Choplifter - 2nd Sortie

This choplifter fan remake has beautiful graphics, but that's all. the gameplay lacks many things and didn't remade properly.

First thing to critize is the turning control. in original choplifter (include apple 2 and c64. i had played MSX ,SG-1000, and SMS  version but recently played c64 and apple 2 versions too), pressing turning(for c64 holding the butten) shortly to center the chopper, and keep pressing to turn it to the opposite direction. when the helicopter is centered, pressing the arrow and turning key to turn to that direction. but in this remake, not only turning speed is very slow, the chopper always turn in the pattern of center - right - center - left. It's very annoying when i want to turn to left but chopper turns to right.

Second is the lack of enemies. i'm not talking about SMS version which features new enemies, but the original apple 2 and C64 version.  Probably the developer had't know, but there are actually two kinds of enemies for jet fighters and saucers.

For jet fighters there are bombers who turn to drop the bomb and fly away, and fighters who hover in the air and try to shoot the helicopter with air-to-air missiles. and for saucers some saucers try to crash with the helicopter and some saucers dorp bombs and kill the hostages. In this remake you can only see bombers and suicide saucers.

Third is about the helicopter's weapons. the chopper's turret and bomb doesn't have any fire sound, which is just irony. Also the bombs doesn't affect by the helicopter's movement while it does in original. if you move forward and drop bombs, the bombs move to the opposite direction and disappears.

Fourth is the hostages' AI. in the original(include c64 and apple 2) the hostages stop and shake their hands when the helicopter is coming or safely rescued and moving to the office. however, when the helicopter is landed and waiting for board, they keep running to the helicopter for their lives. But in this remake hostages suddenly stop and shake their hands while i'm waiting for board, which is stifling when jet fighters or tanks are coming.

Overall, Choplifter 2nd sortie is far from good classic remake. the developer had to replay the classic choplifter seriously before starting the game. but the beautiful and smooth graphics are worth to be appreciated.

Very interesting graphics and fun gameplay. I particularly liked the parallaxing effect and the particle effects. The only thing I found strange was the fact that the helicopter always goes at the same speed, even if its moving sideways or backwards. However, the simple gameplay and interface, together with the nice graphics and retro feel make it a very pleasant game.

Definitely, a game worth playing!