By Jim Rossignol on June 8th, 2011 at 2:08 pm.
Earlier in the week I managed to have a chat with Bohemia boss Marek Spanel and one of the games he talked about was this: Take On Helicopters. It’s a civilian helicopter sim set at first in Seattle, and then on a more global stage. The game uses the Arma 3 engine, and a fresh take on the dev’s helicopter handling and controls. It will be an in-depth sim, but should be a little more accessible than you might expect, too. It’s about commercial competition, and managing a helicopter firm in tough times. For a game that features limited explosions or man-shootings, it’s looking fairly interesting.
My interview with Marek – which discusses this, Carrier Command, and Arma 3, will appear on Monday. You can check out the Take On Helicopters E3 teaser – which inevitably just features shots of a helicopter – below.
08/06/2011 at 14:10 Dana says:
Oh yeah, Carrier Command. I totally forgot about this game !
08/06/2011 at 14:13 westyfield says:
I was wondering what had happened to Carrier Command, there was a brief flurry of screenshots and then it all went quiet for ages. Glad to hear it’s still going ahead.
08/06/2011 at 14:20 Jonny Stutters says:
I’m sure this goes without saying, but Carrier Command in the ArmA engine would be multiple kinds of awesome.
08/06/2011 at 15:21 wu wei says:
CC was my first ever PC game purchase, so I have high nostalgia-fueled hopes :)
08/06/2011 at 14:11 Stranglove says:
I swear that at 0:40 there is someone saying ‘Pew Pew!’ in the background
08/06/2011 at 14:19 egg651 says:
If this is the ArmA 3 engine, then huzzah, because it looks bloody gorgeous. But then again if it looks like that, I fear for my PC – It’s not like BIS have a history of great optimisation and scalability.
08/06/2011 at 17:18 Dwarden says:
A3 si after TOH so it’s engine is way more advanced and improved compared to TOH :)
08/06/2011 at 18:38 Joshua says:
The ground actually looks less detailed, and the skies a bit more (the water always looked that awesome).
Don’t worry :).
08/06/2011 at 14:25 Rii says:
Looking forward to some new info on Carrier Command.
08/06/2011 at 14:26 _Jackalope_ says:
Aw jeez that looks very good. I suspect the minimum specs shall say something like “DON’T EVEN THINK ABOUT IT BUD!”
08/06/2011 at 14:51 Unaco says:
I hope this is going to be as moddable and extensible as OFP/ArmA. Because, if it is, I am going to be living out my Magnum PI fantasies. You’ll all be welcome to join me.
08/06/2011 at 17:19 Dwarden says:
moddability and editability is our aim, same as with our ARMA titles :)
08/06/2011 at 15:01 Helmholtz says:
Looks like I might be returning to my old stomping ground from Flight Unlimited III. Anyone know if they plan to model the air traffic control system? If so, I sure hope they don’t have the robot men from ARMA handling the communications.
08/06/2011 at 15:20 Turin Turambar says:
I hoped for a bit more of real gameplay… hmf. It looks very nice, of course.
08/06/2011 at 15:20 Alexander Norris says:
Hoping against hope some of this bleeds into ArmA3 and makes the helo handling a bit less pants.
08/06/2011 at 15:25 FKD says:
I see a lot of reference to Carrier Command..is that the origional name for this? And I kind of hope this is more SimCopter (as in little missions to run around town) and less Flight Simulator (take off and fly and then land), or maybe even a happy median. I remember there being some kind of helicopter games..rescue or something like that which I have tried the demos of before but never really got that much into.
08/06/2011 at 15:41 Turin Turambar says:
Carrier Command is another game. A scifi one.
08/06/2011 at 17:13 metalangel says:
You are thinking of the SAR Search and Rescue games. Fun for a while, but the dozen or so canned mission types soon got repetitive. A housemate at the time had been in the Norwegian Coast Guard and was impressed by the realism.
08/06/2011 at 21:23 Talon says:
SimCopter was epic! I would love to see a spiritual successor to that!
08/06/2011 at 23:15 FKD says:
@Turin: Ahh ok, thanks for the clarification!
@Metalangel: Yep that would be them! It is interesting to know that they were apparently quite realistic! Though also sad that it seemed to get so repetitive. I guess that partly explains why I could never even bother to get through the demo level :/
@Talon: It really was! As simple, and really repetitive, as it was there was still just something about it that I could fly around for hours and have fun! And not to mention the ability to import your own cities from SC2000 was pretty amazing! It makes me wish it was one of the games I brought with me when I moved :/ Now it is just sitting in storage half a continent away..
08/06/2011 at 15:29 jonfitt says:
“It’s about commercial competition, and managing a helicopter firm in tough times.”
I hope that does not translate to: “You have 1m30s to get the executive passenger across town”. Because races masked as completing passenger drop offs is not how real transport business is done!
08/06/2011 at 17:28 Zenicetus says:
Well, a timed mission basically is the situation when flying MedEvac. But that’s a specialized gig, and I wouldn’t expect a general-purpose transport company to suddenly do those missions.
I spent a few minutes over at their web site, and didn’t see any mention of joystick support, let alone pedals or TrackIR. Flying a helo with a mouse or gamepad controller doesn’t cut it, for me. Does ARMA support joystick, at least?
08/06/2011 at 18:32 Niteowl says:
Welll ArmA2 helos support IR tracking and joystick control, so I can’t imagine the helo sim based off that engine will NOT have it.
08/06/2011 at 15:39 Berzee says:
Two things I need in any helicopter game:
1) The ability to spray rioters with a hose.
2) Ridiculous radio commercials to listen to while you fly.
Sim Copter spoiled me. =) But remembering how fun that was makes me think I should play another helicopter game some day.
08/06/2011 at 21:13 VelvetFistIronGlove says:
Sim Copter was such a broken game. The only thing it got right was the fun. But it was such fun.
08/06/2011 at 22:46 Bassism says:
I can’t really see anything based on the Arma engine to match the same sort of level of fun of Sim Copter. Sim Copter blew my younger mind. Especially when I realized I could play helicopter man in my own Sim Cities.
This still sounds potentially awesome though.
08/06/2011 at 15:40 Turin Turambar says:
“My interview with Marek – which discusses this, Carrier Command, and Arma 3, will appear on Monday.”
Monday? That’s like… waiting five days for an interview already done? Not nice.
08/06/2011 at 16:14 Vexing Vision says:
Wait. Carrier Command? Rainbird’s Carrier Command from 1988? A remake? REALLY?
Ignore me while I drool slightly over here.
08/06/2011 at 17:06 sicsemperjohn says:
Oh my gosh it is a sim game set in my own home town! That’s very nice how they’re letting helicopters take off from Alki Beach, the neighborhood associations over there are brutal. Nice job getting the skyline spot on. I suppose including the construction cranes that are taller than most of our buildings won’t be making it in?
08/06/2011 at 20:45 Dozer says:
I saw one of those helicopters earlier today – I went to the Helicopter Museum in Weston-super-Mare! Because it was right next to Guy From Ebay who was selling me the mcguffin needed for the Pass The MoT sidequest. Well worth visiting if the sight of about six different types of Lynx helicopters lined up next to six assorted Wessex helicopters is enticing. Or if you want to see inside the cockpit of a Hind-D.