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Great concept but needs work

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 8 / 21
Date: December 19, 1999
Author: Amazon User

The graghics are great and the concept is appealing but after reading War & Peace to get the gest of how to operate this sim for 4 day's I was looking forward to enjoying the time in the skies over Korea. However between the Ilegal operations and the lock ups the enjoyment faded to frustration. Back to EAW until this sim is debugged!

If you enjoy fine graphics, Look somewhere else

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 2 / 7
Date: March 31, 2000
Author: Amazon User

This game was a total let down for me.The designer not only made a game that was difficult to play in the learning process of it,but also did not pay enough attention to graphics.Being a WWII flight sim. fan, I've had the chance to play others that gave a more realistic feel,and easier controls to learn.I felt very limited to my viewing the skies for migs. With other games you have a lock on ability for your enemy, so with one push of a button you can find him.This game has a werid alt.map that only shows the enemy in respect to your airplane.This just becomes very confusing and not fun to deal with.So,if you like games that lack in graphics and are hard to figure out,this is the game for you,but if you don't then keep looking because there are alot more games out there was much more to offer. The only thing I will say for this game is, if you buy two they'll make great bookends.

bad results

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 1 / 1
Date: February 12, 2004
Author: Amazon User

no good on windows xp patches dont work dont buy if you have xp

Disappointing.

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 5 / 6
Date: May 27, 2000
Author: Amazon User

This could be a good sim, but unfortunately too many things are screwed up.

My two main complaints are graphics and controls.

The game uses the same graphical engine as 4 years old Flying Corps /WW I Rowan's previous sim/. On the box it says it is a new, advanced one. Well, it's not, I have FC sitting on the shelf for years and they look, feel and play the same. If designers made any changes, they are marginal. This means that graphics are average at best, compared with today's standards. Combined with clumsy viewies and confusing padlocks, the result is miserable. Explosions are cheesy, damage model as well. Ground textures from the lower altitudes are very bad, even with all filtering turned on, with tiles clearly visible. Cockpit art is average at best. Gunfire flashes sprites are laughable. Clouds are bad, with bad textures as well, sun glares are ugly. Rowan should get rid of this engine years ago...

Second major problem are controls. I'm using standard Microsoft's Sidewinder Precision Pro joystick. The controls are sensitive as hell, and there is really no way to decrease it sufficiently enough. /I've seen some reviewers mention this bug as well/. Keyboard controls are better, but result in major disadvantage of course and fast death.

Wingmen are precisely following leader's /yours/ moves. They are really very smart and can anticipate your every move, pitch and bank, without any delay, just like a flight of Blue Angels. Like shadows. Is this realistic?

The game locked up-crashed as well, there are known problems with 3D accelerators, not solved yet completely. /And they never will be, as well they never really were fixed in Flying Corps/.

What are positive things? Sound is OK. A nice documentation, including a replica of authentic Korean War handbook /F86 vs. MiG reports/. Supposedly a dynamic campaign mode /didn't try it/. Frame rates are OK, smooth enough.

MiG Alley is a disappointment for me, sorry but I expected more, and so the game goes back to the store tomorrow after I spent an afternoon with it. Going to try something else /maybe Jane's F-18/, or rather wait till Jane's will make next sequel to WW2 Fighters /that's my favorite :)/.

Run on PII-400 /128megs, AGP TNT Viper550 16 MB + PCI Voodoo2's in SLI /24MB /, for accuracy tested as well on iCeleron 466/128megs, TNT2 AGP ViperV770 32MB . Pretty same results on both machines. Max detected and allowed resolution was 1280*960 :( ; ... Played with the latest ,1.23 patch.

bad

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 1 / 3
Date: October 15, 2002
Author: Amazon User

This game is a dissapointment. But when I bought it I wasn't expecting much. The controls are terrible. How could anybody read the cockpit instruments? The grapics are ok but the pixelation isn't all that great, the worst part as that this doesnt have training. If you want a good sim get USAF.

The flight sim that could have...

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 2 / 4
Date: December 31, 2003
Author: Amazon User

First, a caveat - when I tried this sim on my P4-winXP, it wouldn't respond to joystick inputs. Even when re-calibrating in-game (which just sends you to the WinXP control panel), and downloading the official patch failed to help. With a 3rd party patch I realized a mixed blessing - I could now fly the sim well enough to realize how good it could have been if not for some serious flaws. While I haven't determined which of these problems were endemic to the pre-patched game, they mirrored the same problems I'd found on the Empire Interactive/Rowan game "Wings of Gold", a promising WWI sim. "MiG Alley" (MA) was one of two sims that appeared in the late 1990's dedicated to the Korean air war - the co-called "forgotten war". World's apart from "Sabre Ace", MA was still bedeviled by horrible bugs, again eerily recalling WoG - graphics re-draw (in which the program will re-draw the next graphics frame w/o fully erasing the previous one - reminding you that you are in fact looking at graphics and also making for a more psychedelic experience than you'd expect in a military flight sim), numerous freezes and the all powerful CTD (crash to desktop)! Bugs aside, MA reveals an uncompromising sim from a developer with a uniquely uncanny choice in its subjects, one obviously designed for the serious aviator (WWI sims were on the decline when WoG appeared and remain eclipsed by sims based on WWII Europe; "Flight of the Intruder" remains not only of the most demanding hardcore sims of all time, but one of the few that focused completely on Vietnam. USNF '97 graciously included VN among its otherwise blandly generic missions. "Strike Fighters" included Vietnam War-era planes, but had them fighting a fictitious war in the mideast).

In MA, you fly single missions or in segmented campaigns in the Korean war, a comparatively short though bloody war in which fortunes seemed in constant flux (from the North's initial overwhelming of the US-backed South, to the allied landing and break-out at Inchon, to the entry of red China). Your choice of aircraft is extensive, but also limited to USAF assets (meaning that there's still room for a sim that has you flying FJ-3, F-9 and Corsairs from aircraft carriers, ala "Bridges of Toko-Ri" and "Men of the Fighting Lady"). You'll fly the F-80, America's first true combat jet (and the winner of the first all-jet dogfight), the F-51 Mustang (the legendary prop-fighter of WWII now out of its element flying strike missions and CAS), the early F-84 (a straight-wing jet fighter later designed with swept wings, but not in time for Korea) and of course, several versions of the F-86 itself. Though you get to fly the MiG-15 (a fighter based on the Focke-Wulfe Ta-183 prototype designed by Kurt Tank for the Luftwaffe near the end of WWII), the sim makes it clear where your attentions are devoted (i.e., there are no careers for flying Yaks or Lavotchkin fighters). Each of the plane's are wonderfully distinctive: like the real thing, the game's F-84 is bedeviled by its non-stabilator tail and non-swept wings, but its stability and resilience to damage will reward the faithful; Giving Mustangs the ground-attack missions that should have been tasked to the P-47 (a Mustang contemporary of WWII that was actually an ancestor of the F-84, and possessing, for a prop-fighter, the same stable flight performance and better able to absorb damage) was probably a bad idea, but Rowan uses the inclusion of any prop-fighter to highlight the sensation of their jets - the Mustang of this game is hardly the dumb-downed jet of "Sabre Ace", but so retains the nuances of that prop-fighter that you have to remind yourself that you're not over wartime Europe; the F-80 is the perfect jet for beginners - neither so agile that it's inclined to spin, nor so stable that you'll find yourself wrestling with the controls while trying to anticipate enemy fighters; the ultimate experience of course is the F-86, which will definitely spin if given half a chance, and will likely spin if given any chance. All allied aircraft share the flaw of being outgunned by the MiG-15 (which carried a rapid firing cannon against the machine guns - inadequate by WWII standards - lofted by our planes).

Combat is challenging at every level - there were no HUDs in Korea, so just finding your targets is akin to impossible (the game "allows" a semi-3d scanner reminiscent of the one in the X-Wing Fighter games; echoing the "Air Warrior" series, the game also features dots alongside the edges of your screen hinting at the location of fighters both friendly and otherwise). Realistically, aircraft appear as fast-moving specks on the horizon, then as blazing stars (likely the sun bouncing off that aluminum) and only into fully realized airplanes once they're practically sitting on your hood. Apart from the combat, flight is also a challenge, but a rewarding one (not even downing MiGs is as empowering as saving your plane from a spin - just remember to ram the nose down, lateral neutral, and use full rudder opposite direction of the spin). The campaign mode is also interesting - allowing you to choose how deeply you want to control its course. Unsurprisingly, the campaign mode has the most promise, requires the most attention and suffers the most from the game's inclination to CTD. In the end, I just had no patience to fly the same mission over and over again, knowing that a CTD would set me back to square one. So much of this sim went unrealized, but I've kept it around, if only for its instant action, a few minutes of some of the most demanding and fleshed out air combat I've seen on a computer, and the saddest sign of what could have been the best flight sim of all time.

bitter-sweet failure of a sim

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: May 03, 2003
Author: Amazon User

First, a caveat - when I tried this sim on my P4-winXP, it wouldn't respond to joystick inputs. Even when re-calibrating in-game (which just sends you to the WinXP control panel), and downloading the official patch failed to help. With a 3rd party patch I realized a mixed blessing - I could now fly the sim well enough to realize how good it could have been if not for some serious flaws. While I haven't determined which of these problems were endemic to the pre-patched game, they mirrored the same problems I'd found on the Empire Interactive/Rowan game "Wings of Gold", a promising WWI sim. "MiG Alley" (MA) was one of two sims that appeared in the late 1990's dedicated to the Korean air war - the co-called "forgotten war". World's apart from "Sabre Ace", MA was still bedeviled by horrible bugs, again eerily recalling WoG - graphics re-draw (in which the program will re-draw the next graphics frame w/o fully erasing the previous one - reminding you that you are in fact looking at graphics and also making for a more psychedelic experience than you'd expect in a military flight sim), numerous freezes and the all powerful CTD (crash to desktop)! Bugs aside, MA reveals an uncompromising sim from a developer with a uniquely uncanny choice in its subjects, one obviously designed for the serious aviator (WWI sims were on the decline when WoG appeared and remain eclipsed by sims based on WWII Europe; "Flight of the Intruder" remains not only of the most demanding hardcore sims of all time, but one of the few that focused completely on [SE Asia]. USNF '97 graciously included VN among its otherwise blandly generic missions. "Strike Fighters" included [SE Asia]. War-era planes, but had them fighting a fictitious war in the mideast).

In MA, you fly single missions or in segmented campaigns in the Korean war, a comparatively short though bloody war in which fortunes seemed in constant flux (from the North's initial overwhelming of the US-backed South, to the allied landing and break-out at Inchon, to the entry of red China). Your choice of aircraft is extensive, but also limited to USAF assets (meaning that there's still room for a sim that has you flying FJ-3, F-9 and Corsairs from aircraft carriers, ala "Bridges of Toko-Ri" and "Men of the Fighting Lady"). You'll fly the F-80, America's first true combat jet (and the winner of the first all-jet dogfight), the F-51 Mustang (the legendary prop-fighter of WWII now out of its element flying strike missions and CAS), the early F-84 (a straight-wing jet fighter later designed with swept wings,... and of course, several versions of the F-86 itself. Though you get to fly the MiG-15 (a fighter based on the Focke-Wulfe Ta-183 prototype designed by Kurt Tank for the Luftwaffe near the end of WWII), the sim makes it clear where your attentions are devoted (i.e., there are no careers for flying Yaks or Lavotchkin fighters). Each of the plane's are wonderfully distinctive: like the real thing, the game's F-84 is bedeviled by its non-stabilator tail and non-swept wings, but its stability and resilience to damage will reward the faithful; Giving Mustangs the ground-attack missions that should have been tasked to the P-47 (a Mustang contemporary of WWII that was actually an ancestor of the F-84, and possessing, for a prop-fighter, the same stable flight performance and better able to absorb damage) was probably a bad idea, but Rowan uses the inclusion of any prop-fighter to highlight the sensation of their jets - the Mustang of this game is hardly the dumb-downed jet of "Sabre Ace", but so retains the nuances of that prop-fighter that you have to remind yourself that you're not over wartime Europe; the F-80 is the perfect jet for beginners - neither so agile that it's inclined to spin, nor so stable that you'll find yourself wrestling with the controls while trying to anticipate enemy fighters; the ultimate experience of course is the F-86, which will definitely spin if given half a chance, and will likely spin if given any chance. All allied aircraft share the flaw of being outgunned by the MiG-15 (which carried a rapid firing cannon against the [firearms] - inadequate by WWII standards - lofted by our planes).

Combat is challenging at every level - there were no HUDs in [SE Asia], so just finding your targets is akin to impossible (the game "allows" a semi-3d scanner reminiscent of the one in the X-Wing Fighter games; echoing the "Air Warrior" series, the game also features dots alongside the edges of your screen hinting at the location of fighters both friendly and otherwise). Realistically, aircraft appear as fast-moving specks on the horizon, then as blazing stars (likely the sun bouncing off that aluminum) and only into fully realized airplanes once they're practically sitting on your hood. Apart from the combat, flight is also a challenge, but a rewarding one (not even downing MiGs is as empowering as saving your plane from a spin - just remember to ram the nose down, lateral neutral, and use full rudder opposite direction of the spin). The campaign mode is also interesting - allowing you to choose how deeply you want to control its course. Unsurprisingly, the campaign mode has the most promise, requires the most attention and suffers the most from the game's inclination to CTD. In the end, I just had no patience to fly the same mission over and over again, knowing that a CTD would set me back to square one. So much of this sim went unrealized, but I've kept it around, if only for its instant action, a few minutes of some of the most demanding and fleshed out air combat I've seen on a computer, and the saddest sign of what could have been the best flight sim of all time.

Outstanding dogfighting and dynamic campaign

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 21 / 27
Date: November 16, 1999
Author: Amazon User

I highly recommend this outstanding flight sim. Its only problem is mulitplay which needs some work, however the rest of the sim more than makes up for it.

Last of the real dogfights!

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 20 / 20
Date: January 13, 2000
Author: Amazon User

If you are a fan of the Air campaign over Korea then this is a must have! Mig Alley accurately depicts how chaotic and close the air combat was. The campaigns are robust in that you can control not only your flight but other units that can affect the outcome of the war. It takes time to learn how to do it but it is worth it. I wish there was more medals and stuff in the campaign. The graphics rock, but you need a PC that can take it, what else is new. Yanking and Banking in this sim is not easy because spins can happen at a moments notice. Once you get the hang of it though there is nothing cooler than watching a Mig-15 burst into a fireball! One draw back is that you can't be Mig in a campaign, but you can fly single missions in one.

All in all this Sim is well worth your hard earned $$$$.

Excellent fighter sim

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 5 / 5
Date: April 21, 2000
Author: Amazon User

As a trainee fighter pilot I think this is really the most realistic game I have played. Although the game is very limited, for instance in the number of exercises that can be carried out, I have still found it very usefull. The games biggest plus is the detailed map, that when printed out allows you to fly low level tatical navs using roads ,rivers etc. No game including Falcon 4 does this as well. This game with its excellent flight model is also great for ACM. Especially as it teaches you alot about energy management ( which is essential in a low power fighter ). Once again its a great pity is it doesn't allow more options ex 2v1 & 2v2 setups. Even with all its limitations its a must for any aspiring fighter pilot.

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