aerial aircraft on offer reaches the hundreds, let alone just how great they look. Should you be a supreme aviation aficionado, Birds Of Steel is happy to indulge your plane passions. Revelling in the dynamic campaigns earns you experience and in-game credit that allows you to gradually unlock a hanger of over 100 planes. Should the game reel you in, there’s enough here to uncover to keep you hooked for many hours. 
Birds Of Steel may lack a spark in its presentation that really gives it a unique charm, but what it doesn’t lack, is a clear passion in everything it has to offer. Birds Of Steel is a game crafted with plenty of love and attention. It may not be a spectacular tour de force of action and suspense, but its authentic charms and whimsical nuances make it stand out against more modern day flight sims. Its original campaign may only get brownie points for the illustrious Stephen Fry, but a spectacular amount of offline content and online preferences extend the life of this title by more that just mere hours. If you are looking for a comprehensive World War II flight sim that’ll peak your interest in history, Birds Of Steel does more than fit the bill.
The Bad: In game voiceovers are rather annoying, Missions can get rather dull with poor pacing, Short campaign
Bronze Y Award