Warhammer 40,000: Dakka Squadron - Flyboyz Edition

Arcadey, but ultimately an underwhelming and sanity testing experience.. Mediocre graphics, menu styles and overall feeling of clunkiness are something that followed my short experience. Simple objectives and enemies definitely didn't help change the feeling much. The game felt dated from the get go, but it's not something I'd give a negative review over, can be chucked up to preference. What I will give a negative review for is the overall audio quality, variety of music and voicelines.. Sure, they're fine on their own, quite Orkish and fitting lore wise. Maybe a tad simple but it's all about dakka and waagh for Orks anyways! What kept grating my ears and chipping away at my sanity was the sheer amount of repetitiveness in them. For each enemy you destroy, every time you take damage, there's a voiceline waiting to be played.. After the 50th time of hearing "Dakka dakka", "Enemy fighta down" or "Got 'em good" (same ones could trigger more than once in a row too) I just couldn't continue playing. You'd think it's a bit of an overstatement but, there's a lot of enemies to kill, trust me.. Music is simple, also very repetitive - became old fast. SFX sounds as if it's played though a bad speaker. Combined together, it's just bad sound design. The gameplay loop is simple, arcadey, but not necessarily bad. I did enjoy the flying controls, clunky as they were, and the agility of the plane. There is something here to be enjoyed, shame it was overshadowed by the awful audio experience.

I'm the target for this: I like Warhammer 40k, I like the Orks in particular, and I wanted to play a flying game. If you're not into at least one of those things then probably give it a miss, but if you are then it's worth picking this up on sale and having ~10 hours of fun (that's how long it took me to complete the game, which included 100% it).

Only negative because I can't turn off the unnecessary camera jerking when pitching or rolling. My eyes and head are killing me now.

Dakka Squadron is a fun arcady flight sim with a few laughs and a few bugs. I enjoyed my time with this Warhammer 40k Ork game, but most sessions were short half hour to one hour bursts. It never hooked me in for a long gamming session. It's really an arena shooter with planes, as there are only 5 maps, but you play threw several missions in each. It also feels much more dated than 2021, it really feels like an mid 2010 console release with all of the rough edges. I had my game crash several times in a few places, one was a LONG boss fight making me play one of my least favorite missions far more times than I would have prefered. Unfortunately the game ends on a cut scene that feels like another mission transition with no real closure, it just felt abrupt. Plus, the games attempt at "replayability" is just having unlocks that require you to finish the game twice....ehh. Also, the controls are a bit weird. I got used to them quickly enough, but as other reviewers have mentioned they work differently than other flying games I've played. I have a lot of criticisms, but I really did enjoy my time with Dakka Squadron. The Ork hummer mostly hits, and the game really is fun despite its faults. WAAAGHHHHHH right? Overall I would give it a 7 out of 10, though I would note the crashes and slightly repetitive nature of the game.

This is a game for Warhammer 40k superfans only. If you aren’t already invested in the lore and the specific charm of the Orks, you’ll likely find the repetitive gameplay and dated technical state hard to justify. However, if you are a fan of the faction, it’s a blast—just make sure you pick it up on sale. Don't pay full price for it.

It's a fun arcade flight shooter. The controls are pretty easy so it's good to pick up and play. The levels run a little long with no checkpoints so you can get far, complete a lot of objectives, lose, then have to start all over again. Plane selection is a little too hidden at first, too. Overall worth the purchase on sale for sure if you like flight combat or 40k Orks.

Fun shoota once ya get used ta all da flyin’. Starts off feelin’ like you’ve been strapped to a rokkit by a mad mek no control, just chaos but once it clicks, it’s brilliant. It’s exactly how I imagine a tru Ork pilot would fly no plan, no finesse, just instinct, speed, and as much dakka as possible. You ain’t glidin’, you’re divin’, boostin’, and sometomes not crashin’. Messy, loud, and an absolute blast.

kamikaze.

Fun simple arcadey experience, a bit too short but fine. split-screen coop would be nice to have for this kind of game. :)

This is honestly a cute little game, but it doesn't feel complete. I'm gonna go over my gripes with the game first, though I have overall decided to recommend the game I want people to know what they're getting into. If it were set as early access or something I could understand the unpolished nature, but there are a few things that really need to be addressed. The main one is mission planning. You will be sent on missions that consist of things like destroying a bunch of structures (traditionally a bombing mission) and then after that be expected to dogfight an ace while still in your bomber. Normally your squadmates would be handling the fighters if you are in a bombing role, but the game's simplistic AI and the fact that you are forced to be the one to engage enemy fighters means the only plane you should ever use is basically the first one you ever get, or possibly the one with rockets if you want a burst damage option, until you get the burna bomber with a shield at which point you basically use that for the rest of the time because you are doing fighter AND bomber missions in the same mission pretty much every time. The way they set these mission objectives to have building destruction and then switches your role to a fighter role means optimally you are not going to be able to use a pure bomber really at all. Fixing this, separating out mission objectives for missions to have fighter missions and bomber missions and have them be more obviously denoted which role you'll be filling in for the mission would make things much smoother. The other big gripe i have with the game is that the fighting area is MUCH too small for each map. You get real tired of hearing "youre goin out of the fighting area boss!" when its being shouted at you 50 times a mission. They need to extend the turn around marker about another 2 seconds to allow space for dogfights and for nice run-ups for bombing runs, and they need to make the AI stay within the same combat area the player is forced into. The horizon fog should be able to stay in the same place too, so the maps shouldn't need much re-working. Not a big change, but it would make the game feel better. There's also what appears to be a memory leak, as after a while the game will just crash out during missions, but it always takes a while to build up to it and the performance gets worse as it goes. There needs to be a number of numerical tweaks, damage numbers, defense numbers, the planes should probably be made a bit less maneuverable as both the player and the AI can exploit it to a ludicrous degree, the AI needs to be programmed a bit better not to run into walls constantly, etc. There's plenty of little gripes too, but not really worth writing even more of an essay on it when there's more major things that need fixing. It's playable, so i'm gonna say feel free to try it if you like orky goodness, but I do want you to be warned that it will frustrate you in a number of ways since for now it isnt a completed, polished game, but i've changed this to a "would recommend" as it is pretty playable and with some fixes it could be 4 or 5 stars worthy.