Fighter & Attacker (Arcade)

Made to soar the sky with shrilling sounds (that make you wish you're deaf), and decimate enemies on both air and ground, that's military jet airplane. Today's review is about another vertical shooter game. It's Namco's "Fighter & Attacker" (1992). 

It's released at the same year with Air Combat (NA/Europe version) or you probably know it as Ace Combat (Japanese version). Both game features realistic military aircrafts but on different genre. Ace Combat is aircraft pilot simulator, while Fighter & Attacker is your average vertical shooter. Namco is quite experienced with some vertical shooter also it release Ace Combat. Sound promising, right? But it has a phoenix as mascot which reminds me of Fujiwara no Mokou, the character on Touhou Project series that i very dislike beside Yukari Yakumo. That one is just my personal thinking. So don't heed it, please!  

Well, we get lots of selection of the aircraft here. Usually, i won't hesitate to pick the stealth bomber, F-117A. Because it's my most favorite aircraft beside A-10 Thunderbolt. Because legends says that: It can't be detected by radar. Also i like its aerodynamic design on its head. But this time, i will give everycraft (hopefully) fair share of action. To make things easier, i start to pick the most top: F-15J. I didn't know that Japan has designed jet airplanes before.

There's no briefing about the enemies or their motivation. Thing's for sure is: they have destroyed oil pipeline facility here that cause sea pollution nearby. So you can tell that they're freaking evil. I will get them for this!

Unlike other generic vertical shooter where you can engage the enemies on both surface and air with standard weapon. Fighter & Attacker has 2 attack button. One to fire your air-to-air weapon and the another to fire your air-to-surface weapon. The range of air-to-surface weapon is indicated by the fixed crosshair in front of the plane. F-15J has bombs that excellent against these 2 tanks and 6-way bullets to clear the sky from small fries. Also there's P.O.W (asking for player's help) that can be pickup for scoring. By P.O.W, i mean surrendered enemy crews that soon to be our P.O.W. I hope i can torture them by tickling their feet or nose with feather duster. I'm gonna so enjoy doing that.

Hey, ADATS my favorite anti-air tank! My adoration towards it, rewards me with damage on my armor. Yes, there's no one-hit kill here. You get 3 armor and it will be depleted by 1 whenever you get hit. But there's neither armor replenishment item nor live reserve. So Fighter & Attacker feels not much different than its peer that has one-hit kill system with lives.  

Sometimes bombing the background will uncovers secret hostage that you can save for scoring. Choosing between the executive staff hostages (that are probably crucial on our mission) or P.O.W (that i can torture later) is tough decision.

Damn you, Ooi! I will kill you for this.

Pre-warning about upcoming Boss is confirmed. But, Namco does it half-heartily. I mean it's just blinking red-white words. No further visual effect. Lame

Demoman_specialcompleted11.wav. Did i forget to mention about another button to unleash screen-clearing bomb? No. There's no such thing. This bomb occurs whenever the player use a continue. "What about the boss stage?". It's just Akagi, i mean large carrier that has turrets and destroyable spawning-hatch. Except its main bridge, all of its part can only be damaged with air-to-surface arsenal.

Sniper_negativevocalization03.wav. No torture object P.O.W secured in this stage.

Next stage takes place entirely in the sky. So the air-to-surface firing button become 2nd air-to-air firing button. It's mundane feature, in my opinion. Unless you think it's nice to be able to shoot the weapon at (probably) twice rate.   

"Help!" he said. I want to shoot him instead. Yes, i violate Geneva Covenant. Of course, my bullets pass through him harmlessly. So i capture him instead.

I change the aircraft, again. My initial plan was: whenever i use continue i choose the next plane by pressing directional button down hoping to choose the below of the first ones and so forth. But it didn't go well. Because, it seems Namco puts the order of the plane selection different than the one in starting screen. So i previously take F/A-18E that shoots 4-way bullets. Fortunately, now i control YF-23A that shoots 6-way bullets the same with F-15J. Oh, yeah. The stage boss is this big plane that shoots 5-way bullet pattern that alternate its aim by clockwise. Nothing too special.  

This time i have secured 3 P.O.Ws. Prepare for intense tickling, bastards! (:

Superb! I'm piloting F-117A, The Legendary Bomber. You'll meet Ooi soon, Kitakami. In the afterlife!

But that great moment didn't last for long. I switch to Harrier GR. 5. But it's okay. I quite fancy Harrier for its VTOL capability. Ah, shoot! If i still keep piloting F-117A until here. I can recreate 'Urban Strike' cover.

Like this. Though i'm not sure what aircraft is this. It have the same shape with F-117A but it has top propeller like helicopter. Futuristic chopper, perhaps?!  

This time, the stage boss is this harmless giant airplane that about to take off. It doesn't have any weaponry because it's presumably cargo plane. Sometimes it dispatches tanks to ward off the player. So, it's pretty much harmless to you. Until the camera pan forward so you are forced to fly besides it otherwise you get rammed by its huge body and wings.

Although it's moderately damaged, it manage to escape in front of me. Maybe A-10 Thunderbolt and MRCA IDS didn't fit to wreck this giant. Disappointing.

Next stage is opportunity for JA-37 the only Sweden aircraft in this game. I think this is the time for me to tell you about the differences on each aircraft. Besides flying speed and sprites, the significant differences are obviously the arsenal. On the aircraft selection, Namco shows you the type of the aircrafts by air-to-air weapon: 1) 6-way bullets 2) 4-way bullets with wide pattern (5-way) 3) 4-way bullets with focused pattern (straight) 4) 4-way bullets with side bullets that travel wider (Semi-Auto) 5) 2 bullets straight forward (Auto) 6) 1-2 bullets straight forward (Full-Auto). Also there's quite handful of variety on air-to-surface weapon: 1) Gatling gun that's the weakest weapon but it has maximum range instead of fixed crosshair 2) Air-to-surface missile, Maverick that deals decent damage, homing to targets, and has the longest targeting spot but can't targets enemy at near the plane and slowest attack rate 3) Bombs that's the strongest weapon but can only be dropped at fixed crosshair though they have splash/explosion area on impact. The combination of sprite, speed, and arsenal is what makes every aircraft feels quite different with each other. 

This stage boss is this stronghold with horde of tank reinforcement and turrets. It looks tough but it's obliterated with only 1 use-a-continue bomb. Engineer_autocappedintelligence01.wav

Oh, yawn! Another desert stage. This could be worse Desert Strike than EA's.

At least the boss stage is quite interesting: it's giant military base that's guarded by turrets and...Metal Gears! Although they can only spew bullet barrages, they can take vast amounts of damage before exploding. Pretty much what i expect from famous bipedal nuclear-warhead-launching robot. Notice that in the previous screenshot, the battle is at noon (judging from the color of lighting). When i fly closer to the end of the stage, the atmosphere gradually changes to evening like this. Nice visual feature there, Namco.    

A-10 Thunderbolt only equipped with Gatling gun to deal with surface enemies, which is quite unreliable air-to-surface weapon. Consider yourself lucky, Sendai. -_-

The stage boss is Ise. As she it is still in docking. The battle is over in a flash (of screen-clearing bomb).

Next stage takes place in snowy mountain. I meet the Metal Gears again. Hello again, there. Here i detect the combat handicap. On every generic vertical shooter, i get easily overwhelmed with enemy's barrage because 1) Enemies clearly outnumber me 2) Many of them have capability of shooting omni-directionally, while i can only shoot roughly in front of me. It goes quite the same in Fighter & Attacker's case, especially there's neither power-up to upgrade aircraft's arsenal nor normal screen-clearing bomb. If that problem come from air enemies, i can mitigate it by choosing aircraft that has 6-way shooting. If that problem come from surface enemies, tough luck, man! Because every air-to-surface arsenal doesn't have wide pattern, meaning only targets in front of the aircraft. In this stage there's a lot of bombardment from ground cannon, so it's "Welcome to the credit-feeding section, pal!"

The boss stage: this red chopper that soon accompanied by 2 smaller choppers. It's pretty nice until they fly deeper into this base where many turrets are lock-on my plane. The insolent gits.

Next stage is another up-in-the-sky stage. Here we witness the wretched way to hinder our hero. They form maze of large plane (that can take huge damage) and some of them will shoot at the player. What a despicable strategy. -_-#

Beyond that plane maze is this another big plane that serves as stage boss. It has 2 bodyguards too like the previous boss. Albeit its personal cohorts only show their tail, they still provide fire support, mind you. Presumably this entire screen isn't big enough for 3 of them.

Well here goes the last boss. I forgot that common vertical shooter only last 8 stages. With the final boss explodes merrily, the game evaluates player's performance on boss stage elimination. Yes, boss stage in Fighter & Attacker can escape or get flied through. I already mention before about the giant plane that escape because i didn't damage it enough, that's boss stage 3. While boss stage 5 is the base that guarded by metal gears. I forget to mention that meeting them is quite bliss but they really know how to hinder me from destroying the target. I got siege heavily back there, please understand.  

You're velcome! Fighter & Bomber & Support & Attacker is definitely big step up  from Namco's classic vertical shooter: Xevious, what with more variety in enemies, arsenals, aircraft, and better graphic. The good aspect stops there. The game is mostly boring because it really lacks on advanced feature such as: pick-ups. I quite understand that F&A features lots of aircraft to choose that adding arsenal power-up seems game-breaking or make the selection feels indistinctive. But at least, Namco could tries to put other kind of pick-ups like: sub-standard weapons (rocket or missile), automatic screen-clearing bomb, armor repair, temporary invincibility. Instead of just P.O.Ws and hostages all over again. It seems Namco stops its own fun imagination on making this game because it more focuses developing Ace Combat. Which is quite shame. If it put more pick-ups like i mentioned before, F&A will have high recommendation from me. At least the musics are great. They have up-beat funky sense, which are certainly unique for average vertical shooter. Also some of the boss stage aren't big damage soaker and the graphics are neat.

My suggestion: play this for few stages or finish it once. Also play it by 2 players, so one player has 'crowd control' role (like: 6-way shooters) and the other is focused damager (like: auto shooters). That should amplify the fun you get playing F&A. Or each of you can choose the favorite aircraft. Anything but don't play it alone (like me). It get boring pretty fast but also you can change your aircraft pretty fast too. Oh, almost forgot! If you're curious with battling metal gears using military aircraft. You can experience it here.