B-17 Flying Fortress: The Bloody 100th

Release Date: 2025

Simulation, World War II, planes, elements of strategy, singleplayer

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The third installment in an iconic series of flight simulators originating from 1992. B-17 Flying Fortress: The Bloody 100th tasks us with operating the titular bomber during World War II, taking out targets and treating injured crew members.

Plot
Mechanics
Technical aspects

B-17 Flying Fortress: The Bloody 100th is the third installment in a series of simulation games originating from 1992, set upon the titular bomber. It was co-created by Outerra and MicroProse, the series' publisher, revived in 2019.

Plot

B-17 Flying Fortress: The Bloody 100th is set during World War II. We play as the crew of the B-17 Flying Fortress, a famous bomber used to destroy German bases and cities.

In-game missions are inspired by the titular Bloody 100th, a unit famous and considered cursed for the gigantic losses they suffered during the war.

Mechanics

B-17 Flying Fortress: The Bloody 100th has us playing as one of ten bomber crew members. Players can experience their duties and the events they went through.

The game is divided into missions, each of which begins in the briefing room. After receiving our orders, we must head to the runway, board the plane and take off. Our escort planes then form a squadron to let us reach the target, usually deep within enemy territory, and drop the bombs. Once that's done, we must return to base. Our job's made more complicated by the presence of

hostile intercepting pilots, doing their best to stop us from reaching our objective. Depending on our position, we'll either pilot the bomber while avoiding enemy fire, gun down enemy forces with a mounted machine gun, put out fires, patch up any damage and keep the wounded alive. Once that's done, we're not out of the woods yet, as we must still return to base and land.

The developers chose to emphasize realism, meaning many different levers, switches and displays to pay attention to. We must also manually operate machine guns and prepare bombs to drop.

Over time our crew members become more skilled at their jobs and we acquire new parts for our bomber.