If you’ve listened to this episode, you will have heard me talking about wishing the game had included more enemy aircraft of different types. Maybe even the German Me 262 jet? I think this may have come from my memory of the sequel, which I think included this aircraft.
Well, my prayers were answered! Fellow guest David (evilcommiedictator) found evidence of files that mentioned it. A few days later, kdrnic also searched the game files and confirmed this (see his Mastodon posts).
All this spurred me on to try to find some evidence in-game. David confirmed that the version we had contained savegames for the final missions of the game. That was the first revelation! Flying these missions, I went out not expecting to find anything. I felt like Captain Ahab, searching for his White Whale!
But then, there they were. Two Me262s appeared after I’d bombed the primary target and flew past in the distance – they didn’t engage us. They weren’t visible for long. I’m lucky that I happened to cycle through the external views at the time, and saw them. It was quite a moment for me, one I’ll never forget. To see these planes appearing at last, after 30 years of playing this game, was amazing. Funny to think the code was there all the time, just waiting to be used!
I’ve since seen them again when playing these last couple of missions in the tour (around Jan/Feb 1945), in more usual 4-ship formations. And they do engage you! Fortunately I’ve managed to shoot a few of them down – but it turns out that jets move pretty fast! 😉
I want to thank evilcommiedictator and kdrnic very much for their work on this, it means a lot to me. And it provides a fitting epilogue to the podcast 🙂
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