The year is 1941. Your name is William Crow, growing up in Middle America and as is your patriotic and moral obligation you choose to follow in the footsteps of your dear father. He served in the Air Force until an accident involving an exploding aircraft nearly killed him, so obviously you and your brother become obsessed with planes. While your struggles to make ends meet, eating Corn Flakes and gone-off milk, you spend your time cutting up the skies in a war torn aircraft - that is, until your call comes to defend America in World War II. You and your brother are both stationed at Pearl Harbour, destined to be... Heroes of the Pacific! Before any of that begins however, there's a couple of training levels that you might want to undertake, otherwise you won't be leaving the runway (despite years of practice at home), let alone strafing from enemy fire and shooting back with pinpoint accuracy. A 'firm but fair' sergeant takes you through the necessary basics that include taking off, landing and using your weapons in a series of mini-challenges. Once you've found your bearings, you're ready to explore what else the game has to offer.

The main game runs through the story of Crowe and his brother in a number of mock-ups of the real events of WWII. The story is nudged along with the assistance of animated storyboards that house a real sense of wartime nostalgia, reflecting the patriotic, optimistic banter of posters and adverts of the time - think of the iconic 'We Need You!' campaigns and the like and you're some way to imagining how it looks. Each set scene involves a number of tasks for you to complete. More overly these ask of you the same couple of requirements, such as taking down a certain number of enemy planes, defending a base, escorting vehicles or destroying stationary targets. Of the difficulty settings available (there are four), the easier modes will prove none too challenging. In fact, the only way it seems possible to have your plane destroyed on the easiest of modes is if you accidentally crash it yourself. On that note, your ability to maneuver your plane successfully is vital to the way some missions pan out. The left analogue stick controls your direction while the right stick is the throttle. Careful balancing between the two will see you gliding through the skies like a professional, but mess around too much and you're at risk of stalling or meeting concrete or ocean at a considerable pace.

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As far as combat goes, the lock-on feature available to you doesn't so much hug your enemy's path, it just highlights their position and leaves you to perform the minor tweaks and adjustments that mean you are still able to fire at them. At first this is a frustrating job as the opposition ducks and dives more than Del Boy Trotter, but you'll soon get the hang of it, sticking to your chosen target's tail like that blue ink that stains goofy bank robbers. In some missions you can use the directional pad to control a fleet of planes, causing them to drop back, attack a target, defend a certain area or get back into formation. Switching between controlling your machine and quickly pressing one of the directional buttons is a clumsy task at best, but still it's a nice touch that does seem to have some impact on goings on. It's also worth mentioning that the number of planes available to you throughout the game is considerable, each with their own specific handling attributes. Controlling a Bomber is particularly fun, as you dive with great gusto towards a sitting target, drop your deadly package at the precise moment and speed away before anyone's even noticed. Except maybe the officer who find himself in the sea, trying to tread water despite lacking essential limbs.

Heroes of the Pacific isn't particularly stunning in the visual department, but that's not to say that everything doesn't look convincing. Considering the size of each map, there's a fair amount of detail in the scenery and not a lot of noticeable pop-up at that. In addition, everything chugs along at a steady frame rate with barely a sign of slow down anywhere. Most graphically impressive are the planes themselves which all look as delicious and character-filled as an apple pie made by the mother of a solider returning from combat. Also notable is the realism of the explosions as the enemy or scenery are destroyed, and bizarrely, the clouds. You'll be surprised how much time you lose just flying through them, admiring their texture and depth - whilst all the while being screamed at by your officer for flying off course and ignoring his orders!

The way the game sounds isn't something that's going to blow you away either, unfortunately. There's the predictable 'epic' roar of trumpets that signify you're flying the flag for America. That musical score blares throughout the menu screens, whilst the in-game audio consists of the noise of engines, gunfire and any orders you receive or give. Most disappointing are the quips sounded when you send orders to your fellow men when you want to control them. The person who recorded them must've either been having a really bad day or just didn't care, because they sound as flat and lacking in passion as anything you're ever likely to hear from any character in a computer game - and that's saying something. It's only a slight niggle, but it really does help to destroy any sense of urgency or apprehension that the game conjures up in play.

Other game modes include play and a mission based game that aims to accurately re-create five historic events from the era. The online mode is a welcome addition certainly, as the story mode is a bit short and underwhelming. And 'underwhelming' is a word to describe Heroes of the Pacific as a whole. It's a game that is definitely competent but it just doesn't do anything special. Nearly every aspect of the game works well but when each mission ends there doesn't seem to be any urge to carry on except to finish. It's just hard to care. This isn't helped by a story that's about as original as a film where America saves the world... or a recent game involving warfare, for instance. That said, if you really can't get enough of the World War genre then you could do a lot worse than Heroes of the Pacific, a game that that puts you in the dog fighting cockpit of an American jet and says 'single-handedly win World War II for all us Americans, please.' And lets you respond with, 'Okay, okay, I will. Just as soon as I've had my dinner and fed the cats.'

77%

By Andrew Macarthy