ave you ever wanted to fly sorties during World War II with annoying good old boys from Mississippi as your wingmen who happen to be stepbrothers? With Blazing Angels, you finally get the chance to live your sordid dream.

Blazing Angels lets you fight in major aerial battles from the cockpit of 33 authentic planes. Before you’re through, you’ll help the British Royal Air Force fend off the Germans over London, counterattack the Japanese Zeroes after the surprise bombing of Pearl Harbor, and dogfight during the epic Battle of Midway. Along the path to victory, you will be assaulted by horrid voiceovers and insufferable banter between your squad mates. The only way to survive this inane narrative is to channel your anger into gunning down enemy planes. You’ll be an ace in no time.

Each of the controller configurations is responsive enough to keep your plane in hot pursuit of the enemy squadrons, though I preferred the well-implemented Sixaxis controls. Blasting through waves of Messerschmitts was fun for a while, but the missions never really offer a challenge. The multiplayer modes can help relieve this boredom, and the PS3 version of Blazing Angels features one new team-based multiplayer mode – Adversarial – that teams you up with other pilots in a race to destroy your opponents base before they take out yours.

The biggest complaint I have with Blazing Angels is the presentation. Rather than entertain with action-packed cutscenes of intense battles, the game moves model planes across a Risk map to indicate military moves. The graphics feel underwhelming for a next-gen system. Though the landscape looks great from afar, when you fly low near urban areas it feels more like a barren, lifeless model city than a bustling community suffering through the strains of war. Even when you send planes careening toward their destruction, they don’t take out buildings or leave the city in ruins.

Instead, we get a supplemental smoke effect to indicate damage.
Blazing Angels is a competent air combat title. I just wish Ubisoft would have delivered the kind of epic experience I’m used to after playing games like Medal of Honor and Call of Duty.