The Indian Air Force's sequel to its 3D combat video game releases tomorrow

Guardians of the Skies is the IAF's way of encouraging young people in the country to sign up. The game is expected to be downloaded 5 million times by the end of next year.

The Indian Air Force will launch a sequel to a popular video game it released a in July. Dubbed 'Guardians of the Skies', it will be released on Android, iOS and Windows Phone devices tomorrow. The 3D mobile air combat game puts players into a simulated world where they become IAF pilots and battle it out with a fictitious country called Zaruzia.

Once you go through flight training, you can engage engage in combat missions in various aircraft types of the IAF fighters, transport and helicopter fleet.

The first part of the game with the two teaser missions was released in July this year in a bid to attract young people to pursue a career in the Air Force. The game received an enthusiastic response from gamers in the age group of 15-25 years, and has been acclaimed for its realistic graphics and game play. It won an award from Microsoft for being the 'Best Indian Game' on its Windows app store.

With over a million downloads till date, this release features ten combat missions, and is expected be downloaded more than 5 million times by the end of next year.

'This will effectively mean reaching out to millions of individuals and engaging them with snippets of operational life in the IAF as a combat pilot and motivate them to pursue a challenging and exciting career in the Indian Air Force,' an official statement said.

Many of the missions featured in the game will be seen for the first time on a mobile based game anywhere in the world. The game will also have a multiplayer feature in which players will be able to carry out simulated combat against each other using their mobiles and WiFi network.