Hang glider pilot

A Simulation program / game from the Canadian software house MAPLE LEAF MICROWARE

Description of Extended BASIC version.

There was also a TI BASIC version which in the absence of sprites has slightly simpler screen graphics and played slightly differently to the Extended BASIC version.

Formerly sold by Stainless Software in the UK, this game was reviewed in Home Computing Weekly, a now departed UK magazine which reviewed software and printed listings. It earned the maximum award of five stars.

A change to the usual flight simulators, you here are in charge of a hang glider, which you guide around an on-screen map. There is a sea to provide off-shore breezes, hills to bump into, forests to crash land into... you can steer and control rate of ascent/descent.

From a mountain top launch you have three aims in 1ife:

1. to stay alive- to land somewhere in one piece!

2. To stay in the air as long as possible.

3. To land in a small target area marked on screen.

This is not an especially fast game, although quite fast enough as the mountain or the ground looms ever closer. Definitely challenging, and well put together with lots of on screen information, including a rising and setting sun for time of day. The eagle shows you where there are thermals for gaining height.

The following description is from the UNISOURCE catalogue of 1984, a good resource of what was then available:

"A hang gliding game and trainer... in which time and distance flown must be maximised and concluded with a safe precision landing. Use ridge lift generated by a morning coastal sea breeze (which becomes a land breeze in the evening) and thermals during mid-day. Wind and thermal strengths build and subside in a realistic manner. Various sized clouds and a soaring eagle help in locating the strongest thermals. Very realistic flight characteristics including stalling behaviour and flying and landing techniques."