ACE COMBAT 7: SKIES UNKNOWN
Lock onto a good time online
Things are buzzing, warning lights are flashing, and the game’s squawking “missile!” at me like a drunk trying to catch my attention at the bus stop – “Mate, mate, MATE!” it may as well be shrieking. After my shiny F-14 explodes into fiery pieces the camera spins to a view of my killer, his plane dancing in delight at my demise. Few games rub your face in defeat with quite the same shameless glee as Ace Combat 7.
While the offline campaign can occasionally feel sterile as you target abstract shapes on the horizon in pursuit of a mission goal that can feel just as distant, online neither is the case. Streamlining its core ideas into two game modes, Team Deathmatch and Battle Royal, Ace Combat 7 manages to actually be everything you wanted in a jet-fighter combat sim. Against weaving and winding human players the sky comes alive within seconds of firing off your first missiles.
If a mere two game modes sounds limiting, it’s really not, because each demands a different mindset. Team Deathmatch is, as you’d expect, taut 4v4 or 2v2 tussles high above the islands and canyons of the game’s exotic locales. Working with your teammates, the game’s hit-and-miss matchmaking (often you’ll be playing with pilots in far more powerful planes packing better weapon loadouts) evens out a
BATTLE ROYAL IS THE MODE TO LOVE – WHEN IT CLICKS, IT’S WITH A SONIC BOOM OF ENJOYMENT.
little. In Battle Royal, which revels in eight-player all-for-one dogfights, the gloves are off and those high-ranked players will easily take you out, often from distance before you’ve had a chance to spiral away from a missile. When the matchmaking works, however, Battle Royal is the mode to love – when it clicks, it does so with a sonic boom of enjoyment as everyone crowds together into a cloud of heavy metal chaos. The clinical fire-and-forget of the solo campaign is long forgotten.
With in-game points converted to MRP you’ll soon be raking through the Plane Tree to unlock multiplayer-specific aircraft, weapons, and performance enhancements – think the aerial equivalent to Call Of Duty’s Perks. While there is a steep curve, and you will grit your teeth as yet another overpowered rival blows you out the sky, with patience the wins will come.
VERDICT
Better online than off, Ace Combat 7 delivers the high-flying dogfights the series has always promised. Just stick through the tough starting-out period. Aces high, indeed. Ian Dean