''Propeller Arena: Aviation Battle Championship'' is a

video 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, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This fee ...

for the

Dreamcast The is a home video game console released by Sega on November 27, 1998, in Japan; September 9, 1999, in North America; and October 14, 1999, in Europe. It was the first sixth-generation video game console, preceding Sony's PlayStation 2, Nint ...

console. It was originally titled Propeller Head Online, and was to be released on September 19, 2001. The game was trademarked on August 14, 2001. It was developed and completed by the development team

Sega AM2 previously known as is a video game development team within the Japanese multinational video game developer Sega. Yu Suzuki, who had previously developed arcade games for Sega including '' Hang-On'' and ''Out Run'', was the first manager of t ...

, but the game was never officially released. The release was cancelled just days after the

September 11 attacks The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, nineteen terrorists hijacked four commer ...

, citing both similarities in game packaging and design to the events of that day as well as the Dreamcast's declining market share resulting in projected low sales numbers. The game was on display at E3 on May 19, 2001. After it was postponed, they were working to change the game cover art to remove sensitive images. Hopes of a port to another console never materialized. However, a

disk image A disk image, in computing, is a computer file containing the contents and structure of a disk volume or of an entire data storage device, such as a hard disk drive, tape drive, floppy disk, optical disc, or USB flash drive. A disk image is us ...

of the game was eventually leaked, and became a popular download on many

peer-to-peer Peer-to-peer (P2P) computing or networking is a distributed application architecture that partitions tasks or workloads between peers. Peers are equally privileged, equipotent participants in the network. They are said to form a peer-to-peer ...

networks.

Plot

In 2045, there is an air combat tournament with planes from the

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

era.

Characters

Several pilots join the tournament, each with their own reasons.

Gameplay

''Propeller Arena'' consists of quick

dog fight A dogfight, or dog fight, is an aerial battle between fighter aircraft conducted at close range. Dogfighting first occurred in Mexico in 1913, shortly after the invention of the airplane. Until at least 1992, it was a component in every maj ...

deathmatches in limited areas. The game has four modes: the main game, Championship, which is a sequence of dogfights; Quick Battle, a single dogfight; Training Arena, a number of training missions and minigames; and Network, the online mode. Beating the game and the training missions unlocks extra characters and levels. The game features force feedback via support for the Dreamcast Jump Pack.

Soundtrack

The game's soundtrack, consisting of punk rock, was created by both "branches" of Sega: a Japanese team (Sachio Ogawa and Tomoya Koga) had 13 songs composed and produced in-house, while an American team arranged a deal with the

Fat Wreck Chords Fat Wreck Chords (pronounced "Fat Records") is a San Francisco, California-based independent record label, focused on punk rock. It was started by NOFX lead singer Michael Burkett (better known as Fat Mike) in 1990. The label has released mater ...

label to license nine songs from the bands Consumed, Zero Down, No Use for a Name,

Mad Caddies The Mad Caddies (or the Caddies) are a ska punk band from Solvang, California, United States. The band formed in 1995 and has released seven full-length albums, one live album, and two EPs. To date, Mad Caddies have sold over 500,000 albums wo ...

, and Rise Against. Some of Sega's original songs were remixed as instrumental versions and reused in their 2006 sports game ''

Virtua Tennis 3 ''Virtua Tennis 3'' (''Sega Professional Tennis: Power Smash 3'' in Japan) is the second arcade game sequel to Sega's tennis game franchise, ''Virtua Tennis''. The arcade version of ''Virtua Tennis 3'' is powered by the PC-based Sega Lindbergh ...

''.

References

{{Reflist Action video games Cancelled Dreamcast games Dreamcast-only games Impact of the September 11 attacks on the video game industry Multiplayer and single-player video games Sega-AM2 games Video games developed in Japan Video games set in the 2040s

Plot

Characters

Gameplay

Soundtrack

See also

References