Over G Fighters is the first flight combat game to make its way to the Xbox 360 and, unfortunately, it doesn't do the best job of heralding in the genre.

Graphically, the game doesn't seem to be that much better than something you would find on a PS2 or original Xbox. Textures on the jets and boats look nice but, for the most part, are just way too bland and generic to keep your eyes interested. Everything is too clean as if they all just rolled off the assembly line, as opposed to taking part in various battles.

Between-mission story events have a nice look with static images of generals and politicians explaining what the next location will be and what your objectives are, but the voice-overs feel very phoned in.

Engine sounds, like the textures, are generic and though you will fly in everything from F-16's to Stealth Bombers, there doesn't seem to be much audible difference between the various aircrafts.

Over G Fighters's missions are pretty straightforward. Protect this group, invade enemy territory and destroy all the opposing fighters, do recon, etc. If you've played any other flight combat game, then you know what to expect out of this one.

Where Over G doesn't appeal to my personal tastes is that the game is a little less arcade-like than I would have liked. There were several times when I just wanted to jump into a dog fight, take down some enemies and leave the game. Instead, the game's two modes, Scenario and Challenge, either require a lot of setup, take a lot of time to finish or both.

Scenario Mode takes you across the world going from country to country taking out targets, while protecting your wingmen and other allies. The steps to get into a mission involve not only listening to briefings from the aforementioned generals and politicians, but also selecting your craft and selecting the various guns and missiles that your plane will launch with.

Challenge Mode has two categories, Arena and Strike. Arena Mode is essentially a survival mode where you and your friends take out as many enemies as you can before you either crash or get taken out. Strike Mode lets you design the scenario on your own and select everything from your aircraft, weapons, wingmen, types of enemies and their altitudes and positions. Again, not really something you can just jump into.

In the end, Over G Fighters feels a lot more like a blend between a flight sim and a flight combat game. There were too many technical aspects to the actual flight aspect to make it more than just a combat game and the missions were more than what you would find in a sim game.

Over G Fighters's missions start off fairly easy and gradually get harder as you progress through the game. It has a fairly good, even difficult gradient and, with a few exceptions, never really has any unexpectedly hard missions.

That's the case for the missions anyway. Flying the planes themselves is another case. I found myself fighting with the aircraft more than the enemies and became more annoyed with the number of details I had to juggle in order to take off and land the plane.

As I said above, Over G Fighters feels a lot more like a flight simulator than a combat game. And I don't know if it was me, the 360's controller, or whether a flight simulator has any business being controlled with something other than a flight stick -- but never got comfortable controlling my craft. Every time I wanted to climb, I would lose altitude, if I wanted to bank right, it was either too quickly or not fast enough to keep the bogey in my sights.

I had hoped that I would fall into a groove and the setup would become more comfortable as I progressed in the game, but alas, that never happened and, again as I said above, I found myself more annoyed with my plane rather than the other ships.

Over G Fighters is a good technical game, and fans of simulators will probably like it. But those same fans would also probably prefer to have a joystick rather than a gamepad. Maybe if/when one comes out for the 360, Over G Fighters will have a better feel to it, but as it is now there are more cons than pros.