Mediocrity (Infiltrator, Iron Tank, Isolated Warrior)

Well, it didn't take long for the hope to die, now did it? Infiltrator is some sort of combat flight simulator. Look, why don't we just defer to Phil Sandifer and the original project on this one. He had this to say about a game called Airwolf.

Let's discuss realism. 

Fuck realism.. 

Or at least that's my usual speech on the subject. If I wanted realism, I'd interact with reality. What I want out of a video game is playability, which is generally largely distinct from realism. For instance, I cannot fly an airplane. In that regard, Airwolf was an INCREDIBLY LIFELIKE SIMULATION of what would happen if you put me in an airplane, which is that I could not take off, and if I did take off, I would promptly crash and die.

Pretty much me and Infiltrator. I flew around in circles shooting glowy things at a plane and missing. The plane shot glowy things at me and eventually I went down. I didn't even take a screenshot of the game; just this. The opening mission briefing mentioned some guy wanting to make nerve gas. Then it shows me this. It's the only remarkable thing about Infiltrator. Jesus, at least I could play Ikari Warriors.

Speaking of, we have... (gulp) Iron Tank. An SNK game that feels a lot like Ikari Warriors. You get in a tank and move forward, running over guys and shooting at other tanks. SNK took the only part of Ikari Warriors I liked and made a game about that. It's decent, to a point. Then something odd happened. I got a "call" in-game. I went into my menu and answered this call, and the commander on the other end referred to me as "Snake" before telling me to do something. How... interesting. Even from here, that system's gravity is tugging on us, ever so faintly. A shooting star from a far-off system, reaching the orbit of Iron Tank. Iron Tank is okay I guess. I'll give it a pass.

Isolated Warrior next. Not Ironsword. Ironsword has been flung into a time warp and will be dealt with in the far future. Isolated Warrior now. You're a guy named Max Maverick and you run around all isometric style shooting at things. Sounds decent enough, but I have a complaint. Your basic gun shoots straight ahead. Upgrading it makes you shoot two shots... at an angle. With no straight shot. Great, so now it's harder for me to hit things. I ended up dying to the miniboss and stage boss due to this... only to find them easier when I came back because I had a straight shot. The Gradius syndrome, somehow reversed. This was short. Like I said, these are not hidden treasures. They exist, we have noted it, and now we move on. There's a new letter coming up. A new realm to explore. Oh boy.