''LHX Attack Chopper'' is a combat

helicopter A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning rotors. This allows the helicopter to take off and land vertically, to hover, and to fly forward, backward and laterally. These attributes ...

simulation game Simulation video games are a diverse super-category of video games, generally designed to closely simulate real world activities. A simulation game attempts to copy various activities from real life in the form of a game for various purposes such ...

published by

Electronic Arts Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) is an American video game company headquartered in Redwood City, California. Founded in May 1982 by Apple employee Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer game industry and promoted the d ...

in 1990. Development was led by Brent Iverson who later designed '' Chuck Yeager's Air Combat''. The game was released for MS-DOS and ported to the

Mega Drive/Genesis The Sega Genesis, known as the outside North America, is a 16-bit Fourth generation of video game consoles, fourth generation home video game console developed and sold by Sega. It was Sega's third console and the successor to the Master Syst ...

Gameplay

In addition to the LHX prototype scout-attack helicopter, the game includes two flyable US Army helicopters, the

AH-64A Apache The Boeing AH-64 Apache () is an American twin-turboshaft attack helicopter with a tailwheel-type landing gear arrangement and a tandem cockpit for a crew of two. It features a nose-mounted sensor suite for target acquisition and night vis ...

and

UH-60 Blackhawk The Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawk is a four-blade, twin-engine, medium-lift utility military helicopter manufactured by Sikorsky Aircraft. Sikorsky submitted the S-70 design for the United States Army's Utility Tactical Transport Aircraft System ( ...

, and another prototype (as of 1990),

MV-22 Osprey The Bell Boeing V-22 Osprey is an American multi-mission, tiltrotor military aircraft with both vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) and short takeoff and landing (STOL) capabilities. It is designed to combine the functionality of a convention ...

(which can actually switch between helicopter and airplane control modes), any of which may be deployed against Soviet-made ground and air military equipment in the three war theaters of Libya, Vietnam and Germany. Allied units are also available, but they do not actively join the fight, nor do the opposing units usually fire upon allied equipment, apart from specific escort missions where a B-2 bomber or a couple of UH-60 tasked with CSAR will enter into enemy air space. All missile-equipped units (both ground and air) have a limited number of shots, often matching the number of ready-to-fire missiles available in the real system. Land units do not move but air units do. The player can play any campaign or mission in any preferred order, facing five different complexity levels, which will improve the enemy's

situation awareness Situational awareness or situation awareness (SA) is the perception of environmental elements and events with respect to time or space, the comprehension of their meaning, and the projection of their future status. An alternative definition is tha ...

, time of reaction and sheer number and quality of the fielded forces. Every completed mission will not affect the other missions or the campaign as a whole and the player can run the same mission again regardless its previous result. At the end of every mission, the player receives a mission debriefing describing the consequences of the success or failure and a point counter will change depending whether the primary target is completed, whether the pilot landed at an allied airfield and not just in friendly territory and to a smaller extent the number of other enemy forces destroyed in the process of reaching and returning from the target area. At the debriefing, given the mission outcome, the pilot may receive different medals or a promotion up to Colonel rank. In case the player's helicopter exploded mid-air or crashed, the pilot will die and the player career will end. If landing in enemy territory, different outcomes are available, with the pilot being captured or killed or escaped to friendly territory or rescued by friendly forces.

Reception

A 1992 ''

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 ...

'' survey of wargames with modern settings gave the game two and a half stars out of five, stating that it had a "highly unrealistic flight model". A 1994 survey gave it two stars, stating that "it enjoyed more popular success than I thought it deserved". In 1994, ''

PC Gamer US ''PC Gamer'' is a magazine and website founded in the United Kingdom in 1993 devoted to PC gaming and published monthly by Future plc. The magazine has several regional editions, with the UK and US editions becoming the best selling PC games ma ...

'' named ''LHX Attack Chopper'' the 29th best computer game ever. The editors wrote that "what the game lacks in graphic polish it more than makes up for with fast action."

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Lhx Attack Chopper 1990 video games Cold War video games Combat flight simulators DOS games Electronic Arts games Helicopter video games Sega Genesis games Video games scored by George Sanger Video games set in Libya Video games set in Germany Vietnam War video games Video games set in Vietnam Video games set in East Germany Video games developed in the United States