Carrier Deck Review

Before we get into the review, I figure I should make sure you're familiar with what a carrier deck is. It’s the top, flat surface on an aircraft carrier where different types of planes take off and land. Essentially, an airfield in the middle of the sea. Besides acting as a landing strip, the ships can also be refuelled and repaired here if needed.

Carrier Deck is a fast-paced time management game developed by Ultimate Games, where you play as an air officer stationed on the aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan (CVN-76) during an active war. It’s up to you, and you alone (which feels a little unfair), to take care of all aspects of operations involving the aircraft on the ship; this is essentially flight deck management. Even though you're alone, you’ll need to work fast to increase your chances of warfare success.

There are multiple modes to try out in the game. I opted for the Campaign so I could learn what I needed to do before being launched into a Survival mode where I was guaranteed to be quickly obliterated. There’s also a Quick Play mode available that doesn’t require such a large time commitment, but you’ll want to figure out what the hell is going on first, or you’re sure to be in for a bad time.

We see all the different oceans that we’ll eventually visit on a world map: North Atlantic, Pacific, South Atlantic, Arctic, Mediterranean, Indian, South China, and North Pacific. You start with the training levels located in the North Atlantic.

Something that annoyed me from the start was how the game makes it hard to see what you are highlighting. The developer needs to make it more obvious. I have good eyesight and was having a hell of a time trying to see if the colour of the box had slightly changed. All the locations are locked except the North Atlantic area, which is where you complete your basic certification training, learning how to fuel aircraft, launch them, and land the planes.

Even when you’re playing with a controller, you’ll move a cursor around the screen with the thumbstick to select an action. You click on the aircraft you want to pick and the action you want to perform. The first thing you learn to do is refuel your craft, or assign the crew to run in and do it for you. It’s entertaining to see all the little cadets run in to get this done. After that, you’ll need to move the plane to one of the catapults located on the deck. Once the aircraft is in place, you click on the arrows in front of it to launch it.

When you complete the first basic training lesson, you're certified and promoted to the rank of Seaman Apprentice. After this first certification, you complete others focusing on Search Missions, Cargo Supplies, and Enemy Attacks, just to name a few. Once you have all the different certifications, you’ll be sent around the world to different oceans to battle enemy forces.

Once I had a general idea of what I was doing, I tried out a quick game. Here, you select a mode between Lieutenant, Captain, and Admiral; as the rank goes up, the difficulty increases. Your mission is to defeat 12 enemies. So you’ll need to fuel the planes and get them in position to launch and intercept incoming threats before they attack the aircraft carrier. If you find yourself sitting around waiting for things to happen, you can speed time up by holding the top face button. I’m so happy this is an option, as it can get boring just sitting there with nothing to do!

I’m playing Carrier Deck on the PlayStation 5, and I have to say this game is absolutely beautiful, especially the water. It looks so realistic! All the aircraft look great when you zoom in enough to really check them out. You start with a wide view of the deck, so everything looks super small. The audio is great, especially the sounds of planes taking off and landing. There’s an option to change your view between Launch, Land, or Free Camera if you want to switch up what you see. It’s so cool to watch the planes coming in for a landing; it reminds me of watching the Top Gun movie.

I have to say, Carrier Deck isn’t really my cup of tea. It gets repetitive pretty quickly, and it’s not the easiest game to learn. Even after completing the training, I felt lost and didn’t know the steps to complete what I needed to do. If you’re into games that require a lot of planning and strategising, or if you have an interest in military aircraft, Carrier Deck may be a title of interest for you. But if you enjoy tons of non-stop action, this might not be the most enjoyable experience.