What is Skyfox?

Skyfox is a classic B&W war plane simulator game ported to Macintosh by Dynamix in 1986.

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Arcade game fanatics, listen up: have you been waiting for a full screen, full speed, bang-em-up. blow-'em-up destruction game? Well, strap yourself into the seat of a mean, lean jet fighter, and prepare to do battle. It's time to be a Skyfox.

The game’s premise is simple. Enemy forces are attacking with planes and tanks in an effort to destroy your base. The enemy also has enormous floating fortresses which launch their planes. You'll have to be pretty brave to attack a fortress.

Start off by launching from home base. The mission can start either in the air or right above ground level. The on-board computer screen pops up in the middle of the viewing screen, displaying crucial information about the enemy and its location A squadron of planes only shows up as one plane on the plane's computer, but a Zoom command displays the number of planes or tanks in a group. Fight the enemy at a lofty 35,000 feet, or at a ground-skimming 10 feet. Enemy forces consist of fighter jets and tanks. The jets are intelligent and fast, while the tanks are slow and clunky.

Your ammo is varied: you have an unlimited amount of cannon shells which are shot from both of the planers wings; five guided missiles (which will destroy any enemy vehicle that's in your vicinity); and five heat seeking missies which are effective against planes and tanks that are visible in the head-on view. When you run out of ammunition, land at home base to replenish your supplies.

The radar window displays the immediate area, with enemy craft showing up as blips. The radar view can be toggled between a default top-down overview and a head-on aspect that shows the blips on an imaginary horizon
The autopitot makes this game quick and mean. Home in on a tank battalion, position the autopilot cursor over it, kick it in, and your plane speeds up to maximum thrust and magically guides you to the action. Quick thrust is available for a sharp climb or a desperate getaway.

Skyfox features smooth, full-screen animation, although details are sparse: the "clouds” that fly past the plane's windows are extremely similar to the rocks that litter the ground and there is a distinctive lack of landmarks, except perhaps home base, which is the only group of buildings that you'll encounter.

A wide variety of missions can be fought, and there are many play levels, from a novice air cadet to a true blue aerial ace. If you like this type of game, Skyfox wiil have you flying for hours.

Biedny, David. (October 1986). Skyfox. MacUser. (pg. 33).

Download Skyfox for Mac

Architecture

Motorola 68K

System Requirements

From Mac OS 4.0 up to Mac OS 5.0

Compatibility notes

Architecture: 68K

System 4.x

This game only runs in vMac under a very early System version (It works with System 4.3 but not with 6.0.8)

It is also advised to limit the emulator speed.

 

Emulating this? It could probably run under: Mini vMac