Jet Lancer

Genre: 2D Flight Combat Game

Players: 1

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Review:

Jet Lancer is a 2D Flight Combat Game released on PC and Nintendo Switch in 2020. This game has players piloting a jet aircraft in fights with other aircraft as well as other enemies, both somewhat realistic as well as more sci-fi-based.

Graphically, this game looks good, with jets that look fairly well-detailed given how tiny they are onscreen, with aircraft that near the water leaving nice splashes in their wake and everything leaving a vapor trail and exploding nicely when it takes enough damage. This can get a bit confusing when there are numerous jets and missiles cris-crossing on-screen, although this visual chaos is nice to look at. The game’s visuals are paired with some decent sound effects for explosions and an energetic soundtrack that toes the line between being appropriately light and annoying.

In terms of gameplay, there are elements here that I absolutely love, and elements that I hate.

In terms of love, controlling your aircraft in this game feels like a dream. Players hold down ZR to accelerate, and at any time can release this button to turn off the engines, letting their aircraft coast on inertia and gradually be pulled down by gravity. This can make for a lot of control over aerial maneuvers, enabling players to partake in some impressive high-flying acrobatics. What’s more, firing off volleys of attacks here is really satisfying, with both a machine gun-style main attack as well as a more powerful missile attack that players can charge up to release a volley of heat-seeking missiles all at once. In short, everything about controlling your jet in this game feels amazing, responsive, and joyful.

The problem here is that despite how small the jets are on-screen, the speed at which they travel relative to their size on-screen makes it far too difficult to react to objects on-screen. The edges of the screen have markers that indicate the direction and in a limited fashion their distance, but it’s not easy to look at these and judge exactly how far away these enemies are, let alone what direction and speed they’re traveling at. And if they happen to be coming toward you at full speed, while you’re heading toward them, you may very well find yourself getting into a mid-air collision.

I find myself wishing that the screen was multiple times bigger than it is, or that the action was zoomed out farther, even if that would mean that my jet was a tiny speck in all the action, because make no mistake, that action is quite excellent, with a good variety in enemy types, and situations that call for players to maneuver their jet with the grace and nuance available to them. Unfortunately, that grace falls flat every time I run straight into an enemy I didn’t know was only a split-second away from me.

For players who don’t mind a challenge and have great reflexes, Jet Lancer promises to be a fantastic time – the action this game provides truly is excellent and well worth playing if you can manage to parse where enemies are given the limited information you’re provided. Unfortunately, most will be frustrated by this limitation, and if you’re anything like me, it’ll be all the more frustrating because it feels like you’re being kept at arm’s length from a truly great game thanks to these issues.

tl;dr – Jet Lancer is a 2D Flight Combat game that has you performing aerial maneuvers in a jet fighter in battles with enemy jets, as well as various other enemies. Flying around your jet in this game feels fantastic, but the limited size of the screen relative to how fast these aircraft fly gives players far too little time to react to what’s going on, making for an experience that alternates between joy and frustration.

Grade: C+

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