Comanche

American studio NovaLogic launched the Comanche series in 1992 with Comanche: Maximum Overkill, a helicopter simulator notable for its own voxel-based graphics, which could render sprawling, seamless terrain with real elevation instead of the flat polygon maps common at the time. Players sat in the cockpit of the RAH-66 Comanche attack helicopter and flew military missions where, alongside the piloting itself, managing fuel, choosing and conserving ammunition for different target types, and damage to individual systems that gradually limited maneuverability and firepower all mattered just as much. Missions ranged from reconnaissance over enemy territory to escorting ground convoys and striking armored targets and air defenses, so players had to pick loadouts and tactics to fit each task.

The sequels Comanche 2 and Comanche 3 improved the voxel engine, adding more detailed and varied terrain, night vision, additional helicopter types and larger campaigns, which by the mid-nineties made the series one of the most technically impressive flight sims on PC, also praised for the tangible feel of flying low over the landscape. Comanche 4, released in 2001, switched to a conventional polygon engine, put more weight on story and wingmen, and moved toward more accessible, action-oriented gameplay, which also pulled it away from the strict-simulation reputation the series had built. Even so, Comanche remains tied for many players above all to admiration for the technical trick of nineties voxel terrain and the sense, at the time, that it was showing what PCs were about to become capable of.