Emergency: Fighters for Life is the first game in the Emergency series. It was released on July 31, 1998. It contains 30 missions, some of which are based on true events such as the Ramstein airshow disaster. The game is extremely cumbersome by modern standards, lacking such features as a minimap or an indicator of where units enter the scene. Some of this is intentional due to realistic but unwieldy elements, such as command units and long travel times that make fly-cars relatively useful, that were later streamlined away.