So last night I downloaded Red Baron, the classic 1990 game of Great War air combat that occupied so much of my time visiting my three cousins as a kid, and was a major influence on my interest in the period.
Man is it fun! The graphics don't hold up and neither does the sound, but I was up until almost 0200 playing! It has a facility to record missions to tape (lol) which I kept saying no to, and wishing I hadn't after an epic 2v2 dogfight where my flight lead and I were in Morane Bullets and were confronted by two Eindeckers.
On the first pass my lead was shot down and it was up to me to even the score...I'd damaged one of them on the merge (I doubt they'd have called it that!) and finished him off after swinging around, then his mate got some shots into me and the struts in front of me were holed. It wasn't until a few turns that I looked back and saw I was smoking: no bother, just keep turning to get him in my sights. I got in a few hits and soon he was smoking too.
Then silence...unbeknownst to me my fuel tank had been damaged - I'd not once looked at the gauge - and my engine was dead! I checked the map on my iPhone to confirm which side of the lines was ours and glided down. The Eindecker very respectfully didn't fire another shot, and I managed to just scrape over the trenches and touch down safely. Then - as if gloating over his victory - my quarry floated around me, constantly on the edge of a stall and at barely a hundred feet, for about three minutes. I was amazed how tense I felt in the middle of this 33yr-old game on my laptop, totally at the mercy of some tan and black pixels as they orbited my make-believe cockpit, waiting for his Spandau to fire.
Then he finally did it: he passed in front of my gun during his victory orbits. I hammered down the trigger and nailed him, causing him to crash a few dozen feet away.
Mission done, I magically made it safely back to base and was presented with a newspaper announcing I was now an ace. Wow!
For a game that's almost as old as I am, and despite it being a product of its time, I'm truly surprised at how engaged I am while playing it. I'm just glad I didn't have to go into the workshop at my normal time! Also you bet I included the fuel gauge in my panel scan from the next mission on!
