Hack Attack

Television may have brought the Vietnam War into America’s living rooms, but personal computers brought the Persian Gulf right into our laps. Armed only with information from CNN and the F-15 Strike Eagle II computer program, laptop leathernecks across the country sat in the cockpits of fantasy fighter crafts, eyes glued to our HUDS (Heads Up Display), and flew sortie after successful sortie. All without leaving the safety of our homes. The few, the proud, the computer geeks.

Strike Eagle II is the new cash cow of Maryland-based Microprose Software Inc. Not surprisingly, the company is having a banner year--sales have jumped 35% since Iraq invaded Kuwait in August. According to spokeswoman Cathy Gilmore, there were at least three times the number of Americans flying combat missions over the Gulf on their personal computers than there were U.S. troops in the region. Of course, there are very good reasons that they were there and we were here--early in the war, I myself accidentally blew up the Tel Nof air base near Tel Aviv. Oops.

Since its release in 1988, Strike Eagle II has sold 500,000 copies (the earlier version sold more than a million), mostly to middle-aged male Jimmy Doolittle wanna-bes. (Of course, not all of us are middle-aged). And Microprose’s more challenging F-19 Stealth Fighter has sold 750,000. Both games offer Gulf War scenarios, programmed before the conflict began, as well as situations like a Warsaw Pact attack on NATO in Europe and a campaign against Libya. War isn’t cheap for vid jockeys either; these programs (Microprose also markets tank warfare, helicopter gunship and submarine simulators) retail for $54.95.

Gilmore warns overzealous Top Guns to remember that “line in the sand” between fantasy and reality and not to run out and sign up for flight school, even after a particularly good run. Though designed by aviation and military experts, Strike Eagle II and F-19 are meant to be games, Gilmore says, “not flight training.”