SKY ODYSSEY (PS2)
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Free flight to adventure

By JAMES ANTHONY

Well, you can always guarantee that Sony will come up with something a tad novel for its consoles, can't you. One of the Sony games out for the Playstation 2 is Sky Odyssey, a must-have for anyone who likes stunt flying or barnstorming a la the Great Waldo Pepper.

The game is set in a faraway archipelago where adventurers try their best to find the fabled Tower of Maximus. Legend has it that the tower is on Destin Island and will only appear to those who are brave and clever enough to find pieces of map to show them the way.

As a pilot you have a choice of three starting planes - a Fairy Swordfish, a Pulse Jet and a Bf-109. These can be customized and improved upon as you complete the missions set for you. For example, you can add new engines, wings, fuselage - all of which change the handling attributes of the craft. There are also six secret aircraft that can be unlocked by successfully completing objectives plus you can even strap yourself into a UFO.

Then it's a flick of the controller's pink square to start your engines and you're off into the wide, mostly blue, yonder.

Now there's no violence in this game and so it will suit gamers of all persuasions (except Will Barker). It also means that the missions need to be detail-filled and testing to keep your interest up. This, they do.

The first mission is easy enough and gives you a good chance to get the hang of the controls of your plane. The physics are pretty good and clean, but learning to control your wings does take some practice. It also requires judicious use of speed, as once you start to zig then, sure as eggs, you'll zag - out of control and perhaps into a cliff.

Once you have your wings, however, it's then on to bigger and better things.

Sky Odyssey has a wonderful array of landscapes to fly around and through, and they are very big. From takeoff to mission completion it can take you up to thirty minutes of real-time flying. There are tight canyons, falling rock faces, tunnels, wind currents, underground mazes and a host of other ways to test your skills. Land on a train to refuel, fly through snow and wind-lashed storms, land on an aircraft carrier, save an escaped balloon, avoid volcanoes and electrical storms, even dock mid-air to refuel!

One of the picks is having to nurse your aircraft over a mountain range - in a blizzard - and having to dump your fuel just so you can make the last few metres to clear the peaks. Excellen-tavo!

In the arcade game there are 40 missions to pull your goggles on for and they really keep your concentration levels up.

Along the way you can score bonus points for aerobatics, or completing a stage within time limits and these allow you to upgrade your aircraft. Replay value is good, as in each mission you get graded, so if you manage to finish most of the games 40 levels with nothing but Bs and Cs, perhaps another try might be in order?

The graphics seem to be a little up and down, but when you consider the power needed by the PS2 to render such huge scenes and then deal with fine details such as a stretching fuel-line from a train to a plane, or the moveable flaps on the planes, then maybe it is no great surprise. The draw-in range is pretty pathetic and there were moments of slow-down when intense weather effects and lens flare intermingled. The replays look amazing, particularly when you perform cool stunts or crash. Overall, the visual effect is quite good, however.

Sony has really come up with the goods here, as Sky Odyssey is one of those innovative and entirely addictive titles. Hopefully, at some stage, we may get an add-on that allows dogfights or, better yet, torpedo attacks on ships at sea. Oh ho, Tora Tora Tora!

ORIGINALITY 90%
SOUND/GRAPHICS 85%
PLAYABILITY 90%
ADDICTION 90%
ENJOYMENT 90%