Nice game, shame about the graphics and some of the controls...
But it’s not all good news as Heatseeker’s biggest failing is to come and it may not be the fault of the game itself but more of the system it’s running on. You see, to keep things moving fast and the framerates flowing, Heatseeker’s graphics are, at best, very average. In fact, the comparison to Afterburner is a fair one as even though Afterburner used fairly detailed sprites rather than 3D objects, the look of both games is very similar.Yep, that Wii hardware has to be the culprit as Heatseeker is a low res affair. If you thought Call Of Duty 3 was grainy and Red Steel was passable, you’re going to look at the Heatseeker screenshots and wonder if I’ve run it through some pixellating process like they use on the those cop shows to cover up suspects faces... Ok, I exaggerated a bit and it’s not as bad as that but this does look very much like a PSOne of Xbox game.. so five or six years ago this would’ve been cutting edge...
But poor graphics aren’t Heatseeker's only downside, some of the control options are, to be frank, ludicrous. You’ve got the Wiimote and nunchuck connected, but why duplicate control of the plane on both? Why not have pitch and roll on the Wiimote and yaw on the nunchuck? And why have a pause feature taking up a usable button when the ‘Home’ button does exactly the same thing? Why is the C button on the nunchuck not used for anything at all when other controls are literally crammed into the d-pad. Here’s an example of stupid controls: Hitting down on the d-pad switches weapons. Pressing up twice zooms in your view. To lock your view onto a target you press up and then left... but to look back behind you, something that’s essential in a dogfight, you have to press up and then down... oh, and then to access wingman orders you press left, then either up or down depending on the context. And let’s not forget that to launch flares if you’re attacked you have to shake either the nunchuck or the Wiimote... yeah, that’s a bloody good idea, just as I want to keep control and be manoeuvrable, why not have me shaking the bloody stick all over the shop... very clever.
Jeez, sorry, but completely daft control sets like this really wind me up. Why not have left and right on the analogue stick access wingman commands? And use the C button for weapon switching. Then the D-pad is free for viewing functions. Look, I’m no software guru and have no idea how to write for the Wii but this isn’t rocket science, this isn’t even about coding... this is simple common sense.
