Giveaway of the Day - Air Bandits

Air Bandits

Today’s game giveaway is a side scrolling airplane shooter that was released just under a year ago on the 29th January 2009 by Insofta. The download size is around 10Mb, which shouldn’t be more than 20 or so minutes for those on dial up and will probably download in a matter of seconds for those on fast broadband connections. The installed game is just over 11Mb.

The registration process is different to the usual game registration. You require a registration code to activate the game. Before you install the game, open up the read me file and copy the registration code provided to your clip board. (This speeds up registration when the time comes)

The installation process creates shortcuts to both the desktop and Start Menus program files . Provided you copied the registration code which is a 10x 6 letter code seperated by dashes to the clip board (by highlighting the code then right clicking and selecting copy) before you start the game via the shortcut it will automatically register your game using the stored reg code.

The game reminds me a little of Scorched Earth and Scorched 3D, which are those tank games where you have to shoot at a distantly located tank. Any ground you hit by your bombs gets destroyed in the process, and changes the mechanics of the game; though instead of a stationary tank as in Scorched Earth or Scorched 3D, you have various aeroplanes and other types of ground target in Air Bandits; (see end of my comment for links to alternative games) The graphics in today’s game giveaway are nice IMO. They look like hand painted watercolour backgrounds with brightly coloured and cartoon like foregrounds (in the style of Hergé’s adventures of Tin Tin and other comics of that ilk). The combination of art work and game play works really well for me, though I much prefer Scorched 3D and Scorched Earth to Air Bandits. The game is controlled via the mouse.

There are various missions from bombing missile silos and even mountains to more traditional military targets like bridges, ammo and fuel dumps, to tanks, anti-aircraft guns and pillboxes, as well as other airborne threats. There are 50 missions in six episodes to complete, with three types of friendly aircraft to use during your missions. To progress to the next level you must destroy all targets. You will get bonus points for destroying targets quickly. One of the things that let this game down in my opinion is the lack of no more than two weapons (one gun and bombs). Arcade games of this type should always have loads of different weapons to blast the enemies to smithereens; that said, it’s still a lot of fun. You do get to pick up lots of in game power-ups throughout the game by destroying the zepplins; when you destroy a zepplin, power-ups are deployed by parachute. Power ups include spare ammo, bombs and health packs (You may need these if you get too close to exploding targets or the enemy fire back at you. Overall, you’ll find around 15 different types of enemies, some of which you can see in the video I’ve linked to below and some in the image that shows various objects found in game.

Controls:

Mouse:

Mouse Cursor……….Direction
Mouse Wheel………..Speed
LMB…………………..Fire Gun
RMB………………….Drop Bombs
Esc…………………..Go to main menu

You’ll find a list of key bindings in the games menu. The left and right arrow keys are supposed to roll the plane left and right and the Z key is supposed to flip the plane, but they didn’t work for me.

Keyboard:

Space……………….Bombs
Ctrl………………….Gun
Arrow Up……………Speed Up
Arrow Down………..Speed Down

Personally I love this type of shooter and would be biased if I was to give it a quantitative score. Trying to be objective and not allow personal feeling to creep in I think its worth around 6 out of 10; the main reason I’m saying it only scores ‘average’ is because there isn’t enough weapons to have fun with, there’s only four ‘unique’ power ups, which is still not enough for a shooter of this type and its really only a casual game that couldn’t be played for protracted periods as I think you’d begin to find it boring. Instead, I’d say it’s an ideal game for filling in those odd moments when you’re taking a break from a bigger game, or from the work you so desperately need a break from for a few minutes. If I took my own feelings into account, I’d give it 8 out of 10 because I’m a sucker for this type of game, and there are plenty of levels to keep you entertained. I think the best way of deciding whether you’re going to bother downloading this game is to look at the screen shots and watch the video of game play that I’ve linked to below.

Sorry there’s no full review today. I was out all day Christmas day and have to go out visiting family again later this morning, so haven’t had the time to research, so that I could give you more information. There doesn’t appear to be any in depth reviews of this game anywhere yet which is surprising as it is very playable, but that’s probably because it is only a casual game at best.

I have copied some of the shorter reviews I found below (with references)

Summary:

• 50 levels

• 3 Friendly Aircraft

• 2 Weapons

• 15 Enemy Types

• 4 Unique Power-Ups

• Plays in XP and Vista

• Controlled by Mouse

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Useful Resources:

Video:

The following video footage of Air Bandits game play may give you a better idea about what to expect from this game. Check out the You Tube video HERE

Short Reviews:

The following are a couple of short reviews I’ve managed to dig up:

Air Bandits, Insofta Games’ first arcade title, is now available for download. Resembling one of nostalgic games of the 80’s, Sopwith, the game features a small but properly armed airplane confronting various air and ground enemies. (I’ve posted a link to Sopwith, which is free abandonware below)

You can control the plane’s direction and use its weaponry with a mouse. (Hint: destroy not only the enemy targets, but also the fuel supplies and explosives to gain more score points). Also, blow up Zeppelins (flying balloons) and collect bonuses.

Another nice game play feature is the ability to dig tunnels in the ground, discover hidden trophies and shortcuts to enemy fortifications.

You should also survive in dogfights with air bandits! These planes appear on higher levels and may pose a serious threat, but will also reward you with more points.

In conclusion, the game offers a simple yet addictive game play.

Reference accessed on the 25th Dec 09

In game objects and enemies

In Air Bandits, you play as a pilot of a vintage fighter plane who must soar over unfriendly territory, bomb ground targets and take down enemy aircraft, while avoiding their fire. Each level is won when you destroy all the targets displayed as red spots on the mini-map. In the game you’ll encounter different types of ground targets, including fuel supplies, explosives, tanks, anti-aircraft guns and pillboxes. This all keeps the game fresh and exciting to play.

Reference accessed HERE on the 25th Dec 09

System requirements:

• Windows 2000/XP/Vista
• DirectX 8
• 800 MHz
• 512 MB RAM

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Alternative Games:

You’ll find some airplane and helicopter style shooters as well as loads of related space shooters via the Free Games Synopsis, just look to the right hand of each game for the flight or arcade shooter description of the games. You’ll also find several related games (despite the thread not being updated for quite some time) via the Space Shmup’s thread
and loads of games such as Sky Fire, Air Typer, Naval Strike, Incinerate, Star Sword, Desert Hawk, Star Rage, Star Shooter, Tank Commander, Galaxy Strike, Alien Wars, Air Assault, and Deadly Stars, all of which are actually commercial games that are given away for free via Gametop. You can also get Sopwith from Abandonia. (It was released in 1984, so don’t expect too much graphically; however, for those into retro or nostalgia trips, you may like to check it out; (you’ll find a link to Scorched Earth at the end of the page). You may need to play Sopwith via DOSBox, which can be downloaded via a link on the Sopwith game page. Just click on the DOSBox Icon in the compatibility slot just below the title to the top left of the page. Wizzard of Oz has posted a short tutorial on how to install and use DOSBox, which is free). You’ll find both Scorched Earth and Scorched 3d via the Free Games Synopsis. The latter of the two is my favourite of these two games (better graphics and game play). ‘FINALLY’, if you just like the air battles, you may like a great WWI flight Sim’ shooter called Red Baron, which is now available as freeware. There is an updated version of the game that isn’t freeware, but the version that’s linked to in the games synopsis is free,
NOTE:

When downloading games from Gametop please make sure you watch every step of the installation process because most games now have checkboxes which are by default checked. These may either or both install toolbars and divert your home page to Gametop. Both are easily remedied if you do forget, but they are a minor annoyance. Thankfully un-checking the boxes avoid the problem. When you close down any Gametop game it automatically attempts to open your browser to Gametop’s home page. You can block this activity with your firewall, but your browser will still open. However, this is totally innocuous (safeScorched 3D to the games synopsis I think the actual download link is a Gamershell link, which at the moment is rated red by the Web of Trust (WOT). You can Google the name to find other links, but I’ve been downloading games from Gamershell for years and ‘never ever’ had a problem. Apparently, they linked to some very suspect sites awhile ago, so WOT rated the site red)

Finally. one of my security measures did flag up a trojan while I was testing the demo, so I contacted the giveaway team and they assured me that the full version file had been tested negative for any known trojans. They sent me the following link detailing the tests that had flagged it up as negative:

http://www.virustotal.com/analisis/942283aac9f13d80f5e37603573e3b9e4b44a6d1a2cff018af57e9a7b3dcaf14-1261815726

The security system that flagged up the trojan for me was Returnils Virtual System. My Kaspersky found nothing. I will be installing the game.

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