Top 5 Flight Combat Simulators for the PSP

Written by: sinisterporpoise • Edited by: Michael Hartman
Updated May 23, 2011 • Related Guides: Sony | PSP

Portable consoles andflight simulators do not always go together, but a number of flight games have been released for Sony's PSP.

The best Playstation Portable Flight Games

Sony’s Playstation Portable may not be as popular as the Nintendo DS or DSi, but Sony’s portable console does have one distinct advantage over the more popular portable console. Flight games work slightly better on it, although neither the DS nor the PSP has taken full advantage of the genre. The two best games give you the option of flying a World War I aircraft or a modern jet.

1. Snoopy Versus the Red Baron

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Fans of Charles Schulz’s Peanuts comic strip know all of Snoopy’s fantasies. Few of the famous Beagle’s fantasies translate into video game gold, however. Snoopy’s fantasy that involves his fights against the evil Red Baron were just crying out for attention.

Do not make the mistake of thinking this kid-friendly title is easy. Snoopy Versus the Red Baron offers challenging game play for all levels of gamers. In fact, the challenge the game play offers may make this game less suitable for younger players.

The voice acting is charming, even if the storyline is not engaging. The designers put the Peanut’s characters in just the roles you could imagine in them most easily. Lucy plays the bossy general. Linus plays the intelligence officer. Charlie Brown plays a janitor who gets captured, and Marcie plays a scientist. Peppermint Patty makes brief appearances as a bomber pilot.

Although multiple planes are available in multiple player mode, the game only lets you fly the Sopwith camel in storyline mode. The different planes are unlocked through collecting the letters to spell out the names of characters throughout the level.

Ace Combat X

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You flew low-speed gasoline powered aircraft in the Snoopy game. Now it’s time to switch to high speed aircraft that run on jet fuel. The cartoony graphics are replaced with more realistic depictions of jet aircraft. Despite the realism of the planes, the plot actually makes less sense than the plot for Snoopy Versus the Red Baron.

You cannot ask for a better PSP adaptation of a modern flight combat simulator. Ace Combat X’s dogfights are fast paced. The game controls are deceptively simple, but that does not mean you will never perform an Immelman or a barrel roll to dodge enemy fire or to get your plane in a better firing position.

Air Conflicts: Aces of World War II

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The Air Conflicts series has titles that offer flight combat simulators in a variety of historical settings. Aces of World War II is their combat flight simulator for the Playstation Portable .

Many gamers get tired of playing historical scenarios over and over again, the designers included beautiful backgrounds that come as close to real life as the system hardware allows.

After Burner: Black Falcon

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If a player can get a hold of this rare UMD, he should keep it. Even if he does not like the game itself, the disc has high resale value. Afterburner Black Falcon continues Sega’s classic Afterburner series. This arcade game went through several ports, but it never caught on with Console gamers.

The plot starts out in a serious manner, but becomes more ridiculous as the game progresses. If the player does not worry about the plot, this game has much to offer. You get to fly 13

Real-world aircraft and it supports multi-player mode. If a player gets tired of saving the world, he can choose to dazzle his friends with his air combat skills.

IL-2 Sturmovik: Birds of Prey

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A little-known Russian company decided to do its own take on World War II flight simulator. The scenarios are real, but the PSP version suffered from some flaws that the home console versions did not. The game suffers from a few problems because they scaled down the PSP version a little too much. The console has far greater graphics capabilities than this game uses. The voice acting suffers because all of the voice actors have Russian accents. The Russian accents seem unlikely for pilots flying for the Luftwaffe.

IL-2 Sturmovik shows promise and includes planes that many American game designers do not put in their games, but 505 games should consider releasing a sequel that fixes the glaring flaws of the PSP version.