Carrier Deck – PS5 Review

I’ve been on a couple of aircraft carriers in my time. They’re surprisingly intricate spaces with lots of metal corridors, ladders and lifts to bring you up from the lower decks. I’ve never concerned myself with how one is run, though. Every Single Soldier have been prolific with their military sims and now flight deck management is the subject of one. Carrier Deck has been out on PC for years but it’s now made an eventual transition to the Playstation 5. Whilst the game comes across intact, it’s lack of options make for a tricky and less than ideal time.

Carrier Deck tasks you with managing the incoming and outgoing fleet of aircraft at your disposal. The flight deck is where most of your time is spent with the lower deck used for repairs and taking in cargo. Your means of interacting with the deck is a simple cursor which is moved with the left analogue stick. Selecting a vehicle gives you a few assignments to send them out on.

These assignments are colour-coded and correspond with the air, surface and submarine channels which are indicated on the bottom of the screen. You’re effectively giving aircraft a lane to operate in. What you do with these aircraft is defend the ship from threats. This can be done with searches to make them visible from further away. From there you can dispatch fighters to engage the opposition. You also have submarines and warships to combat on a regular basis.

The deck can be very busy. Dispatching planes and helicopters can be a lot easier than receiving them. You’ve got multiple helipads and runways to launch from but only one landing strip. That leads to me checking the entry is clear to allow returning planes to land. Typically, I can’t have them linger on the strip for too long before the next flight comes back in.

Orchestrating these movements feels very deliberate. Very, very little of these operations can be automated. Refuelling is about the only thing I don’t have to think too hard about. It does escalate quickly with a lot of plates being spun to ensure a well run ship. It’s incredibly active and can spiral into trouble if you’re not paying attention.

Enemies come in waves and there doesn’t seem to be much downtime between them. Whilst it does lead to incredibly manic missions, they do feel short. The campaign has a straight-forward structure with only one mission being unlocked at a time. You have some basic objectives to meet but the main concern is typically survival. How well you do is rated in stars and the carrier’s health seems to be the main indicator of what rating you end up with.

As a result, I would sometimes just escape with the bare minimum rather than chase perfection. It does feel like a game where eggs are going to be broken and you just have to live with damage. On the one hand, I admire the game’s pacing. On their own, the tasks given to you are basic and easy to accomplish. When they stack up in a battle, it became a matter of priorities and seeing just how quick I can send units out.

Threats advance at a steady pace but, depending on the radar capabilities of the channel, I might not see them until they’re at the door. Prep work becomes crucial but that can clog the runway when those search planes come back in. Missions will sometimes have craft already active, meaning they will return along with whatever else you decide to dispatch. Progression itself feels very stagnant. The aircraft you start with will ultimately be the armaments throughout the campaign. Outside of the tutorial, no new mechanics are introduced.

The gameplay is pretty hectic and I don’t think the left analogue stick is zippy enough to cover it all. There’s no button shortcuts available and no way to up the movement sensitivity. I’ve also had moments where I’ve simply lost track of the cursor. It can vanish into the ocean background. On PC, I don’t think these issues rear their head much. On console, it’s borders on a liability. As such, management becomes more about acceptable losses and pre-emptively queuing vehicles. That can be done in the campaign as missions operate on a set cycle.

I find presentation to be a little dull. The menus and button layout look like they’re lifted straight from a mobile game which, whilst functional does imply a game that is not aiming hard for depth. There’s the bare minimum in terms of options which means little in customisation. There’s a lot of blue which does match the seafaring but can make things look a little stale.

In gameplay, the carrier is static but it does have a small environment that is decently detailed. I love how calm the water looks, although it does seem no missions take place in rough seas. The interface does a solid job of giving you all the info you need and it’s clear enough to read. Enemy threats are called out as they’re seen and the other announcements are good at letting you hear the status of the ship.

Carrier Deck has been out long enough on PC that I think it’s audience is already found. As a console experience it can feel a little unforgiving and there’s a lack of variety in objectives. That said, the plate-spinning panic of gameplay never really goes away. That kind of pressure is intoxicating and having just a cursor to guide units makes for a very manual experience. I find the presentation to be functional but the menus aren’t easy on the eye. As a game, it’s not brimming with depth but does like to overload you with the simple things.  Unfortunately, that wasn’t enough to hold my attention.