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| BOMBS AWAY BIFFO!
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D A M B U S T E R S
| WE'RE BANG ON COURSE, SKIPPER. WHEN WE GET TO THE DAM
CAN WE GO FOR A QUICK RECCY ROUND THE REGION? THAT
WAY WE CAN PLAY HIDE 'N' SEEK WITH JERRY'S GUNS.
| Wave goodbye to dear old Blighty - you may never
return. You take off from Scampton Airfield twelve
miles from the east coast and fly straight to the
Dutch coast.
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| Travelling as the crow flies is just for the birds.
You'll run into big trouble if you head straight for
the dam without plotting a course round the heavily
armed areas.
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| SQD.LDR. BADGER BLENKINSOP PUSHES THE
STARTER. THE FOUR MIGHTY ENGINES SPLUTTER
INTO LIFE. THE BIG LANCASTER BOMBER LURCHES
UP THE RUNWAY AND TAKES OFF INTO THE NIGHT.
ONE OF THE MOST DARING EXPLOITS OF THE
WAR IS ABOUT TO BEGIN. NOW YOU CAN JOIN
THE VALIANT AIRMEN OF 617 SQUADRON IN
U.S. GOLD'S NEW GAME DAMBUSTERS ...
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| Set your course with the cursor by placing it over
your destination. The pilot will then find the correct
direction marked on his compass.
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| UNIDENTIFIED ENEMY AIRCRAFT ... PULL US UP SKIPPER ...
WE'VE TAKEN A PRANG ... SORRY LEADER, MADE A HASH
OF THAT ONE! AAAGH! I THINK I'VE BOUGHT IT SKIP ...
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| PREPARE FOR TAKE OFF. OK, THIS IS THE BIG ONE, CHAPS. LET'S
TAKE HER UP. ROGER AND OUT ... OK CHAPS, KEEP YOUR
HEADS DOWN! WE'VE JUST ENTERED ENEMY AIRSPACE AND
WE'RE GOING IN LOW, VERY LOW. LOOKS LIKE THE
FIREWORKS HAVE STARTED ALREADY.
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The light have come on all over Europe. A quick
squirt to the base of the searchlight should soon put
them out again. As the rear gunner, you've got four
303 calibre machine guns firing twenty rounds a
second, but you'll only see the tracer bullets - one
in four.
Ack ack ack. Take it out or take 'er up. If you fly into
the barrage balloon you'll have really blown it.
Fortunately, they're not hard to shoot from a way off.
Prepare to meet them as soon as you hit Holland.
Flying Hun at two o'clock and he's coming in at quite
a lick. You'll have to be quick to take him out. If you
miss fifteen ME110s, one of your gunners'll be a
gonner. So, the moral is to make sure you make a
mess of the Messerschmidts - or it's Goering, Goering,
gone!
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You'll have no trouble with take-off. Your Lancaster
behaves just like a jump jet - straight up and you're
off. It seems rather a shame that there's no runway
and you can only tell you're on the ground from your
instruments.
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If your front gunner fails to shoot a searchlight, at
least make sure you take avoiding action. If you do
fly straight over one, you can expect a fair bit of flak
- from you crew as well as from Jerry! So, put that
light out.
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| GOOD SHOW, SKIPPER. SHE'S FLYING LIKE A DREAM.
IT'S ALL ENGINES GO! ... WE'VE GOT THE GAS SO
GIVE IT SOME WELLY, SKIP. JERRY WON'T
KNOW WHAT'S HIT HIM.
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The first engineer really comes into his own on the
bomb run. Using the slider controls, you'll have to
set the boost to max and the revs on each engine to
9600. That should give you an airspeed of 230. But
be warned, if you take the revs above 10000 you're
in grave danger of going up in flames.
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The second engineer's in charge of the fuel
consumption - make sure the flaps are up in flight
or you'll use more gas. It's a real drag. If you do lose
an engine, you'll have to adjust the rudder trim -
move it up and you'll veer to the right.
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| WIZZARD SHOW ... BANKING EAST ... SLAM US ON FULL THROTTLE ...
BOMB ON ... DOWN, DOWN, DOWN ... UP A BIT ... KEEP 'ER
STEADY ... BOMB AWAY ... PULL 'ER BACK ... IT'S BLOWN ...
DAMMIT, NO ... BACK TO BLIGHTY, CHAPS ...
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OPS ROOM BRIEFING
9:45AM, 16TH MAY 1943 |
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 | Areas of high population.
These are mostly situated along the Rhine valley. Take avoiding action.
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 | Military installations.
Jerry's not going to welcome you over here, so keep a low profile.
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 | Industrial sites.
Here lies the power and Krupption of the Third Reich. Let's turn their
wheels of industry into water wheels!
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 | Airfields.
You can be sure of finding ME-110s around here.
The Luftwaffe may not be the RAF but it's not trounced yet.
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It's the navigator's job to position the cursor directly
over the dam to give the pilot an accurate compass
bearing. One degree out and you ain't gonna see
that dam for dust and dark!
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Gently does it. Ease the beast round until the
compass lines up with the direction mark, then level
her out to the correct height: 51ft. From the right
hand dial you can tell whether the first engineer's
doing his job - it should read 230 for the run.
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Meet the seventh crew member, the Bomb Aimer.
He's had his feet up for the duration but now his
time has come. First, switch the bomb motor on,
followed by the searchlights. Only when the two lights
totally overlap is the Lanc at the right height.
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Here it is - the dam! And it's all lined up between
the front gunner's distancing sights. As soon as the
two turrets sit snugly between the sights, it's time
to let rip with the megabomb.
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Damn! We missed it. The dam's still intact and the
Reich can breathe again till the next run. When you
do get it right and the dam blows, the piccy still
stays the same. Bit wet that!
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DAMBUSTERS
You won't earn your wings
grounded back at base -
Squadron Leader Ross Holman
didn't. He's flown more active
missions in Dambusters than
anyone else. Prepare for his
pre-bomb briefing.
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altitude, is the bomb primed, do the spotlights overlap? There's an awful lot to
master - and that's without the threat of
enemy action. You'll have to learn to set the
speed of the aeroplane to 230 mph and the
altitude to 51ft. The height's not too tricky
once you've sussed how to operate the spotlights. There's one on each end of the
Lancaster and their reflections on the water
overlap when the bomber is flying at the
correct altitude.
You'll also have to practise the correct
point at which to shout those immortal
words 'Bombs Away'. Only when the dam
fits exactly between the front gunner's
sights, can you be sure of destroying the
target.
So, now you're ready for the flight from
Scampton Airfield and over the English
Channel. Feeling pretty confident about it
then? Well, you'd better, 'cos this is where
things start to hot up. The enemy is just
across the water.
Each Lancaster has a crew of seven men
but it's your job to direct them all. You can
reach them by pressing a key from Q to U,
plus there's an extra status screen to let you
know how well you're doing. If something's
up on one of these screens, the appropriate
letter will flash at the bottom of the screen.
Move quickly or you could find your
mission terminates abruptly - in death.
If you avoid the military and industrial
centres, you should have a safe flight with
only the horizon lights and a few stray spots
passing under the plane. As soon as you
cross into the airspace above an area of military importance, be prepared. There you'll
find the barrage balloons, spotlights, flak
and the deadly ME110s. You've got to be
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half asleep to have trouble with the balloons
- they're big, they're bold and they blow
up, no problem. If your front gunner misses
one, then the rear gunner should pick it off.
Spotlights are pretty visible too - that's half
the point of them. Just make sure you don't
fly directly over one or the ground gunners
will have you for breakfast.
And that just leaves the Messerschmitts.
They're fast and fatal and worst of all they
don't play fair. They're just as likely to
attack from the front as from behind. That's
why you've got to scuttle from screen to
screen as the letters flash. They only lose
points in the realism stakes because they
can't shoot you down - and if you don't
shoot them they just wing their way back
into the clouds. Only if you miss a certain
number do you lose out - one of your
gunners ends up riddled with bullets. Also
they don't really appear very keen to start
close combat scrappin'.
There's a real sense that you're on a night
mission over enemy territory and you may
very well fail. Surprising then that my main
criticism is that the game isn't hard enough.
The flight simulation just isn't accurate -
there's no runway, no take-off and no need
to get back once you've dropped your
bomb.
If you're ever going to make it to a true
Dambuster then you'll have to destroy all
the dams as a Squadron Leader. And that
should keep you fully occupied. The knack is
to keep monitoring each screen, jumping
quickly to those that warn you of imminent
danger. Your run up to the dam must be
precise and controlled but with practice flying a Lancaster will become second nature.
Good luck!
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First, the background. In 1943 the Battle of
Britain had been won but Germany was
very far from being broken. What was
needed was an almighty body blow to her
industrial backbone - the Ruhr Valley. But
how? Bombing one military base or one
factory would be forgotten within a week -
production made up within two. No, this
had to be big - and permanent. So, a daring
plan was devised to destroy the very heart of
all that power - the three dams on the
Moehne, Eder and Sorpe rivers. But a task
like that would require a new type of bomb
- one that would bounce; a new type of
plane - the Lancaster was adapted; and a
new type of man - the Dambusters.
Your prime objective in Dambusters is to
reach the rank of Squadron Leader - and
destroy the three dams. But before you get
close, you'll need to go out on a fair few
practice flights. Fortunately, there are two
skill levels that'll take you to that stage:
Practice and Flight Lieutenant.
The practice flights will help you to perfect your dam runs. It's all a question of
juggling the different roles you have to play.
Is the airspeed correct, are you at the right
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