Pilotwings

When the Super Nintendo was coming into the world, it needed a game that would fully show off its technical muscle. Pilotwings was exactly that title, and to this day it remains an elegant showcase of the console's capabilities.

Instead of racing or shooting, Pilotwings sends you to flight school. In a series of relaxing aerial disciplines you learn to control a light aeroplane, parachute down aiming to land as precisely as possible on a marked target, pilot a rocket belt, and manoeuvre a helicopter. Each discipline has its own rules and scoring, and it's more about precision and calm mastery of flight than adrenaline.

The star of the game is the Mode 7 technology the SNES boasted. This graphical trick made it possible to smoothly rotate and scale the background, creating a convincing sense of flying over a vast landscape, into which you dived and from which you pulled away. For its time it was a visually impressive experience that vividly demonstrated to players what the new console could do against its 8-bit competition.

The game's atmosphere is unusually soothing. Pilotwings doesn't push the player with harsh combat or time stress in a negative sense; instead it offers a laid-back sense of flight, graceful movement, and a kind of meditative striving for the cleanest possible execution of manoeuvres. It's a game about the joy of mastering the air.

As one of the Super Nintendo's launch titles from the internal studio Nintendo EAD, Pilotwings fulfilled its task perfectly: it entertained and, at the same time, sold the console on its technical sophistication. The series later got sequels on other Nintendo platforms.

Why play it: For a relaxing flight simulator that, as a launch title, vividly showcases the magic of Mode 7 graphics technology and offers the calm joy of pure flight.