My Paradise Lost Review

[escaner]

I have been flying this campaign an it was great. It has been created as a story driven tour of duty of a Huey pilot in Vietnam... just it is not Vietnam. Very immersive and the missions are challenging at times, such as making you land in spots where you know that the helicopter just does not fit... yet somehow it does (sometimes you need to do a leap of faith!) or the cool developments in most of the missions: wait, was that an emergency beacon? Why did it stop? Is that a bug? From which radio did it come?

Navigation is not specially hard, but you will need to work on it a bit. We are flying around a small island and there are large landmarks as reference (coastlines, airports, golf courses, lakes) and sometimes you can even use direction finding to locate places or they are marked with smoke. Note that your icon and the enemies are hidden in the F10 map, which is something that I usually dislike in case there are problems with the missions or if I did not understand something. This is because at some stages it is required to look in this F10 map, which will be your reference map. Note that you will be required to do some multitasking: looking at that F10 map or tune radios while in flight. It is good to learn how to correctly trim the aircraft for that (and for taking external view screenshots) or use the "autopilot".

In general, I preferred flying the slicks over the gunships (personal preference). I am not such a good Huey pilot, but always enjoy the challenges of landing in a difficult place, in a hot LZ or sling carrying some cargo. If this is not enough, in some missions you will be flying from the left seat (not a difficult feat in itself, but harder when you are not used to the new visual references). With the gunships at times you need to shoot targets that you can't see, because they are hidden in the jungle. Is is very realistic and always fun spraying 7.62mm and rockets, but somewhat disconcerning not really knowing whether you are hitting the bad guys or not. Is is really well done. As for the targets, mainly they are foot soldiers an trucks, easily neutralized with your weapons.

The part I mostly struggled with is the takeoff in the fully loaded gunships. The overweight is insane, and despite watching Reflected videos where he explains the why and how of this (I also read Mark Garrison's book :P), I never was able to do a rolling takeoff without blowing the EGT above the red line. Just a little bit and for a few seconds, but I always had to do it. BTW, I flew the campaign with the previous engine model, as I guess that it was created with that one in mind.

In any case, it is a very enjoyable campaign and very recommended for intermediate and advanced Huey virtual pilots. I really hope Reflected creates more content for the Huey at some point.

[Reflected]

Many thanks for the detailed review, I appreciate you taking the time to share it with everyone here. 

[dobe_r_man]

Was something changed with the flight model?   It flies very differently it seems like in this campaign (specifically taking off and landing).    Just curious

[MAXsenna]

On 2/12/2024 at 11:51 PM, dobe_r_man said:

Was something changed with the flight model?   It flies very differently it seems like in this campaign (specifically taking off and landing).    Just curious

Absolutely. A year ago or so. ED is still tuning it. Of course this has nothing to do with the campaign, but the Huey in general. 

Cheers! 

[Pyrocumulous]

I concur with @escanner, this was a really well done campaign. The diversity of the missions, and the intimacy of the helicopters with the landscape, really felt immersive. So many campaigns it's the same mission ten times. This was not that. At all.

Thank you!