Video Game / DogFighter

Make it rain red in the wild blue yonder.

DogFighter is a multiplayer Action Game / Simulation Game developed by the Northern Irish team Dark Water Studios, using Instinct Software's eponymous Instinct Engine. It's all action and no plot or backstory, pitting piston-engine propeller craft against each other in the usual forms of online multiplayer combat—free-for-all, Team Deathmatch, or Capture the Flag. The game also has some single-player modes—such as a "Tournament" mode which challenges players to achieve trophies under certain conditions, and a "Survivor" mode pitting the player against increasing waves of enemy craft.

DogFighter was released on Steam back on June 14, 2010. It didn't too badly, generally receiving good reviews from contemporary sources and moving 67,000 copies come October, placing sixth in the top ten most sold Steam games for that month. Over the course of the following year Dark Water Studios released more game modes, maps, and aircraft, including some made by the community. By 2012, Instinct Software acquired the IP rights to DogFighter and some of Dark Water Studios' other projects.

Unfortunately, a few years after release DogFighter's online playerbase evaporated. There have been attempts to revive it, but if you want to play with others, your best bet will be getting your buddies together for an online match. (Or you can always play with bots.)

Not to be confused with other similarly-named games such as Airfix: Dogfighter or Dogfighter -WW2-.

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DogFighter provides examples of:

• Abandoned Area: The original website described both "Redmines" and "Shambhala" as these. For the former: "The Redmines is an old abandoned mining settlement whose name is taken from the red staining on the tunnel walls that make up a vast underground theatre of destruction." For the latter: "A long forgotten outpost that has been shrouded in mystery."
• Airstrike Impossible: If you so choose, DogFighter is more than happy to oblige. A number of maps have treacherous, cramped corridors and hidden areas, enough to make any veteran of Pilotwings 64 or the Ace Combat franchise feel a stirring in their underpants. Some notable examples:
  • "Redmines" has a rather impressive long, winding mining tunnel network that connects to various parts of the map. There's also a sizable arena underground, with just enough space for a scrap.
  • The pyramids in "Pharaohs" have tunnels leading into them, connecting to a central interior point and pool of shimmering water. One of them has a more elaborate interior, with enough space for a dogfight inside. Meanwhile, the temple or plaza connecting the pyramids has a "moat" as well as an underground labyrinth.
  • "Volcano" has lava tunnels filled with powerups which connect to the central chamber of the volcano. The two largest ones have a number of stalactites limiting access, and inside the volcano itself, there's additional pickups under the central platform very, very close to the lava.
• Artificial Stupidity: Their names might invoke famous aces, but DogFighter's bots don't always do their namesakes proud—
  • While enemy bots may be justified in ramming into you if that's what it takes to kill you, when your own AI teammates do this, it's more than a little annoying.
  • If you play Capture the Flag with bots, sooner or later one will crash into a wall or tricky obstacle while carrying the enemy team's flag. You just might get treated to a spectacle of watching the opposing team beeline for their flag in order to recover it ... only to crash, respawn, and repeat over and over.
• Autobots, Rock Out!: Somewhat curiously given the game heavily draws from the Golden Age of Aviation for its aesthetic, the game's entire soundtrack is hard rock—the kind of music commonly associated with fighter pilots, especially between the 70s and 90s. That being said, it's rather good.
• Badass Back: Defensive weapon pickups like the Backfire Homing Missiles and Rear Facing Bobcat Shotgun give you the ability to strongly discourage pursuers.
• Build Like an Egyptian: "Pharaoahs" features three pyramids connected by a sort of temple or plaza. Notably for the trope, the pyramids and plaza are not undecorated sandstone. As the original website says of this map: "At the centre of a vast featureless desert lies an untarnished vision of Ancient Egypt." The pyramids have look more like what the Pyramids of Giza would have looked like when they were built, with polished limestone sides and capped with gold. The plaza is lush with water and lined with palm trees, and the obelisks and statues that dot the complex are vivid with colorful paint.
• Chasing Your Tail: A natural outcome for a game about combat between piston engine aircraft. AI opponents, even at their easiest difficulty setting, are irritatingly good at this.
• Convection, Schmonvection: At first, "Volcano" might seem relatively harmless as far as DogFighter maps go ... but if you linger too long near the surface of the lava in the volcano's core, you will start losing health rapidly.
• Convenient Color Change: In team games, picking up the Disguise powerup changes your plane's color to that of the enemy's. This might get bots to ignore you, provided they weren't already hunting you when you got the powerup. There's also a chance that the Disguise powerup will instead make everyone see you as an enemy, during which your plane takes on a third color scheme entirely.
• Deflector Shields: The Shields defensive pickup temporarily protects a plane from everything except crashing.
• Diesel Punk: DogFighter's fleet of aircraft are (mostly) piston engine prop planes ... that just so happen to have access to railguns, shields, invisibility, and other really advanced goodies. There's even a bit of Cosmic Horror Story with the map "The Old Gods" and the Black Death.
• The Dreaded: The Black Death is played up as this—a supernatural grim reaper of the skies that kills indescriminately. On the original website, the description of "Volcano" included: "Beware! This is the supposed home of the Black Death."
• Dressing as the Enemy: As part of the Disguise powerup during team games, which can (potentially) fool the enemy into not firing on you.
• Eternal Engine: "Dirtbox" features a massive core drill hooked up to four smoke-belching power stations. The original website described this map as "a noisy, tight mess of machinery and dust."
• Expy: "The Old Gods" is based on Hoi Ling Bay in Vietnam, and initially even went by that name during development. Of course, the real Hoi Ling Bay doesn't have a massive temple carved into the side of its cliff faces.
• Fixed Forward-Facing Weapon: The basic Machine Gun and every offensive powerup are fixed and forward-facing. Hellfire Rockets, Seeker Homing Missiles, and the Annihilator Cluster Rocket also fire directly forward. That being said, the missiles (and the Bobcat Shotgun) don't need to hit something dead-on to damage or destroy it.
• Fragile Speedster: There's several different takes on this trope within the lineup—
  • The Swift is a classic example of the trope, with both excellent Boost and speed ratings, but little health or agility.
  Sacrifices manoeuvrability for increased engine power. Great boost and great top speed but poor armour. Get in and then get out... FAST!
  • With little health, meager speed, and excellent Boost and agility ratings, the Rockwell puts more emphasis on weak-but-agile instead of weak-but-fast.
  The acrobat. This craft is incredibly manoeuvrable with a solid boost. Suffers from decreased armour and overall speed.
  • The Fleetfoot leans even more into "Fragile Acrobat" territory than the Rockwell, with maximum speed and agility ratings, but poor health and Boost ratings.
  Fast and manoeuvrable but has a very weak boost and low armour. This is a real pilot's craft.
  • Later the KillerBee was introduced as official fan-submitted content, further maximizing agility and base speed at the cost of poor health and almost no Boost rating.
  The most agile craft in the fleet with a good top speed. This agility comes at the cost of a very weak boost and a very low armour rating.
  • Released in March 2011 along with the KillerBee, the Angelfire focuses on maximizing Boost ability with middling health and agility and low base speed.
  The most advanced craft in the fleet. Its booster delivers a massive speed increase combined with a fair agility. The canopy cockpit means this craft can go higher than any other but its weight means it has trouble on steep climbs.
• Geo Effects: If you fly close enough to the ground or a surface and use your Boost, you'll find that the meter drains far less quickly and regenerates faster. In addition to providing cover from enemy fire, this further encourages pilots to run through trenches and tunnels—for example, the wall-walk in the walls of "Shambhala" make for an effective way to zip across the map to the enemy flag in CTF games, nab it, and high tail it back home, all while reasonably protected by ramparts on either side.
• High-Up Ice-Up: Exaggerated here in DogFighter. All of the planes stall if they fly too high—or if they fly too slowly or are hit by the Engine Disruptor—but the "service ceiling" is far, far lower than real life piston engine planes. Once a plane stalls, it immediately pitches down and plummets toward the ground. The game tells you that you can restart the engine by rapidly tapping Boost, but in practice, you're going to eat dirt before you get the engine running again.
  • Of note is that the map "Aces High" takes place high above the ground, at an altitude that would be unreachable on the other maps. Of course, you'll still stall if you try to fly even higher.
• Informed Equipment: Surprisingly averted! Any offensive or defensive item you pick up will physically appear on your plane until it runs out of ammo or is otherwise consumed—and unlike in many games, all the items you've picked up are visible on your plane at all times. Collecting the myriad items will leave your plane quite visibly armed to the teeth.
• Invisibility Cloak: The Invisibility pickup works this way, as you might guess. It works indefinitely, but firing any weapon, or using any defensive pickup other than the Engine Disruptor, immediately drops the cloak. Similarly, if you're playing CTF and you have the flag, activating the cloak automatically drops it.
• Interface Screw: Two InstaGrabs cause this. The Radar Scrambler disables enemy radar temporarily, while Reverse Controls screws with enemy controls. They can also, like other non-health InstaGrabs, backfire and affect you instead.
• Jack of All Stats: One plane in particular—the Wingblade—stands out as this, and is even explicitly named as such in-game (as well as being a Master of None). Four star rating for health and speed, three for Boost and agility.
  The Wingblade is a solid all rounder. A jack of all trades - master of none, the Wingblade is a good starting craft for a pilot new to the world of DogFighter.
• Lethal Lava Land: "Volcano," as the name suggests, takes place over and inside a volcanic island.
• Level in the Clouds: "Aces High" features four airships and a number of smaller flying platforms parked high over the ground below. So far, this is the only map where planes fly at high altitudes without stalling. (Provided, of course, you don't try to fly higher.)
• Lightning Bruiser: The Black Death, in pure stats, outclasses other playable craft in every way. It also has better versions of the offensive weapons available to other planes, though it can't pick up refills, and when it appears due to a player picking up its powerup, the Black Death has an invisible time limit before reverting back to a normal plane. The official website put it best—
  Power. Speed. Agility. It has it all. If you see this craft, get out of there. Only the bravest pilots can take this craft on.
• Magnetic Weapons: The Viper Railguns are these. Most planes can be brought down in one or two shots, and you can snipe targets from across the map provided you have good target leading.
• Mighty Glacier: Several flavors present in the roster—
  • The game presents the Samnite as a classic Mighty Glacier, with a maximum health rating, good agility, but middling Boost and meager speed ratings.
  This craft likes nothing better than soaking up damage and laughing at opponents futile attempts to bring it down. A slow moving hulk.
  • While its base speed isn't bad, the Protofighter has a poor Boost rating and has outright miserable agility.
  The thug. This craft can take a beating and has enough engine power to move its large mass at speed. It does however suffer from manoeuvrability issues.
  • The Badger—a Version-Exclusive Content plane—outdoes the other examples in health rating, at the cost of poor speed, meager agility, and middling Boost ratings.
  Do not be deceived by its scrap yard appearance. The Badger is a brute capable of withstanding even the most terrible beating. This is the juggernaut of DogFighter.
• Multi-Mook Melee: The Survivor single-player mode puts you up against wave after wave of enemies, increasing in number and aggression, interspersed with waves of multiple Black Death planes. You get the "Soft Boiled" achievement for reaching Wave 10, and "Hard Boiled" for reaching Wave 20.
  • Lone Wolf is a similar single-player mode, except that it's essentially Team Deathmatch where you are your only team member, facing off against an entire team of enemy bots.
• My Rules Are Not Your Rules: You might notice that when AI players decide to hunt you down, regardless of the plane they're flying, they will be able to park right on your tail and blast away. They seem capable of flying slower than the player unfettered by the risk of stalling, as well as being capable of low-airspeed maneuvering the player can't match.
• Nitro Boost: If you grab the Unlimited Boost pickup, for a limited amount of time you can Boost as much as you like ... but sometimes the pickup will disable your Boost instead. There's also the Max Speed Increase pickup, which is Exactly What It Says on the Tin ... but will sometimes malfunction and plunge your aircraft into a stall.
• No Plot? No Problem!: No attempt is made to explain the setting of DogFighter in-game or on the original website. It's all about the dogfighting.
• Poison Mushroom: With the exception of the health-boosting pickups, the InstaGrab powerups (that is, not the offensive or defensive powerups) have a chance of backfiring on you. If you're close enough you might be able to discern a "poison" InstaGrab from a regular one, as they will have faint black "zoom lines" similar to what you see with the Black Death powerup. The nastiest one might be the Max Speed Increase's "poison" variant, which immediately stalls your aircraft—almost always fatally.
• Power-Up: A major part of the gameplay, appearing as either offensive weapons, defensive weapons and abilities, and InstaGrabs that automatically apply a temporary benefit such as increased maximum speed, unlimited boost, or jamming enemy radar. Pickups spawn throughout the map at predetermined points, but are also contained within shootable barrage balloons that descend from on high. (You don't want to fly into one. Or be near one when you shoot them.)
• Shotguns Are Just Better: The Bobcat Shotgun in both offensive and defensive forms (though the defensive version was originally called "Flak" according to the original website's code) are short ranged—but they have a very wide cone of effect, a decent amount of ammunition upon pickup, and can be fired in rapid succession. That gives you the ability to quickly plow through groups of enemies.
• Shout-Out: In the finest of Steam gaming traditions, many of the achievements are pop culture references—
  • The "You No Take Flags!" achievement for returning twenty flags in CTF references Kobolds in World of Warcraft and their broken English catchphrase, "You no take candle!"
  • Fly in "Volcano" for at least an hour and you get the achievement "I am the God of Hellfire!!!" (Hi, God of Hellfire!)
  • Fly in "Pharaohs" for at least an hour and you get the achievement "The Best Digger in all of Cairo."
  • Fly in "Shambhala" for at least an hour and you get the achievement "Shangri La."
  • Kill fifty enemies with the Vulcan Chaingun and you get the achievement "Live Long and Prosper."
  • Kill fifty enemies with the Hellfire Rockets and you get the achievement "Rocketman."
  • Kill fifty enemies with the Viper Railgun and you get the achievement "Snake, Respond."
  • Killing a hundred enemies (human or bot) as the Black Death nets you the achievement "Don't Fear the Reaper."
  • Once you kill a hundred human players, you get the achievement "That My Friend is the Smell of Inevitability," modified from Agent Smith's attempt at a Pre-Mortem One-Liner from The Matrix.
  • If you host multiplayer games for a total of five hours, you get the achievement "Shaken not Servered," a pun on James Bond's famous martini preference.
• Shout-Out Theme Naming: Many non-player characters have names taken from various flying aces from the World Wars, though often rearranged. For example, Otto Just and Erich Brauneck got their names from German WWI aces Otto Brauneck and Erich Just. Other examples include Arnold Rickenbacker, who gets his name from American WWI ace Eddie Rickenbacker, and John Bateman, whose name is taken wholly from the eponymous British WWI ace.
• Smart Bomb: The Engine Disruptor (curiously called "Sonic Burst" in the original website's code) immediately stalls every aircraft in its radius. Shields are the only thing that protect against it, but it will drop the shield.
• Sprint Shoes: All of the aircraft have a Boost ability not unlike nitrous oxide systems used in some aircraft during World War II, albeit exaggerated. The aircraft have varying Boost stats, with some planes capable of intense but brief bursts of speed and others longer-lasting but more subtle speed boosts.
• Quad Damage / Super Mode: The Black Death pickup transforms your plane into the eponymous Black Death. As The Black Death, you have access to stronger versions of several different offensive weapons (such as a much more rapid firing Viper Railgun, and a Vulcan Chaingun that's like a literal river of bullets) as well as a limitless supply of Hellfire Rockets. The powerup has an invisible timer once picked up—if you're shot down, you drop the powerup for someone else to pick up, but the amount of time available doesn't reset.
• Ramming Always Works: Planes take massive damage, if they aren't destroyed outright, from bumping with or colliding into one another. This often results in a Mutual Kill, unless one of the planes had the Shields pickup active or had way more health—such as with the Mega Health pickup.
• Try and Follow: DogFighter strongly encourages tactics like this. Every map has multiple obstacles with just enough space for a daring pilot to navigate through, and they can make for a great way to discourage pursuit. (Provided you don't plow into something yourself.)
• Version-Exclusive Content: Berlin-based publisher Just A Game released a boxed version of DogFighter in March 2011. Owning this version is the only way to unlock the Badger; it's not available through other retail versions.