Air Assault 2 Demo

Helicopters may not be everyone’s weapon of choice when the situation gets tough, but with a fine pilot and enough ammo, vertical liftoff can be exactly what you need. There are many video games portraying this exact scenario, on the other hand, and most of them are arcade shooters or sidescrollers in which you have to keep clicking for entire hours.

Air Assault 2 is about as classic as it can get in the genre, since it’s all about shooting enemies and avoid being killed yourself. Naturally, you control a helicopter with a huge arsenal of deadly weapons, although most of them need to be picked up along the way. As long as your aim is true and your reflexes are in order, however, things should fall into place quite neatly.

To begin with, you should know that there’s not much of a story to keep you company as you blow up everything in your path. Each level is a separate mission and the goal is to make it to the end, with no other objectives along the way. There are no cutscenes or intermissions either, so all you need to do is survive. A good move on the behalf of the developers, because no story is definitely better than a bad story.

Just like in every decent arcade, there are many different power-ups you can pick up to turn things in your favor. Hence, whether you happen to find a faster machine-gun to replace the default one or you stumble into a stealth power-up that allows you to become invisible, everything is up for grabs. Repair kits are also floating around every now and again, given the fact that the helicopter can get damaged by enemy fire.

From a technical point of view, the game certainly does not excel in any regard, since the graphics are basic and the sound is just there to avoid awkward silence. Hence, the 2D visuals go hand-in-hand with the retro feeling of the game, while the music is nice enough not to get on your nerves after the first few minutes of shooting bad guys.

Air Assault 2 is not exactly a jewel of the genre, and it doesn’t try to be one either. However, if you need something light to play one day and you enjoy a bit of a challenge as well, then this may very well be a good solution for you.