Chapter 343: Flight and Fight I
How could it not be more interesting when this video game could emulate Top Gun itself?
A movie tickled fascination, toys are the handsy physical manifestation, costumes are for idolative imitation, while a comic book could be a source or expansion...
As for video games... well... they offer a simulation that can really double down the immersion.
Takeoffs, blazing through turbulence, ascents, descents, dogfighting, and rocket launches... even cruiser landings with supposed "missions".
Alexander was probably logical than any other person out there but he really went a bit crazy on the technicalities of this one.
There's no denying that movie-based video games are crap, so he kind of wanted to break a stigma with this one.
It hadn't been easy.
His usual plundering tactic wouldn't be a help on this one.
Given that he had a lot of choices but none of them were really up to mark. On their own, that is.
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As covered, Alexander had a lot of ways to go about this one but taking the top of the list had been Konami's Top Gun.
Nothing could be any more on the nose to plunder than something that Paramount themselves have approved on.
This Top Gun video game, appropriately named Top Gun... is a shoot 'em-up combat flight simulation game, viewed from a first-person perspective inside the cockpit of an F-14 fighter plane.
A full-on cockpit experience wherein players are presented with onscreen information such as altitude, airspeed, radar, and a fuel gauge.
With players themselves playing as the hotshot star, Lieutenant Maverick.
Clearly, this is based on the 1986 hit film Top Gun.
It is supposedly so, however, it just had to have elements such as...
Having unlimited machine gun ammunition, and three different types of missiles, each one with its own advantages.
Of course, a nitpick on realism didn't really matter when the source material isn't so grounded and when considering that this is supposed to be a video game.
Anyways, the player has three lives in the form of F-14 planes. All three planes being destroyed yields game over with no continue.
It is played across four levels, each one involving the player fighting off enemy MiGs...
With enemy MiGs also having their own missiles and ammunition, which the player must avoid or destroy.
In the second level, the player must also destroy an enemy aircraft carrier.
For the final two levels respectively, the player's target is an enemy fortress and a satellite base in outer space. Really?
It also has other weird caveats such as the player being able to call in a tanker plane to refuel the F-14 if necessary.
Refueling is done in mid-air, and the player must align the F-14 with the fuel pump.
With the final clincher being about the player having to truly and successfully land their F-14 on a U.S. aircraft carrier.
It seems okay enough when worded as so...
However, plenty of others who had been able to play the game had a lot of not-so-glowing things to say about it.
The main complaints are impossible landing sequences, incredibly hard, bland gameplay, and not a lot of levels.
For Alexander, it wasn't so bad.
If anything, it was a technical marvel of 8-bit gaming. Being able to simulate the feeling of being a Top Gun pilot.
Then again, he had a technical anomaly that can improve on what's what and take away what's wrong with it.
Hence... the inclusion of elements from Konami's second installment...
Top Gun: The Second Mission.
It is pretty much the same as its prequel in some form but it has much more interesting missions to deal with.
Alexander couldn't speak for anyone else but he loved the concepts of the boss characters
All highly advanced Soviet Union prototypes from the time and the enemy aces have stereotypical Russian-styled names such as "Gorky", "Demitri", and "Stalin".
The first mission is to destroy the enemy's Tupolev Tu-160 Blackjack.
The second mission is to destroy an advanced version of a Mil Mi-24 Hind helicopter, through an obstacle course through a forest.
The third and final mission is to destroy an enemy "star wars space shuttle", with two obstacle courses of avoiding lightning bolts and laser beams.
It added lore which was a concept that Alexander had pretty much built on.
Of course, not but not least, the player can opt to select a one-on-one dogfight mode against seven aces or another player.
The "another player" aspect was something that Alexander was much too intrigued by.
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Now, this new game had more missions, great bosses, lore, and a multiplayer option that embody the team-ups done during the hops.
Of course, Alexander wasn't exactly too pleased with the first-person perspective and limited visual on how cool you're truly fighting and flying your jets.
Which was why... he turned to the equally popular and debatably better After Burner series by sega.
Like Konami's Top Gun, the player assumes control of an American F-14 Tomcat fighter jet and must clear each of the game's eighteen unique stages by destroying incoming enemies, using both a machine gun and a limited supply of heat-seeking missiles.
Not too different when you compare the game series... especially when the game developer, Yu Suzuki was inspired by the 1986 films Top Gun and Laputa: Castle in the Sky.
He originally planned for the game to have a steampunk aesthetic similar to Laputa, but instead went with a Top Gun look to make the game approachable for worldwide audiences.
He didn't get Paramount's approval though.
None of that really matters to Alexander, since the thing he was more interested in was this game's use of the third-person perspective.
Yu Suzuki and his Sega SM2 team were mostly known for prided "taikan" gaming. An advanced yet costly type of arcade machine gaming.
Of course, visual-breaking classics such as Space Harrier and Out Run are their work, and their After Burner was not anything less of that.
Undoubtedly, it was a visual treat and an option that Alexander wanted to have... besides the restrictive cockpits in first-person perspective.
Along with 18 more unique stages... things were shaping up to be quite good.
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Truly, it was so far so good when one adds all those factors together.
It was the quintessential Top Gun game that the world could have had when both Top Gun-licensed and Top Gun-inspired games are combined.
It was especially so when considering the other complexity, parity, and design factors of the whole thing.
Not to mention the improved graphics that the whole thing has. Alexander stuck to the whole 16+bit to the point that the whole display may not be as polygonal as Star Fox but still more impressive despite its 2-D framing.
Only sprinkling a few visible "bits" and "grids" to hide the generation that it might as well be from.
Then again, it was easier summarized than done.
Game developers of this time would scream to 'hell with it' and quit right then and there when presented with this horrific task.
Of course, Alexander wasn't so miffed with it.
With a few strategic sprites aiding and planning from his whole Creed Games team...
His own skills to boot...
A lot of overnight pushes that mortified Old Sullivan...
And a trusty cheat from certain something...
Alexander was now fiddling with one of the GameKeys that enables players to unlock the game in question.
Random flashes of red-green could be gleamed from his dark-pupiled eyes as he mused at the wonder he had in hand.
He wondered how people of today would react to the experience it could give.
A premise involving a fresher and fleshed-out interactive immersion to the most famous jet-flying film currently garnering their fancy.
If they found Top Gun awesome, then Alexander did not doubt that they'll flock for this one as well.
This video game will no doubt doubly ignite their impassioned musings of being a TOPGUN cadet and pilot...
After all, not a lot of games were capable of simulating this level of flight and fight.
Hence...
Top Gun: Flight and Fight!