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We got a full day of hands-on play at CDV's recent press tour in San Francisco. We discovered a promising blend of casual and addictive play.

Aerial combat has reached new heights since World War II. Back when propellers were popular, pilots didn't have the luxury of fire-and-forget tech; Nowadays, F-22s, Harriers, MiGs, and other jets pack long-range sidewinders, bomblets, and other lockable, radar-guided, heat-hungry munitions. Back in the good ol' days of winged war, pilots relied more upon their own wiles and instincts than precision equipment to get the job done.

Attack on Pearl Harbor is a game that reflects these themes of simplicity. Less a flyer kept aloft by an accurate sense of yaw and pitch, Pearl is meant more as a middle-ground between the purely realistic and (recently more common) casual titles that dominate the genre. At a press tour held earlier this month in San Francisco, CDV treated journalists to a day of hands-on play with Attack on Pearl Harbor, and after putting hours into the game's campaign and multiplayer modes alike, we're pleased to report the title delivered a promising blend of casual and addictive play.

Developed by Swedish studio Legendo, Pearl's primary distinction from other '40s-era fliers is that it serves up a pair of single-player storylines: one each from the American and Japanese side. Donning the leathery gear of either Douglas Knox or Zenji Yamada, players will be privy to 50 total missions across four campaigns (two for each character). In the late-stage build we played, we encountered the standard mission types you'd expect from a flight sim -- search and destroy, escort, bombing-runs, and air-clearing skirmishes among them. In each, the player operated essentially as a singular unit; Pearl Harbor doesn't put emphasis on managing wingmen . From what we saw, the other planes on your side fly around and engage more for the sake of window-dressing than supporting you as active NPCs.

Similarly, the missions we played in the campaigns lacked much complexity beyond "go here, bomb this," but the play was smooth and effortless. Wire a missile here, sink a few destroyers, bully the planes that don't look like yours a bit...all in a day's work. Aces seeking something beyond objective-based combat may want to look elsewhere, but the individual moments retained their fun in the face of repetition, helped genuinely by the game's willingness to be less-than-true to history.

The introductory Pearl Harbor battle, as well as later bouts at Coral Sea, Wake Island, Peliliu and Saipan , though loosely, are all based on their historical derivatives, but Pearl Harbor won't throw anything as pretend as power-ups your way. Ammunition is infinite, including missiles, torpedoes, and bombs, which reload themselves within a few seconds time. Damage modeling is simplified too - your plane can soak up a good share of holes in its hull before it'll start to smoke. Put simply, Pearl sprinkles a token level of realism but is blended considerably with casual gameplay.