''Airforce Delta Strike'', known as in Japan and ''Deadly Skies III'' in Europe, is the third installment in the

Konami , commonly known as Konami, , is a Japanese multinational entertainment company and video game developer and video game publisher, publisher headquartered in Chūō, Tokyo, Chūō, Tokyo. The company also produces and distributes trading card ...

Airforce Delta , known as ''Deadly Skies'' in Europe, is a series of combat flight simulation games developed and published by Konami. The series began in 1999 with '' Airforce Delta'' for Dreamcast, with its last main series game being the 2004 '' Airforce Delt ...

'' series. It was released in 2004 exclusively on the

PlayStation 2 The PlayStation 2 (PS2) is a home video game console developed and marketed by Sony Interactive Entertainment, Sony Computer Entertainment. It was first released in Japan on 4 March 2000, in North America on 26 October, in Europe on 24 Novembe ...

. It plays very similarly to the previous ''Airforce Delta'' games.

Story

The game plot occurs in an unspecified time in the future, featuring sci-fi weapons, planes and environments. When OCC (Orbital Citizen Community), a space colony set on Earth's orbit, rebels and launches an invasion of Earth, EDAF (Earth Defense Allied Forces) launches a defensive campaign. EDAF is overwhelmed by the OCC's superior weapons and numbers early in the war, losing a majority of its conventional forces and is forced to enlist any militia forces to help, including the Delta Squadron, an ill-famed aerial strike group known as a "dumping ground" for disgraced or misfit pilots. Despite their differences, Delta Squadron's efforts allow the EDAF to turn the tide and liberate portions of Earth occupied by the OCC, earning them the attention and rivalry of the OCC's elite experimental squadron. As the tide starts to turn and as the Earth forces advance, they find out that OCC is not the major threat - an organization from Mars is planning to destroy Earth with the help of the orbital colony.

Gameplay

AFDS features a large selection of planes to choose from and a series of missions to play through. However, unlike the previous installments, AFDS features an all new cast of

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-style characters illustrated by Jun Tsukasa. Some can be played as and others are just for support. Each character has a unique selection of planes to fly and has a different branch of missions to complete. Completion of some missions unlocks secret missions and hidden planes for replays. After the game is once completed, a secret hangar becomes available. As the game is completed and medals are earned, more secret planes become available.

Reception

The game received "average" reviews according to the

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website

Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...

. In Japan, ''

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'' gave it a score of one seven, two eights, and one six for a total of 29 out of 40. Henry Ernst of ''GamePro Germany'' criticised that the game does not make fun and that the "multi-million dollar jet handles like a wild goose that has had a load of buckshot thrown at it in the belly - extremely reluctantly." Atomic Dawg of the U.S. version of ''

GamePro ''GamePro'' was an American multiplatform video game magazine media company that published online and print content covering the video game industry, video game hardware and video game software. The magazine featured content on various video ...

'', however, said, "The visuals are sharp and clean all around, and the game features plenty of slick aircraft shots and beautiful skylines."

Notes

References

External links

* {{TwinBee series 2004 video games Airforce Delta Combat flight simulators Crossover video games Konami games PlayStation 2 games PlayStation 2-only games Single-player video games Space combat simulators Video games developed in Japan Video games set in the future