Carrier Deck Review (Diamondlp2003)
When it comes to recommending this game, I’ve quite struggled with the decision and ultimately landed on a “no”, but it’s not without its merits, in fact if it would just be fixed up a little it might be really good.
The Good: At its core, this is a really fun and challenging game. The difficulty curve is steep, especially in the early levels, but that’s part of its charm. When you struggle through a tough stage only to breeze through it later, the sense of improvement is incredibly satisfying. The later levels crank up the challenge even more, pushing you to earn every victory—and man, does it feel good when you finally nail them. There’s a rewarding sense of progression here that keeps you hooked.
The Bad: Despite the fun, two major flaws drag it down. First, the repair/breakdown mechanic is a mess—poorly thought out and frustratingly inconsistent. Take Mediterranean-3 as an example: you’ve got a Chinook inbound, followed by a rapid-fire sequence of Amphibious tasks a bit after. It’s stressful but manageable—until your Chinook comes back damaged. There’s no time to repair and re-arm it, so you’re forced to send it out still damaged anyway. If it crashes (and the chance of that is definitely higher than I wish it was), say goodbye to your 5-star rating. It’s pure luck, not skill (at least in this scenario), and critical aircraft should be immune to this nonsense in their key levels. Second, the bugs are a nightmare. I had to replay the entire game twice because a completed level mysteriously “uncompleted” itself, triggering a domino effect that unwound my progress all the way to the end. Which isn't a huge problem for me since I like the game, but it's incredibly frustrating when you're so close to having all stars just for it to say "nope" at the very end.
Edit:
Correction: Apparently you're supposed to have 3 Chinooks coming in, in that level, but apparently my game bugged out there, but my point still stands about the mechanic still stands
I really hope the new Game will capture the charm of this one, while also addressing the problems this one had for me. Have a good day everyone