System Requirements: Windows 3.1 or higher; 386SX16 or above; 2MB RAM; 4MB hard disk space. Sound and color printing requires an optional sound board and/or color printer.
Where did you learn to fold paper airplanes? The end product usually made a wobbly flight to the front of the class, and you made a trip to the principal's office. Well now you can learn to make better planes, and try them out, all in the relative safety of your own home (and there's nothing old Mrs. Foster can do about it!).
Kitty Hawk's "The Greatest Paper Airplanes" is in the form of a notebook. The install is simple and straightforward, and the notebook format makes the program very simple to use.
This program is not just the down and dirty how to fold lessons you got in the back of the class. The notebook has index tabs, and each section gives history and information accompanied by animation and sound effects.
In the tab marked Flying, the program provides information on basic aerodynamics, and explains why things fly or glide. The Paper tab gives a brief history of paper, and demonstrates some of the folding techniques used in the planes. Now we're ready for the Planes tab, which lets us choose from five styles of planes including Darts, Gliders, Jets, Stealth, and Starship.
It's amazing the variety of planes that Kitty Hawk has come up with, and with 25 models to choose from, there is something for everyone. Each plane is accompanied with a description, which may include flying characteristics, or folding information. The Marlin for example is accompanied by the description "This simple variation of the 'classic' dart is easy to fold and can be thrown very hard, as a 'blackboard bomber' should" (ooh are you gonna' get in trouble?!).
In the Print tab you are given the options of artwork, folding lines, and double side printing. While artwork really adds to the finished product, I did have a small problem with the folding lines. The program uses a page frame which is slightly smaller than a standard 8 1/2" x 11" piece of paper. I found that if I cut the paper to the size of the outline frame, the lines were right on the money. If you don't want to go to this trouble just turn off the folding line option.
Now we're ready to fold along with our computers. The program uses excellent 3D animation to demonstrate the entire folding process. Provided along with the folding animation page is a set of VCR like controls which allow single step or continuous playing of the animation.
Also included in the program is a screen saver which consists of the plane folding animations. I love new and different screen savers, but leaving this one running at your desk will make in painfully obvious who lobbed that beautifully folded Marlin from the back of the conference room.
For those "Peter Pan" types out there like me, who refuse to grow up, The World's Greatest Paper Airplanes needs to be on your desktop P.C. After all, it's a lot easier that hauling your entire comic book collection to work!
Reviewed by Tom Rockhold for NautilusCD December, 1994.
