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F-22 Lightning 3

F-22 Lightning 3 Game Cover
71%Game Brain Score
story, optimization
graphics, gameplay
71% User Score Based on 105 reviews

Platforms

PCWindows
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F-22 Lightning 3 Game Cover

About

F-22 Lightning 3 is a single player and multiplayer simulation game. It was developed by NovaLogic and was released on June 18, 2009. It received mostly positive reviews from players.

Mass Destruction! Use tactical nuclear weapons to level entire city regions. The most realistic weather environments ever created. Changing weather effects including: rain, snow, hail, and wind. Extreme temperatures affect flight performance. Fly it yourself or let the world's most advanced fighter do it for you!

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F-22 Lightning 3 screenshot
F-22 Lightning 3 screenshot
F-22 Lightning 3 screenshot
F-22 Lightning 3 screenshot
F-22 Lightning 3 screenshot
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71%
Audience ScoreBased on 105 reviews
story5 positive mentions
music3 negative mentions
  • The game delivers a balanced 'simcade' experience, combining approachable controls with engaging combat flight simulation.
  • It features a large variety of missions, dynamic campaigns, and challenging AI that provide good replay value and strategic gameplay.
  • With some third-party patches and wrappers (like dgVoodoo2 and nGlide), it runs well on modern systems and improves graphics and resolution.
  • The game suffers from technical issues such as crashes, difficulties running on modern OS versions, and requires manual tweaks to function properly.
  • Graphics are outdated and low resolution by modern standards, with jagged textures and limited fullscreen/widescreen support.
  • Controls and UI can be unintuitive and clunky, lacking a comprehensive tutorial or easy configuration, which may frustrate new players.
  • story
    47 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game's story is conveyed mainly through mission briefings and situation reports, offering a sizable campaign with diverse missions but lacking in cinematic or narrative depth. While the campaigns present a progression culminating in major events like nuclear strikes, the storytelling is straightforward and sometimes hampered by bugs that affect mission continuity. Overall, the narrative serves more as a functional backdrop to varied mission gameplay rather than a deeply immersive or character-driven experience.

    • “The size of the game in terms of content is massive for that time, with several campaigns spanning across multiple missions with interesting objectives and targets at times.”
    • “Lightning 3 has a very interesting story and does a good job of telling it despite there being little more than "situation reports" to fill in the background for your missions.”
    • “You work your way through various deployment campaigns and the mission situations build up to a finale mission for each campaign (typically culminating in a nuclear strike or combination bombing/multiple enemy squadron mission).”
    • “No story.”
    • “The worst bug: if you destroyed all enemy radars and missile launchers in every mission of the final campaign (select your wingman to engage enemy), then you can't complete the final mission because you can't receive the voice authorization to release the nuclear weapon.”
    • “Many missions and campaigns, but basically the same game with different missions, a few new weapons, and a different plane.”
  • graphics
    22 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The graphics are generally considered dated by modern standards, featuring voxel-based visuals that can appear floaty and lack smoothing, typical of games from the late 1990s. However, they were regarded as impressive and realistic for their time, especially when using recommended settings and hardware, effectively capturing the feel of flight simulation despite their simplicity.

    • “The graphics and simulation for a game from 1999 are fantastic.”
    • “Novalogic was one of many companies that made games such as these, and with a combination of military jargon and visuals, famous, then-contemporary and cutting-edge jets, and a simplicity couched as a sort of mystical automation - flares and chaff launching automatically, autolanding autopilot, instant IFF, and so on - they were able to capture both arcade and sim fans and introduce a generation to combat flying.”
    • “Final tip: make sure you select the Voodoo Banshee graphics card with the 3dfx setting turned on in the options menu, as well as setting the resolution to 1024x768 (max quality for the game) for the best graphic quality.”
    • “The graphics are volumetric pixel based or "voxel" which makes the scenes seem floaty, and objects often inflate and deflate like a balloon depending on the viewing angle.”
    • “The lack of antialiasing makes the graphics look like you're having a Texas Instruments calculator dangled at you on a string.”
    • “This game has horrible graphics that are dull and controls that are just disgusting.”
  • gameplay
    11 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The gameplay offers a mix of arcade and simulator elements, providing both fast-paced fun and realistic flight simulation. However, some find it slow and occasionally bland, with a few technical issues affecting the overall experience.

    • “F-16 multirole fighter was a great game, tons of fun, tons of missions, really cool plane, good controls and everything. It had a good balance of arcadey fast fun and simulator slow scary gameplay.”
    • “A good balance of arcade and simulator gameplay.”
    • “You get a game that is a military simulator in a lighter category, but it still contains a balance of realism and fun gameplay at the same time.”
    • “Multiple gameplay errors.”
    • “The gameplay is slow and bland/boring.”
    • “Boring gameplay.”
  • music
    5 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game's music and audio quality are generally considered poor, with the default soundtrack contributing to an arcade-like feel rather than a realistic simulation. Overall, the sound design receives negative feedback from users.

    • “The enormous loadout of the plane in this game, along with its default soundtrack during missions, makes the game feel more like an arcade compared to the other simcades Novalogic made in that period (F-16 and MiG-29).”
    • “The audio (sound/music) isn't that great either.”
    • “Poor audio (sounds and music).”
  • optimization
    4 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    Optimization improvements include disabling fullscreen optimizations for smoother performance, along with features that track stats and provide scoring and rank promotions based on gameplay. Overall, the game runs smoothly with these adjustments.

    • “Disable fullscreen optimizations in the game directory for better performance.”
    • “After applying the optimization tips, the game runs smoothly.”
    • “Useful tips for game optimization improve overall gameplay experience.”
    • “Exe in the directory and disable fullscreen optimizations.”
    • “Tips for game optimization”
  • grinding
    2 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    Users consistently highlight that grinding in the game is very time-consuming, often requiring extensive effort or "a second life" to progress effectively.

  • stability
    2 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game is generally more stable and less buggy than comparable simulations, but it still experiences freezing issues, particularly when attempting to change video resolutions.

    • “I can't change the video resolutions, it freezes!!!”
  • replayability
    1 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game’s enhanced resolution significantly improves its playability, offering a more enjoyable experience that encourages replay despite its age.

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Frequently Asked Questions

F-22 Lightning 3 is a simulation game.

F-22 Lightning 3 is available on PC and Windows.

F-22 Lightning 3 was released on June 18, 2009.

F-22 Lightning 3 was developed by NovaLogic.

F-22 Lightning 3 has received mostly positive reviews from players. Most players liked F-22 Lightning 3 for its story but disliked it for its graphics.

F-22 Lightning 3 is a single player game with multiplayer support.

Similar games include IL-2 Sturmovik: 1946, Microsoft Flight Simulator X, VTOL VR, IL-2 Sturmovik: Battle of Stalingrad, Rise of Flight United and others.