Apache Longbow (1995), one of the most important helicopter sims ever made, has just been re-released on Steam.
Sometimes this is just called Apache. But make no mistakeāthis is Digital Integrationās take on the AH-64D Longbow. The very same game that won PC Gamerās Best Simulation of 1995. It sold over 200,000 copies in its first six months.
At the time, it felt cutting edge. Polygonal terrain. Crisp HUD overlays. SVGA graphics, which were considered high-end in 1995. You didnāt need a monster rig, but a Pentium made it sing.
No background music here. Just full voice acting, crystal-clear radio chatter, and some of the best rotor-wash sound effects of the era. It doubled down on authenticityābecause this was a simulator, not an arcade game.
Controls are strictly keyboard and mouse. You could even link two players togetherāone flying, the other handling weapons. Multiplayer stretched up to sixteen players if you had the setup.
The original supported DOS and Windows 95. On Steam today itās Windows-only. No confirmation yet on Linux Proton, though Iād bet it works.
Steamās store page lists a GTX 1070 as the requirement, which feels like a boilerplate placeholder. This thing ran on a 486.
No new reviews yet, but the legacy speaks for itself. This is a classic that stood shoulder to shoulder with Janeās Longbow a year later.
MicroProse has been on a roll bringing these sims backāApache Longbow joins a growing stable that makes them look like the retro flight sim company all over again.
Introductory price: C$10.39.
@atomicpoet @videogames I loved it back in the day. But I remember playing with an analog joystick.
Itās been available on GOG for over a decade
Polygonal terrain
Wasnāt it voxel? Or Iām recalling a different game?
Wasnāt āComancheā the one with the voxel landscape?
It was Comanche, using NovaLogics proprietary Voxel Space engine. Looks like it was also the first commercially released flight sim to use voxels, too.
Maybe. It was 30 years ago, soā¦
@atomicpoet @videogames I remember the microprose sim gamesā¦ Man I loved them
Wasnāt there an Amiga version of that as well? I vaguely remember having played something like that excessively.
2 player cockpit and 16 player multiplayer sounds dope for that time.
