[ArmA] Shot Down by UH60MG

Review by Mathias_Eichinger

Overview

The Overview is in the classic style, with a picture showing a burning Blackhawk, accompanied by the appropriate text.

Intro

The Intro is very basic, with a camera revolving around a Blackhawk falling down from the sky. This camera control is a bit unfortunate because it makes the viewer dizzy. The intro does not end by itself, one has to press a dialogue button on the screen.

Briefing

The Briefing is very short and to the point. There is almost no background information about the crash (like if the team has been on insertion or just been extracted) and no weapons selection.

Mission

Right at the start of the mission you are presented with a dialogue interface where you can pick different times of day (random, morning, afternoon, evening and night) and three different levels of difficulty, which is a nice touch.

Then you find yourself sitting in a Blackhawk, where you have the possibility of a limited weapons selection, while the enemy is already converging to the crash site. This kind of weapons selection has the disadvantage of picking an unwanted weapon, because you hit the mousewheel and the enemies don`t leave you much time to choose.

Once outside, there are different numbers of enemy infantry to ward off, depending on your difficulty selection. On the hardest level, they appear to be a bit overdone. It feels more like a classic FPS, with enemies converging on you from all sides. Especially the fact that they pop up out of nowhere, closer than 50 m does not look too convincing.

Then the player has to make his way to a hiding spot, chased by enemy vehicles and running into a blocking force. Some time passes and the next task is to get to the extraction LZ alive, with various numbers of enemies thrown your way. While easy and medium mode are quite entertaining to play, the hard mode is unbalanced here as well, because the chasing vehicles which are different each time the mission is played often contain twin T72s, which are almost impossible to beat, especially with a row of enemy infantry shooting at you at the same time.

At the LZ the helo would come quickly, along with some pursuing enemies. The helicopter does cause some headache, because more often than not, it would land hundreds of meters away from the LZ, only to move back to it, if you have not loaded all of your men at once.

Outro(s)

An outro is not present.

Special

selection of daytime and difficulty , plus the dynamic loaction of the mission each time you play it.

Overall

Bottom line: A mission that follows a rather basic concept with no surprises or twists. It offers a chance to play during different times of the day and the location of the mission changes dynamically on North Sahrani.