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Desert Strike: Return to the Gulf 
Release date: 23 Apr 1993
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Mygamer review
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Chopper Carnage
Terrorist leader General Kilbaba has invaded a small Arab emirate in the Middle East. Hoping to avoid an all-out assault, the US president has ordered your chopper team to slip into enemy territory and prevent a nuclear disaster. Desert Strike: Return to the Gulf places you in the cockpit of the Apache attack helicopter, the limits of which you'll be pushing as you attempt to wipe-out Kilbaba's forces.
From the Main Menu three choices appear, each corresponding to a button on the controller. Campaign Menu allows you to enter a password (two of which can be found in the manual) either to skip to another campaign or enter a cheat. Copilot Selection lets you choose from the game's available copilots, with more becoming available as you play through the game - though it's not wildly apparent that this changes gameplay at all. Options lets you configure your buttons and choose from three types of controls: From Above, From Cockpit and With Momentum. From Above sets up the D-Pad as north, south, east and west and is the easiest to use, but it doesn't allow backward movement so you'll be bumping into things. From Cockpit sets up as forward and down as reverse, regardless of which way you're facing. With Momentum is the same as From Cockpit except the Apache still retains some inertia momentum when releasing the D-Pad; unsurprisingly, this is the most realistic setting.
The four campaigns begin with a briefing from your CO detailing your missions. Once you are actually playing, all of this information can be referenced on the Pause screen. Pausing accesses your helicopter's onboard computer, and it's where all pertinent information can be found including passenger load, remaining lives, armor (health), fuel and ammo. This keeps actual gameplay free from cluttered text and HUD graphics. The Pause screen is dominated by the Battle Map - a large map of the current level. Left and right on the D-Pad scrolls through everything that can be found on the map during the campaign such as friendly landing zones, MIAs (soldiers Missing In Action), mission objectives, fuel drums and even enemy artillery locations. After selecting what you wish to find on the Battle Map, ‘B' calls up the Mission Data Log. Here a short paragraph of info details the item you selected on the Battle Map. Weapons and buildings also have their armor and power ratings listed. You can also scroll through items here with the D-Pad. ‘C' brings you to the Campaign Status screen, which lists mission objectives and their current status. ‘A' returns you to the Battle Map.
Desert Strike plays out over four massive campaign levels where you're free to fly anywhere, at any time, in an isometric view that looks three dimensional; there are many objects that you can fly behind and even above. Your missions can usually be done in any order or, if you so choose, not at all. You're free to go about destroying civilian buildings and killing MIAs just as long as you don't mind taking a hit to your score. You can even destroy your Landing Zone, though doing so instantly causes a mission fail and requires you to return to your frigate for a restart. You'll be restarting often at first, because this is just too much fun not to do.
Desert Strike's twenty-seven missions will require you to rescue hostages, POWs, and UN inspectors, capture bio-weapon scientists and enemy soldiers, prevent oil spills, destroy weapons facilities and battle against tanks, boats and even other choppers. Dedicated pilots will even find bonus objectives to increase their score, such as protecting valuable downed F-15 technology by destroying its wreckage, and rescuing its pilot and an EANN TV news crew. To accommodate your needs the Apache is equipped with a winch - a retractable cable that picks up items by hovering over them. Weapon crates and fuel drums are scattered about the battlefield, most of which appear on your Battle Map. However, some are hidden in buildings, along with the toolbox for armor repair, and the sparkplug to increase the speed of your winch - so don't be afraid to shoot everything in site to find what you need! The winch also picks up passengers - some more eager than others - and they can be dropped at any Landing Zone for an armor bonus. To conserve fuel you'll want to fly over water whenever possible, and to conserve ammo you'll want to trick enemies into shooting at you when buildings are in the way. When low on fuel, or armor, a warning will sound. Outside of this the game is nearly totally silent save for when you're shooting something.
As the levels become more difficult you'll have more Landing Zones at your disposal, and future missions appear as question marks on the map, requiring you to learn as you go. For example, after capturing the lead bio-chemist in Campaign 3 you learn the location of the missile silos - the destruction of which becomes your next objective. Strangely, it's okay for the missiles to launch; all you need to do is destroy the silos and you'll complete the mission and move on. This is also seen with the SCUDs in Campaign 2. Desert Strike also suffers from occasional tagging issues…every so often you'll find yourself shot down because your missiles didn't register.
Desert Strike looks great, especially the intro, which shows Kilbaba lowering a man into a vat of boiling acid and the occasional in-game cut scene where the Apache drops off or picks up a passenger. The levels are populated by soldiers operating road gates, jeeps that travel along these roads, and even buildings that are irrelevant to gameplay but are included to pad the environment. The visual color palette even changes with each campaign to show the changing time of day. Detailed animations such as dropped passengers actually walking into your base and flags waving in the breeze help complete Desert Strike's realistic feel.
Review by Dave Kaplan on 31 Oct 2004
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