Decked out with garish signs and weatherworn workers, the refueling platform looks more like a truck stop than a sophisticated piece of engineering. That is, until I walk to the edge of the platform and see an entire desert planet looming below. There's no time, however, to drink in the view. My comrades need help, so I call in a landing pad drop. A capsule screams in from the sky, smashing into the ground as the landing pad installs itself. I climb atop the pad and hop into a Hawk. The massive mech leaps into the air and, in a flash of whirring metal, transforms into a jet and rockets into the sky - at which point my beautiful flying machine is summarily obliterated by a more skilled pilot.

The setting changes - different planets, different platforms - but I've repeated the above exercise more often than I'd like to admit. I could do something else. I could call down a supply bunker or a tank. I could concentrate on building defenses, dropping down turrets and walls. Starhawk offers those options, but me, I've got to fly.