Video Game Flight

You'll believe a plumber can fly.

Super Jumping is a common ability in video game worlds, and even the lowliest platforming hero is commonly capable of a Double Jump, but flight is comparatively much rarer: few video games actually let your character fly freely about the world. From a design standpoint, this makes sense. After all, if your character can fly anywhere, what's to stop them from flying to distant parts of the level and completely avoiding all the obstacles you planned for them? And even worse: How do you keep them from flying off the edges of the level (or world map) without having to rely on Invisible Walls?

However, ignoring the obvious Flight Simulators (and many an aerial dogfighting game), there are still games that let your character fly freely through the wild blue yonder, but for the sake of gameplay and level design they will usually impose one or more of the following limits:

• Flight can only be used in specific levels or areas, or by acquiring a specific item or powerup that is itself found only in specific levels or areas.
• Landing/take-off is only possible at certain locations or on certain terrain types.
• Or, similarly, Gravity Barriers impose clear rules on where the player is and is not allowed to fly. A Truth in Television example is the flight ceiling, a general threshold above which real-life aircraft cannot generate enough lift to maintain safe flight. Though for real aircraft this tends to be much higher than videogames featuring such a limit.
• Flight is granted as a late-game ability: The fact that you can skip between levels and areas is moot when you have already played through them just to get there.
• The ability to fly itself is hard to acquire or maintain. Perhaps it requires dozens of hours of grinding to unlock, or fuel for aerial vehicles is ridiculously expensive.
• The skies are filled with enemies and obstacles, making them just as treacherous as the ground, if not more so. This is especially the case if your character cannot adequately attack or defend themselves in mid-air, or can be easily smacked out of the sky into the nearest pool of molten lava or Bottomless Pit.
• Or, on the other hand, the skies are empty: There are few to no puzzles, Power Ups, Plot Coupons, or other events that can be accessed from the air, requiring the player to land at the nearest open space and continue the rest of the way on foot. A common limitation of the Global Airship.
• And that's assuming there is a sky to take to. Walls and ceilings encroaching on all sides impose obvious limits as to where the player can fly; more Nintendo Hard games may give the player a whole maze of Deadly Walls to fly through.
• Flight can only be used for limited durations at a time, beyond which the character is out of fuel (another Truth in Television), energy, or is otherwise too exhausted to continue flying and must return to the ground to rest or refuel. Or touch the ground for a split second to instantly reset their flight meter, as the case may be.
• It is Not Quite Flight; for example, a winged character who can only glide or make wing-assisted leaps. In practice, this usually involves mechanics similar to a Double Jump. Can easily resemble the aforementioned limited duration situation, especially if the character can glide and Double (or triple or quintuple) Jump.
• Other methods of transportation are actually faster (say, if there were trains and speedboats but you could only fly as fast as you could run).
• Flight may be clumsier than ground-based movement, with it being more difficult to dodge enemies and obstacles. When simply bypassing an entire area by flying high above it is not an option, this may make conventional movement a better option than low-altitude flight.
• You are able to fly freely, but you can only land in areas you've already been to, preventing Sequence Breaking and turning it into simply a means of fast travel.
• Unintentional example; When a Good Bad Bug enables you to functionally fly, if even for a limited amount of time. The most notable example is rocket jumping, often still a byproduct of even advanced physics engines. Power ups are also usually a culprit, particularly when they are stacked with other power ups creating unintended overlap effects, like infinite ammo and damage reduction enabling more rocket jumping.

Not to be confused with VideoGame.Flight.

---

Examples:

Action Adventure

• Beyond Good & Evil has flight granted as a late-game ability with the Beluga.
  • Allows access to some new areas.
  • Also allows appreciation of the Scenery Porn from new and better angles.
• Castlevania
  • Castlevania: Symphony of the Night: True to his vampire heritage, Alucard can fly by transforming into a bat. This slowly uses mana, and you can only attack if you've collected the Fire of Bat powerup. The mist form can also be upgraded to grant infinite, invincible flight, but it uses mana much more quickly than the bat.
  • In Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow and Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow, Soma can also fly by turning into a bat.
  • Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin: Charlotte can turn either character into an owl (that can fly, naturally).
  • Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia: Shanoa can get wings. All of these (except Alucard's) are obtained relatively late into the game.
• Dreams To Reality lets you fly at any given moment, but doing so drains your energy.
• Raziel in the Legacy of Kain series can glide using the remnants of his ruined wings. In Defiance, Kain can do the same thing, though he can't sustain the glide as long. He can also transform into a swarm of bats to fly long distances, both in Defiance and in Blood Omen, but this is more of a teleporting ability since a) it can only be activated at certain locations and b) you don't actually control him while he's doing it.
• Owlboy gives you unlimited flight almost right at the beginning, but the game revolves around this ability, so it isn't gamebreaking.
• In Kid Icarus, Pit can't fly with his normal wings, but uses many items for different variations of video game flight. The Angel Feather is a Bottomless Pit Rescue Service that only last a few seconds in the first game and short last method of quick travel in the second, The Wings Of Icarus from Super Smash Bros. Brawl can be used anytime but still fade in seconds, Uprising's Miracle Of Flight moves him where it wants for up to five minutes, and finally the Wings Of Pegasus let Pit fly wherever he wants whenever he wants, limiting them to the end game.
• Faxanadu let the player fly for up to 30 seconds with wing boots equipped. However, a Good Bad Bug could extend that time limit.
• Captain Comic 2: Fractured Reality gave you a jetpack with severely limited fuel. In the very next stage, though, you get the unlimited fuel cell. Naturally, the stage after that began with a very, very long vertical-scrolling stage with no platforms until the very top.
• In The Caves of Doom for the ZX Spectrum, you need to use a jetpack to get over any sort of obstacle, but its fuel tank empties quickly. Fortunately, extra fuel is lying around everywhere.
• Secrets of Rætikon allows the player to swoop freely around the game world, with the flight speed affected by air currents, frequency of dashing/flapping, and height off the ground. There's even an option to freefall as well.
• In the Ubisoft game Night Hunter, Dracula can fly by transforming into a bat, but this drains the flight meter.
• This is the basic premise of NiGHTS into Dreams…: once your player character (one of the two dreamers) meets with the titular dream jester, you control them and go through four flight courses with Nightmarens scattered about and unique mechanics for each stage, as you collect back the five Ideyas. However, in the last level (Twin Seeds), the player character flies without NiGHTS.

Action Game

• Joust has unlimited flight (although you have to do the flapping yourself) and it's unlimited within the wraparound confines of one screen.
• In God of War II, Kratos acquires the Wings of Icarus, which allow more-or-less unlimited flight in very short intervals.
• Thexder allowed transforming into flying mode with no restrictions. This is balanced by some claustrophobic level designs, wide open areas filled with swarms of enemies, and the auto-aiming function restricted to humanoid form. (Hint: Don't fly into wide open areas. EVER!)
• Many winged characters in the Skylanders series can learn to fly. Although they can't really fly high (it's really more hovering above the ground), it does allow them to bypass a number of environmental hazards, as well as making them faster and giving them an evasion boost that allows them to dodge more attacks.
• In The Matrix: Path of Neo you can only have unlimited flight in the last few levels.
• In Marvel's Avengers, Iron Man and Thor can both fly freely through the air, as well as hover in place.

Fighting Game

• Godzilla Unleashed:
  • Both King Ghidorah and Mecha-King Ghidorah can fly for short periods of time (So long as their energy doesn't run out).
  • Battra (PS2 version of the game only) and Mothra have unlimited in their adult forms.
  • Megaguirus (A giant mutated dragonfly) has unlimited flight as well.
  • Both Mechagodzilla 2 and Kiryu can hover for short periods of time thanks to the rocket boosters in their backs.
  • Rodan has limited flight.
  • Oddly enough, about the ONLY winged kaiju that cannot fly in the game is Destoroyah.
  • Spacegodzilla can hover for short periods of time.
• The Updated Re-release of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: All Star Battle has Pet Shop, a falcon. Usually he acts like a normal character, "standing" by hovering in place, "jumping" by flying up and then back down, and "crouching" by landing on the ground. However, he has a Flight Mode that allows him to fly around freely and grants him unlimited dashing; however, using this mode consumes stamina, and it also prevents him from using several moves, including blocking.
• Flight is pretty common throughout the Super Smash Bros. series: Pit, Kirby, Meta Knight, Dedede, Charizard, and Jigglypuff can fly in the "triple/quadruple/etc. jump" sense, and Pit, Meta Knight, and Charizard are all able to glide in Brawl. The "gets tired after a while" variation occurs with Pit and ROB when they use their Up Special moves, and many more characters can fly as part of their Final Smash attacks.
• Painwheel from Skullgirls can use her wheel-blade to fly for short periods of time.
• Nearly 40% of the cast in Marvel vs. Capcom 3 can fly. At most, they'll only get 3 seconds of flight, and they're left wide open for punishment after it ends, so be wise about using flight. This is also a great tool for zooming across the screen and escaping mixups.
• Dragon Ball Z: Budokai Tenkaichi takes flight for granted in the spirit of the show. The first game gives it to everyone, its sequel however takes account into who is actually allowed to fly and characters that don't have such power in the show can only jump very high only to plummet to the ground. The third game takes an inbetween approach, non-flying characters will jump into the air and fall slowly, they can be also given the power in custom matches.
• Tekken:
  • One of Yoshimitsu's stances, Dragonfly, has him fashion his sword into impromptu helicopter rotors, enabling him to hover above ground. In this stance, he is immune to low hits.
  • Devil, Angel, True Ogre, Devil Jin, and Devil Kazumi are all capable of short bursts of flight, by virtue of having wings.

First-Person Shooter

• Duke Nukem 3D has a Jet Pack available in most levels, though all can be finished without it. Some secret places can only be accessed with it, and it can make certain areas a bit easier. Naturally, its fuel supply is limited, though still quite reasonable (unless you use the God Mode cheat, which also makes it unlimited). Unlike other powerup examples, you can turn it on and off as desired so long as you have fuel for it. User maps, on the other hand, are much more likely to make its use a requirement to finish the level.
• Heretic has the Inhilicon's Wings of Wrath powerup, which allow you to "fly" (actually, move vertically), but only for a limited period of time. Sometimes allowed you to get otherwise unobtainable items. Unlike every other item kept in the inventory, they can not be kept between levels.

The Wings of Wrath also appears in Hexen, but unlike Heretic, it has an unlimited duration, and only expires once the player moves on to the next hub. Given that you don't actually get the Wings until you actually reach the end of the hub, this generally limits their usefulness to going back and exploring previously unreachable areas to get hidden items. An exception is the hub with a Boss Fight against the Death Wyvern; the Wyvern flies and is hard to hit from the ground, so the most natural thing is to dodge its fireballs at first and fight it on equal terms once you get the Wings.

• The flight power in Clive Barker's Undying only worked outside the mundane world, and only for short periods (as opposed to the two other sorcerers you fight, who are admittedly much more experienced.)
• Halo:
  • In addition to the obligatory vehicular flight combat sequences, in a few levels you can use a Banshee to skip large sections of the level and even find a few easter eggs. Of specific note is a level in Halo: Combat Evolved that has a Banshee on a bridge. An Elite races to it as soon as you step on the bridge, but if you kill him, or otherwise beat him to the Banshee, you can bypass the entire second half of the level.
  • Halo: Reach and Halo 4 have the rare Jet Pack Armour Ability, which allows flight for a limited time before needing to be recharged. Usage can become unlimited if the right option is enabled in a Multiplayer/Firefight game, but it's still restricted by level boundaries.
• Space Marine, being a 40k game, has the obligatory Assault Marine class and several jump pack levels in the campaign.
• Far Cry 3 early on has paragliders that allow the player to glide over their targets and scout out the region. Unfortunately, they are limited to cliff edges and other high areas. In the second half of the game, the lead dons a glide suit that allows them to jump from any location to do the same.
• Far Cry 4 brings back the gliders and the wingsuit but one-ups them with the Buzzer, a primitive but highly capable mini-chopper. This one really is a Game-Breaker because its sole limitation is its flight ceiling, and even that's so generous it very rarely keeps players from reaching crucial locations. Apart from that, the Buzzer doesn't need fuel, is faster than any other vehicle in the game, is surprisingly resilient to gunfire and other damages, can be repaired in seconds without having to lug around tools, is so small it can land on a postcard, and to top it all off, one can shoot handguns while flying it (and one available handgun is a freaking grenade launcher). Even better, both become available for free barely one hour into the game. If you're willing to forego stealth in favor of cheesing the hell out of the Buzzer, much of the game becomes trivial, partly because of the sheer destructive power of the Buzzer-grenade-launcher combo, partly because the thing makes the almost immediate acquisition of many powerful weapons so ridiculously easy.
• Several champions in Paladins have some sort of flight capabilities. Naturally, flight has its limitations to prevent it from being overpowered.
  • Drogoz uses a jetpack to launch himself into the air and fly while he rains down death from above with his rocket launcher. Once his jetpack runs out of fuel, he must land for it to recharge.
  • Evie can take to the skies on her ice staff, using it like a Flying Broomstick. In addition to her Blink, this makes her an extremely mobile flank champion.
  • Androxus can Flash Step up to three times in any direction, including upwards. He can also slow his descent in the air with the jump button. Clever players have realized that he can achieve semi-flight by careful use of his flash steps and slowing his descent.
  • Willo is a fairy who normally hovers over the ground, but her ultimate gives her true flight, allowing her to freely soar in any direction while also giving her unlimited ammo for the duration.
• Red Faction has an Unexpected Gameplay Change level where the player pilots an Aesir jet fighter through the Martian caverns In the Style of Descent.

Hack and Slash

• In most of the ground missions in the first two Drakengard games, there isn't much stopping you from just hopping on your dragon, flying wherever you need to go, and incinerating everything below you on the way there. Not much, that is, aside from archers, wizards, and enemies who are immune to magic (and, by extension, dragonfire).

Mecha Game

• Build a NEXT correctly in Armored Core for Answer and it could fly indefinitely. Certainly an advantage in gameplay, but most levels take place in a designated "mission area" that if you stray from, you fail the mission.

MMORPG

• City of Heroes grants unrestricted flight. There is an energy cost, but it is negligible. It usually does not become Sequence Breaking as most of the content takes place inside buildings and enclosed environments where the player is unable to avoid notice by enemies without a stealth power. The rare outdoor maps can allow a flying character to skip over troublesome areas and directly access objectives or important enemy groups. However, the benefits of floating around the ceiling when most of your opponents have better melee options than you do are non-negligible. Blasters love to take advantage of this in PvP combat, challenging tankers and scrappers (who only have melee attacks) to arena combat and then floating out of reach. Temporary items allow melee combatants to fly, but invariably slower than the blaster, who just runs away and continues attacking from range. Super frustrating.
• World of Warcraft:
  • The games allows unlimited flight via flying mounts in Outland from level 60 onward, flight in Northrend at level 68, and flight in Azeroth ^note Eastern Kingdoms and Kalimdor at level 60. These flight licenses require the expansions The Burning Crusade, Wrath of the Lich King, and Cataclysm. There are also 3 different flight speeds, all based on normal running speed: 150% (level 60), 280% (level 70) and 310% (level 80). There are also various items, buffs, and talents that increase speed when mounted, peaking at 492% of normal speed.
  • The developers will jump on any opportunity to deprive the players of their flight capabilities, however. Most of the expansions did not allow the players to fly in the new areas until they were at or near the current level cap. Many additional areas added by patches do not allow flying, such as the Molten Front or the Isle of Thunder (sometimes they bother with an explanation, sometimes they dont). Dungeons and raids never allow flight (except for specific situations using special mounts). This is particularly annoying for druids, who can otherwise shapeshift into flying creatures at will, but may be forced to suffer fall damage or death because the devs didn't feel like letting people fly in that area.
  • Azeroth zones didn't allow flight until Catacylsm in part because the world was plain unfinished in parts and not built around the concept. Cataclysm gave them the opportunity to revamp everything, but for some reason the zones added in The Burning Crusade, the Blood Elf and Draenei starting zones, were left out. They are even still technically part of Outland, which is particularly puzzling for the Blood Elf zones, accessible only through a portal.
  • The open world battleground Wintergrasp is particularly weird about this. Between battles, players can fly normally in the entire zone, but during battles flight is disabled. Tol Barad got around that headscratcher by just not allowing flight at all.
  • After multiple expansions of blizzard essentially trying to take flying away, Dragonflight will add a form of flight at launch, wherein players will fly much faster but requires players to find specialized "Glyphs" in order to learn more traits and abilities for flying. With the only drawback being that these traits can only be used on The Dragon Isles and used for "Dragonflying" class of Mounts that are rewarded in that area: where they can only use those abilities in that zone.
  • The Dracthyr Evokers as a new Playable Character Class added in for the expansion can use their Dragonflying racials however outside of The Dragon Isles but to a much lesser degree.
• Aion allows "get tired" flight from level 10, which starts at one minute and can be lengthened through consumables, equipments, and manastones. It's also possible to "glide" (controlled descent that can't be altered into flight without touching the ground first) for about twice as long as maximum flight time. However, once you get to the Abyss, which requires level 25, flight is unlimited. This is good, since the Abyss is made up of a lot of floating islands. Interestingly, physical characters (warriors and scouts) get passive abilities that increase their damage or dodge while flying, while also restricting the ability to fly unless in the Abyss, for Player Versus Environment balance issues.
• Perfect World:
  • The game allows all characters unlimited flight at level 30, or earlier if one buys certain aerogear from the boutique. Additionally, Winged Elves can fly starting at level 1 with a special pair of wings that use a small amount of mana every second of flight... elves that run out of mana will "get tired" and fall from the sky (as will players who unexpectedly disconnect from the server while their characters are in midair), though unless they land near an aggressive enemy this is less of a problem and more of an incovenience. Said elves can still get the unlimited flight at level 30 (or, as stated above, earlier from the boutique). The only combat limitations of ground vs. air are certain Genie skills, and in the case of Venomancers, which pets may attack the enemy.
  • A few bosses constantly use area-effect attacks that disable flight until the debuff expires. Chief among these are Inferno Lord Phyrex (Undercurrent Hall fire boss) and Changeling Commander Haspon (Western Steppes overworld boss that must be killed to complete the "Soul Purification" weekly quest).
• Champions Online allows characters to obtain travel powers including several different forms of flight. There is little restriction (aside from zone boundaries) on where characters can fly.
• Remnants of Skystone has three classes, one of which can use a steampunk jetpack to fly indefinitely. The zones all have defined boundaries, being divides into relatively small rooms, and lots of hurty things, be it monsters or spiky terrain - which interrupt flight. As well as steam jets which can't be passed through when midair. Still, in theory, you can fly as much as you want, and from level one.
• Fly FF allows any Lv.20 or higher character to use an item to fly. There are extremely few flying enemies (a grand total of three types, which may or may not have been patched out of the game for now), your only attack is a melee attack (unless you're a magician with a wand; even bow users smack enemies with their bows instead of firing arrows), and there are Invisible Walls in the sky in some areas. You can land in most places where it's possible to stand, and you can take off anywhere if you can go 10 seconds without being attacked. Flying, while ostensibly the main gimmick, is mainly used for transportation.
• DC Universe Online Has three movement options: Flying, a la Superman, allows the character not only unlimited flight but also hovering powers; Acrobatics has a very long glide, which can be upgraded with a "Rocket Boost", allowing infinite flying (but no hovering); and Superspeed, which... can't even jump very high. There is an invisible ceiling over the city that you cannot pass, which is implied to be a Brainiac Forcefield.
• In Star Trek Online, the Risa summer event features anti-gravity jetpacks that inexplicably only work on the event map on Risa.
• Final Fantasy XIV brought flying mounts to players with the release of Heavensward, but only in those new zones added by the expansion. Moreover, flying could only be unlocked by attenuating to "aetherial currents" within each zone, located using a compass sensitive to the presence of such currents; other current attenuations were granted by completing both sidequests and main story missions. The Shadowbringers patch 5.3 added flight to areas preceding Heavensward, with the only requirement being to finish the 2.X launch MSQ.
• Guild Wars 2 added flight with "Path of Fire" and the Fourth Season of the Living World story (an alternative flying mount to the Griffons, which takes a lot of RNG to obtain). Unlike other games, altitude is limited but the player can hover or glide indefinitely, and players are encouraged to climb off of high places and mount up. It has been jokingly called "Falling with Style" as mounts do not act behave like a helicopter in Guild Wars 2.

Platform Game

• Banjo-Kazooie:
  • Kazooie has this ability, but not only needs Red Feathers to do so, but also can only take off from certain flight pads. However, the Bee transformation in both the original game and Tooie allows for unlimited flight (in specific levels), and in Tooie, solo-Kazooie can learn to glide in a hard-to-reach point in a late-game area.
  • Propellers, wings, balloons and jet engines can be gradually unlocked in Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts, allowing the player to build quite a variety of flying vehicles that are only limited by their fuel and control. Both the Hub Level and a few missions limit your choice of vehicle, and there's plenty of missions where a land or water-based craft is a better choice, though.
• In Cave Story both versions of the Booster will allow flight for a very short time. Naturally, the flight time instantly replenishes when you touch the ground. There aren't many places to fly to anyway, considering most of the game is set in a cave. The Booster also gets taken away from you in the late midgame, but you get it back after doing a few Fetch Quests.
• Donkey Kong Country
  • In Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest, the Squawks the Parrot transformation allows you to fly, but only in specific levels. However, said levels tend to be labyrinths where just touching the walls means death, so be wary.
  • Diddy in Donkey Kong 64 has Rocket Barrels, but they're powered by Crystal Coconuts. Run out, and he'll go plummeting to the ground. Plus there are certain areas which inexplicably forbid flying. Fly into one of these areas and you'll get a "NO" sign with a bizarre, incredibly startling evil laugh and Diddy will come down regardless of his crystal coconuts. All the powerups have these restrictions.
• Duke Nukem II has the Flame Thrower, which if fired while crouching can propel you into the air. It's somewhere between a jetpack and rocket jumping, though it does have twice as much ammo as the other limited-ammo weapons.
• Duke Nukem: Manhattan Project has a Jet Pack powerup in some levels, but its fuel supply is severely limited and it can't be toggled on and off, only used until it runs out or is discarded by the player (which is easy to do accidentally).
• Kirby is one of the few series that generally lets its characters fly about freely (except in Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards, Kirby and the Forgotten Land and a few spin-offs, where Kirby gets tired after a while). However, Kirby game stages are usually designed with flight in mind. Outdoor stages tend to have an invisible ceiling that prevents Kirby from going off the top of the screen and cave and indoor stages place even clearer limits on where Kirby can fly. Additionally, enemies patrol the sky almost as much as the ground and Kirby's only method of attack while puffed up cancels the flight and sends him plummeting back towards earth.
• Super Mario Bros.:
  • Super Mario Bros. 3 also has the Super Leaf, Tanooki Suit and P-Wing where you have to, with the former two, build up enough speed to take off, then could only fly for a limited time (the P-wing made this infinite, but was a rare item).
  • Super Mario World:
    • The Cape Feather grants this ability. Mario has to build up speed and flying is relatively tricky.
    • The Blue Yoshi can fly indefinitely while in special levels or temporarily by holding a shell.
    • There's a P-balloon item that lets Mario float, but at a very slow speed, that will lose effectiveness after a while and drops him like a rock if he so much as brushes up against anything that can hurt him. This culminates in "Tubular", the second stage of the hidden Special Zone, a level built entirely around the use of this powerup to float over a vast Bottomless Pit, and easily considered to be the hardest level in the game.
  • Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins:
    • There are carrots that give Mario Rabbit Ears, that allow him to glide by flapping them, smashing the A button.
    • In the Hippo Level, you can fly freely by jumping into a hippo's snot bubble. Doing this lets you fly upward through the entire level unharmed, and is required to reach the Space Zone.
  • Super Mario 64: Mario gets a flying cap. Flying requires some finesse, as well as thoughtful use of Mario's momentum. It also fades after a set time— try not to be in the air when that happens.
  • Super Mario Galaxy:
    • The Red Star is a Power-Up that makes Mario fly. Exact control over movement in the air, able to turn on a dime and fly straight upwards... except with one problem. You can only get it in the Observatory (where it's completely useless other than for a 1-up or two) and one mission in the Gateway Galaxy.
    • The Bee Mushroom, meanwhile, allows for very limited hovering that is barely better than normal jumping, and the Boo Mushroom allows for unlimited hovering, but is only available in three missions.
• Wario Land:
  • Most games have the Puffy Wario and Vampire Wario transformations for unlimited flight, but the former has the obvious limitation of constantly going upwards without any way to get back down (and deflating when Wario hit a ceiling), and the latter, not only can't go through doors or pipes, is transformed back by light or water, meaning that most levels with the ability simply put a lot of candles or lights stopping Wario from going off wherever.
  • Wario: Master of Disguise has Wicked Wario. You unlock this form in the second to last stage. It's limited to up and down flight until you get the upgrade for it in the same stage.
  • The first Wario Land: Super Mario Land 3 has the Jet Hat which cancels all vertical movement as you fly in one direction. Because of an exploit, you can go through certain stages flying most of the time.
• Spyro the Dragon:
  • Spyro can glide in every game he appears in, but he usually can't actually fly except in cutscenes or mini-games. The exception is The Legend of Spyro: Dawn of the Dragon, where he can fly all he likes, whenever, wherever. Well, save being chained to Cynder, and save for climbing puzzles with wind currents that keep Spyro's flight from letting you bypass them... The other major exception in the original trilogy is the Speedway levels, where Spyro can fly indefinitely (but not leave the island). A lesser exception is the final unlockable level in the first game, Gnasty's Loot, where the player can fly indefinitely, but can only fly as high as the player has previously ascended on-foot in the level.
  • There are also powerups in some levels that will let Spyro fly until they run out (and they run out a lot quicker if the player tries to leave the designated flight area).
  • Spyro: A Hero's Tail added in a wing-assisted Double Jump, which amounted to a short-range fluttering which could be comboed into a glide after hitting its peak.
• Vexx has a hand-glider powerup, but it can only be used at specific spots (which are rather rare), and it only lasts for a short period of time.
• Helium in Glider PRO lets you fly upward without Vent Physics, but it tends to run out quickly (especially if you don't find multiple canisters), and goes away instantly if you fly over a microwave or touch a battery. Of course, gliding is as basic to the game as running is to most platformers.
• Sonic The Hedgehog:
  • Tails, and later Cream, in most games of the series use the 'get tired' version. Knuckles has gliding combined with climbing, which allows him to get to some pretty interesting places but also allows the level designers to box him in with overhanging ledges.
  • In Sonic Heroes, the 'tired' variation happens again with the appropriately named 'Flight' Characters, but if you remain in flight but stop moving forward, the characters can remain airborne forever.
  • In Sonic Mania, Ray the Flying Squirrel's gliding ability works similarly to Mario's Cape Feather, where Ray can fly almost indefinitely if he builds up enough momentum.
• Ratchet & Clank has multiple examples:
  • Ratchet & Clank: Going Commando
    • After finding the Momentum Glider on Tabora, you can take off from certain areas and glide through to areas you couldn't get to before.
    • The Levitator gadget allows you to fly as long as your (quick to deplete) fuel supply lasts. Fuel can only be filled at specific pads which aren't available anywhere other than areas where the gadget is required.
  • Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction has the Robo-Wings that allow Ratchet and Clank to fly around anywhere as long as they can find a launch pad to take off from.
  • The GrummelNet Jetpack in Ratchet & Clank: Into the Nexus and Ratchet & Clank (2016) functions like a better version of the Levitator. The fuel capacity is much better, allowing for longer flights before refueling, and you can also use your weapons to engage in dogfights at any time.
• Mega Man:
  • Mega Man (Classic) has many ways of flight. The most used one is riding on top of Item 2/Rush. Rush and Treble can be fused with in 6/7 and Mega Man & Bass respectively to gain the ability of flight.
  • Mega Man X5 has the Falcon Armor, giving X a "tired" version of free-form movement. X7 has the Glide Armor for X.
• The Smurfs (1994) has one level (not counting the bonus stage) where the player character could fly... in a soap bubble. And the level was a rosebush labyrinth.
• In Metroid, gaining the Space Jump meant you could effectively fly, but it's gained late in the game and it takes a while to master; by the time you gain the powerup that lets you chain one jump into another just by holding down the Jump button, you're already knocking on Mother Brain's door.
• Rayman:
  • Rayman 2: The Great Escape upgrades the parachute-like effect of Rayman's helicopter hair to actual flight in one (rather well enclosed) level, and then took it away at the very next level.
  • The remake Rayman 2 Revolution allowed you to keep the ability outside the level, but only over lava. It's also used in a new boss battle.
  • The first Rayman game give you the same power-up, again only for one level (and a few other limited areas).
• Scorch the dragon from The Lost Vikings 2 is able to glide and quadruple jump.
• Firebrand of the Gargoyle's Quest series of games started out with limited flight capability in the first two games. He has a "wing meter" that will rapidly deplete when flying, though near the end after acquiring upgrades he can fly infinitely, but cannot actually gain altitude: you are limited to how high you could jump, and you essentially still have to climb by clinging to the walls and jumping up. In later games, long jumps over pits are no longer a problem. Demon's Crest averts the limit, though, with Firebrand starting out with the ability to hover and fly infinitely, and the Air Crest would allow him to fly against strong wings and fly upwards.
• Jett Rocket has a jetpack which serves as one of his most important means of locomotion. It's really more hovering than flying, but it's necessary for getting to some more out-of-the-way areas. Just make sure to refuel often.
• Spelunky has the rare cape, which allows gliding, and the even rarer jetpack, which allows true flight, limited only by fuel which refills completely upon landing. However, it all takes place underground, so it isn't that helpful for avoiding obstacles anyway.
• Karnov has a Wings power-up, but it is only used in one level.
• In The Quest of Ki, Ki's floaty Jump Physics are almost but Not Quite Flight, but several stages give her a powerup that lets her really fly around. The levels do tend to be closed in, though.
• Blaster Master gives your tank Sophia the ability to fly only after you defeat the third boss and gain Hover Mechanics, and even then it's limited by a meter.
• In Kick Master, you can fly once you get the Harpy Wings magic, but it consumes MP rather quickly.
• In Little Nemo: The Dream Master, there are places where Nemo can get a bee to fly him around the level. The main limit to the bee's flying power is that it can't fly too long without touching ground.
• Conker can fly in Conker's Bad Fur Day, but gets tired very quickly and only flies up a little bit when he starts flying.
• In Little Samson, Kikira the dragon can fly, but only for a few seconds at a time.
• This is possible in Jak 3: Wastelander by exploiting a glitch. Unlock infinite Light Jak with enough precursor orbs, then use Light Flight and alternate the flapping of Jak's wings with Light Shield.
• In Jetpack, you can use the Jet Pack to fly, but you have to find fuel for it. Some levels contain no fuel at all.
• Two of the vehicles in Rocket: Robot on Wheels allow you to fly. The first, the ShagFlyer, is available in the fourth level, Arabian Flights. As the level name suggests, it's actually necessary for getting around in the level, as it's composed of various islands floating high up in the sky. The second, the Glider Bike, is available in the fifth level, Pyramid Scheme. Although it only really lets you glide, skillful gliding and dipping is necessary to reach some of the areas in the level, as well as complete some of the challenges.
• In Jaleco's Psychic 5, all five player characters can hover, but free flight is only possible for a limited time after picking up the Flying Broomstick.
• The Sacred Armour of Antiriad: Once the gravity displacers have been collected, the anti-rad suit can take to the sky. This is important, because the anti-rad suit cannot move any other way than by flight. The suit cannot be damaged, but taking what should be damage does drain its energy. If the energy meter reaches zero, the suit becomes inoperable until it receives a new recharge cell.
• Rogue Legacy features the sky runes which your characters can equip to fly for a limited amount of time that depends on how many of them you have equipped.
• In Madō King Granzört for the SuperGrafx, one of the three player mecha, Winzart, is capable of flying, but this drains MP rather rapidly.
• In FreezeME, after you beat Fat the Cat for the first time, you gain the ability to go into "Rage Mode" as long as your health is full. In Rage Mode, you can fly any time you like; though it's hard to fly higher than you start from due to your momentum being tricky, you can use it to glide and high-jump very effectively.
• In Rolo to the Rescue, obtaining a helium canister will inflate Rolo, making him capable of floating freely.
• There are two styles in Blender Bros. Normally, Blender can glide by spinning his ears around. However, he also gains the ability to fly for real for a limited time when you pick up a Wing powerup.
• Shantae:
  • Both Shantae (2002) and Shantae: Half-Genie Hero have Shantae can learn the Harpy dance as the final transformation. This is additionally balanced out by making it awkward to control, with Shantae having insane horizontal momentum in the form. She also can't attack in the form until receiving the separate Harpy Talon item. Still, on a New Game Plus playthrough, having the Harpy mode available from the beginning removes just about all the challenge from early platform sections.
  • Half-Genie Hero also grants the Bat transformation. This is received earlier in the game, but it can only fly directly left or right and can't attack at all, greatly reducing its usabilit outside specific instances.
• In Fe, the eponymous protagonist learns to glide early on, which can be upgraded to true flight near the end of the storyline by collecting all 75 Crystals.
• In Demon Sword, like its spiritual precursor, The Legend of Kage, the hero can Super Jump from the get-go, but the superior Japanese version also features a Wing power-up that grants actual flight for about 20 seconds.
• The Adventure Island series features the pteranodon as one of dinosaurs Master Higgins can ride, allowing both flight and pelting rocks on enemies below.

Role-Playing Game

• Dragon Quest VIII: The party gains the ability to transform into a bird in the last act of the game. The ability is plot-critical for a single event, but is primarily used to avoid monster encounters on the world map. It also allows the party to reach areas which are otherwise inaccessible.
• Kingdom Hearts:
  • Sora gets a glide-type flying power from Tinker Bell’s pixie dust late in Kingdom Hearts, which becomes full flight in a few areas.
  • Same deal with Roxas in 358/2 Days.
• In the X-Men Legends games, many characters can gain the ability to fly, but it has an energy cost. In the first game, the flight ability has a duration that increases the more points are spent on it, but required increased energy per second. In the sequel, the energy used per second decreased with each successive rank bought until it cost no energy to fly on the final rank.
• Marvel Ultimate Alliance allows some characters to fly instead of double-jump, though this comes with arguably limited use - you can't recharge your energy in the air, can really only use range attacks, and are blocked by the same invisible walls that inhibit everyone else. But that doesn't mean it's not neat to use. Its main advantage is that a flying character is notably faster than a walking one. This, added with the fact that your other party members just teleport to you when they fall too far back, means it's really useful for backtracking.
• The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind has a fairly straight example with the Levitate spell. When cast, it allows the caster to "walk" through the air. The speed at which you walk is determined by the spell's strength.
• Freedom Force has flight (or levitation, which was half-speed flight) for several characters, but almost every enemy has a ranged attack (frequently attacks with knockback that will result in you taking Falling Damage as well) and your energy regenerated slowly or not at all while in-flight. And there's still the occasional floor-to-ceiling barriers. Ironically, Bullet's alter ego is an Air Force pilot, yet his powers don't include flight.
• Valkyrie Profile has an odd version in the first game - your character can fly around the entire worldmap from the get-go (she's a Valkyrie), but has to travel on foot when in dungeons and towns. Your ally Freya can fly wherever she pleases, though.
• In Dragon Slayer, the spell that lets you fly around the dungeon is the very last new ability you can acquire. It only works for a limited time, but there's no restriction on repeated use other than your supply of magical potions.
• This is available in many Pokémon games, after you've found the HM item that will allow it, taught it to a Pokémon, and earned the gym badge that will allow you to use Fly outside of battle. However, it acts only as a Warp Whistle—you can only fly to cities you've already visited, and it can't be used while you're in an enclosed space like a building, cave, or particularly dense forest. You can fly out of the middle of a route and similar places, but until the remakes of Pokémon Ruby and Sapphire you couldn't land in them, you'd always land in the city, outside the Pokémon Center. Starting in those games, it is possible to land in a route.
  • There is a true flight mechanic in OmegaRuby and AlphaSapphire in which you ride Latias or Latios at a high altitude, referred to in-game as "Soaring" to avoid confusion with the aforementioned "Flying" mechanic. It uses invisible walls to prevent the player character from wandering too far, and while there are wild Pokémon encounters, there is very little to do actually in the air, requiring landing somewhere to actually accomplish tasks. Soaring does have its uses though, as only from high altitudes can you find uncharted islands that you cannot see otherwise.
  • In Pokémon Legends: Arceus, you can fly using the titan Hisuian Braviary, but it’s more like gliding because Braviary can’t regain altitude while carrying the player character.
  • Pokémon Scarlet and Violet has a Warp Whistle feature to fast travel between cities, or from a route or even a cave to a city, but you can also unlock gliding on Koraidon or Miraidon after defeating several of the Titan Pokémon. It's still gliding in reality but enables the player character to combine it with the mount's climbing ability to go anywhere on the map. The exception is in the endgame. You're forced to walk down the Great Crater of Paldea because your mount is afraid and won't leave its Poké Ball. You can glide in the crater post-game though.
  • The Indigo Disk DLC allows you to achieve actual flight after you get a certain berry for your ride.
• In Child of Light, Aurora becomes able to fly around freely in all directions once she obtains her wings. Although this is an early-game ability, most of the dungeons and areas allow the player to make full use of it.
• In Dragon Ball Z The Legacy Of Goku, Goku can fly to cross water and avoid enemies, but this uses up rare Flight Charges that are capped by level.
• In Terranigma, once you obtain an airplane, you can land it only where airfields have been built.
• In Faery: Legends of Avalon, this is the only mode of movement during normal exploration — the player character simply flies in the direction the camera is pointing, and levels are designed around that. However, there's no movement during the Turn-Based Combat system, although player characters are still always hovering.
• In Xenoblade Chronicles X, flight modules for skells can be unlocked late in the game. Flying allows players to access areas of the planet Mira that would otherwise be inaccessable and challenge flying monsters, including a few Superbosses, at the expense of continuously using fuel (and doubling fuel consumption during battle).

Shoot 'em Up

• Adventures of Dino Riki is a ground-based Shoot 'Em Up where ordinarily Dino-Riki has to do a bit of jumping around to avoid falling into water, but he can fly if he gets the "Bird" powerup, which puts a pair of wings on his back.
• In Atomic Robo-Kid, you start out flightless, but get unlimited flight after grabbing a powerup in the first few seconds of gameplay. Of course, most of the levels consist of tight corridors packed with Respawning Enemies. In Atomic Robo-Kid Special, you can just fly from the start.

Third Person Shooter

• Warframe features the archwings, Jet Pack wings which the Tenno normally can only use in outer space missions, but by crafting a relevant gear item they can also be deployed on landscape areas, allowing crossing vast distances in a matter of seconds. What prevents them from trivializing challenges is that equipping an archwing overrides the warframes' (generally much more useful) abilities, and enemies in those areas have plenty of countermeasures specifically to knock the archwing down.

Wide Open Sandbox

• Oddly, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas has flight as a later-game ability, with the requirement being 'learn how'. Not many limitations, aside from two logical ones: avoid buildings, and avoid no-fly zones. Of course, not many targets when you get too high.
  • It's not naturally a late game ability, you can climb over the airport fence and steal a plane at any time. It's just that if you don't have a pilot's licence, military jets will come and shoot you down.
  • Even later in the game, you get a jetpack (finally!)
• Grand Theft Auto V also features a flight school, but none of the protagonists is required to take lessons there in order to fly whatever they want, wherever they want. Flight lessons are merely the easiest way to quickly level up the flight skill. If you don't mind the increased sway of your vehicle, you can jump into any aircraft you find at any time and explore the whole map without any restrictions aside from the no-fly zone above Fort Zancudo. In fact, small helicopters are far and away the easiest and most convenient way to collect most of the letter scraps and starship parts; some even can't be accessed any other way. All this freedom is kept from being game-breaking by how difficult it is to deploy any onboard weapons that might come with a fighter jet or a gunship, and missions don't usually allow for free vehicle choice anyway, which means aircraft are mostly restricted to free-roam mode.
• [PROTOTYPE] allows you to eventually fly a military helicopter; something of a Game-Breaker, but you aren't allowed to learn it until fairly late in the game.
  • The Glide and Air Dash abilities establish the typical short-term flight, where the player must periodically touch the ground or a wall to continue.
• Spore
  • The Creature stage has this, but limits it with both the "gliding" and "everything important is on the ground" varieties(the hotbar even calls the skill "Glide"). Though there is a partial encouragement with the "Flight Of The Bumblebee" achievement, which requires you to glide a massive distance nonstop.
  • The Galactic Adventures expansion does the same thing when the Captain is planetside, though an adventure creator could avert "everything important is on the ground" if they so desired. If you didn't give your creature wings, there's a jetpack Captain's Part that does the same thing at an energy cost, and one prop you can add to an adventure is jump pads. Flight is also hailed as a Game-Breaker for adventures as it makes traversing areas far easier.
  • Oddly enough, in every stage where you're not controlling an individual specimen (Tribal, Civilization, non-GA Space), your creatures, left to their own devices, can fly around unimpeded.
• Crackdown 2 has a "wingsuit" that unlocks with agility level 5 that allows you to glide for extended periods of time — if you know how. Instead of instructing you, the Voice of the Agency just sarcastically comments that it's difficult and that you should practice... nearly every time you use the ability.
  • Also at agility level 5, you can reach a helipad at the agency headquarters from which you can fetch a helicopter for much easier flight. The helicopters are also armed, but aren't much good for serious combat as they tend to explode at the slightest provocation.
• A staple in the Saints Row series, although mostly using vehicles in the pre-IV era:
  • Saints Row 2 has unlimited flight, and no map edges to contain movement. It's not possible to access most of the missions, side jobs, and collection quests with it, so it's only practical (and awesome) for wide-open wandering or traveling to specific points. A perk can be achieved which negates falling damage, making it a little more practical (and a lot more awesome).
  • Saints Row: The Third has more flight and earlier on; however, it's limited by the fact that while you can park cars in multiple garages, places you can park your helicopters are rare and there's only one place to park fixed-wing airplanes. Later in the game, you get access to VTOL aircraft that can be parked on helipads and allows for both types of flight.
  • Saints Row IV, meanwhile, introduces superpowers, one of them being a superjump and glide ala Prototype. You can upgrade it fully for three air-dash glides at an exceedingly slow descent for no stamina cost and clear easily a quarter of the game world before hitting the ground. You can also summon vehicles, including aircraft, from the menu at any time. But with full upgrades to super speed, running (with occasional jump to clear buildings) is the fastest way to travel.
  • Saints Row: Gat Out of Hell takes this trope to its logical limit by giving Gat and Kinzie the ability to fly under their own power by means of burning wings.
• Superman Returns: The Game gives you Supersonic Flight as well as eighty-plus miles of city space to fly around in.
• In Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, you can use Buckbeak to fly anywhere in the game world, and pretty early on too. The only limitation is that you can't leave the Hogwarts grounds, but you can't do that on foot either. In The Chamber of Secrets, you can do essentially the same but with the broom.
• Minecraft allows the player to fly around freely, but only in Creative Mode, by double tapping the jump button. Interestingly, vertical movement is limited to the jump (fly upwards) and sneak (fly downwards) buttons, and touching the ground cancels out the flight.
  • Later updates introduce the Elytra, an item that equips to the chest slot. With these, players can glide in survival mode. If they craft enough fireworks, these can be used to provide propulsion and actual flight. The limitations: 1) flying consumes the Elytra's durability, and with it taking 1 durability per second during flight, the Elytra's 431 durability allows 7 minutes and 11 seconds of flight unenchanted, while an Unbreaking III Elytra allows 28 minutes and 44 seconds; 2) obviously, a player can only carry a certain amount of fireworks, limiting flight time, but they're more likely to consume the Elytra's durability before all the fireworks are consumed; 3) flying below level 0 will kill the player (The End is the only place in Survival mode where this can happen); 4) the flight speed generally causes injury upon landing, though an experienced player can avoid this; 5) flying too far in any direction but down to load new chunks will eventually overload your computer, especially with higher graphics settings; 6) while using an elytra, you cannot wear any kind of chestplate, leaving you much more vulnerable to death by other means (although this can be helped by keeping said chestplate in your inventory and swapping it out with the elytra when needed.)
• Ghost Recon Wildlands allows the player's team to commandeer helicopters, but the more closely guarded enemy territories have SAM sites that will blow you out of the sky.

---