''Chuck Yeager's Advanced Flight Trainer'' is an aircraft simulation

computer game Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device to gener ...

published by Electronic Arts in 1987. It was originally released as ''Chuck Yeager's Advanced Flight Simulator''. Due to a legal dispute with Microsoft over the term "Flight Simulator", the game was pulled from shelves and renamed. Many copies of the original version were sold prior to this. Chuck Yeager served as technical consultant for the game, where his likeness and voice were prominently used. The game allows a player to "test pilot" 14 different airplanes, including the

Bell X-1 The Bell X-1 (Bell Model 44) is a rocket engine–powered aircraft, designated originally as the XS-1, and was a joint National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics– U.S. Army Air Forces–U.S. Air Force supersonic research project built by Be ...

, which Yeager had piloted to become the first man to exceed Mach 1. The game is embellished by Yeager's laconic commentary: When the user crashes one plane, Yeager remarks "You really screwed the pooch on that one", or other asides. Chuck Yeager with Ned Lerner - Summer 1987 Farther magazine

Chuck Yeager with Ned Lerner - Summer 1987 Farther magazine

Chuck Yeager's Advanced Flight Trainer (Amstrad CPC)

Aircraft

''Chuck Yeager's Advanced Flight Trainer'' includes 11 real aircraft and three experimental aircraft designed by the developers. The fictional experimental aircraft were named after people who worked on the game. ;Real aircraft: *

* Cessna 172 *

Douglas X-3 Stiletto The Douglas X-3 Stiletto was a 1950s United States experimental jet aircraft with a slender fuselage and a long tapered nose, manufactured by the Douglas Aircraft Company. Its primary mission was to investigate the design features of an aircraf ...

General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon The General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon is a single-engine Multirole combat aircraft, multirole fighter aircraft originally developed by General Dynamics for the United States Air Force (USAF). Designed as an air superiority day fighter, it ...

Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird The Lockheed SR-71 "Blackbird" is a long-range, high-altitude, Mach 3+ strategic reconnaissance aircraft developed and manufactured by the American aerospace company Lockheed Corporation. It was operated by the United States Air Force ...

* McDonnell Douglas F/A-18 Hornet * North American P-51 Mustang * Piper PA-28 Cherokee * Sopwith Camel * SPAD S.XIII *

Supermarine Spitfire The Supermarine Spitfire is a British single-seat fighter aircraft used by the Royal Air Force and other Allied countries before, during, and after World War II. Many variants of the Spitfire were built, from the Mk 1 to the Rolls-Royce Grif ...

;Experimental aircraft *Grace Industries XPG-12 Samurai *Hilleman Ltd. XRH4 MadDog *Lerner Aeronautics XNL-16 Instigator

Reception

The game was a big hit for EA, selling 100,000 copies by December 1987. In May 1988, it was awarded a "Platinum" certification from the

Software Publishers Association The Software and Information Industry Association (SIIA) is a trade association dedicated to the entertainment, consumer and business software industries. Established in 1984 as the Software Publishers Association (SPA), the SIIA took its new na ...

for sales above 250,000 units. Game reviewers Hartley and Patricia Lesser complimented the game in their "The Role of Computers" column in ''

Dragon A dragon is a reptilian legendary creature that appears in the folklore of many cultures worldwide. Beliefs about dragons vary considerably through regions, but dragons in western cultures since the High Middle Ages have often been depicted as ...

'' #126 (1987), giving PC/MS-DOS version of the game 4 out of 5 stars. The Lessers reviewed the Macintosh version of the game in 1988 in ''Dragon'' #140 in "The Role of Computers" column, giving that version 4 stars as well. '' Compute!'' criticized the blocky graphics and sound, but noted that the simple graphics resulted in a high frame rate. It concluded that ''Chuck Yeager'' differed from other games in simulating flying high-performance experimental aircraft. ''

Computer Gaming World ''Computer Gaming World'' (CGW) was an American computer game magazine published between 1981 and 2006. One of the few magazines of the era to survive the video game crash of 1983, it was sold to Ziff Davis in 1993. It expanded greatly through ...

'' reviewed the game and stated that ''Yeager'' has been a top gun performer for the San Mateo based software company, also noting that the game went SPA "Gold" quickest of any Electronic Arts title (in a little over three months of sales). In a 1994 survey of wargames ''

'' gave the title one-plus stars out of five.

Legacy

This game was followed in

1989 File:1989 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The Cypress Street Viaduct, Cypress structure collapses as a result of the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, killing motorists below; The proposal document for the World Wide Web is submitted; The Exxo ...

by ''Chuck Yeager's Advanced Flight Trainer 2.0'' and in

1991 File:1991 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Boris Yeltsin, elected as Russia's first president, waves the new flag of Russia after the 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt, orchestrated by Soviet hardliners; Mount Pinatubo erupts in the Phil ...

by '' Chuck Yeager's Air Combat''.

References

External links

* * {{Authority control 1987 video games Amstrad CPC games Apple II games Advanced Flight Trainer Commodore 64 games DOS games Flight simulation video games Classic Mac OS games MSX games Single-player video games Tandy 1000 games Video games developed in the United States ZX Spectrum games