Oh, Ace Combat 6: Fires of Liberation, where do I start? I guess I’ll start by saying this: I’ve never been a fan of flight simulators or flying games in general so picking this game up and playing it wasn’t something I had much interest in, but I’m glad I did. I would say Namco did something right with this title, as they should have, considering they’ve had six previous games to get it that way.
The story is simple enough, a war between the Emmerians and the Estovakians starts when the Estovakians attack the capital city of Emmeria . It follows several different people, on both sides of the war, giving glimpses of their wartime lives via cutscenes between missions. The cutscenes are utterly gorgeous, especially considering the game has a few years on it. The gameplay and story progression don’t really have anything to do with each other, I found a bit odd at first, at the same time I understand why they split it up how they did. Some of the story is heart wrenching, featuring a mother who’s lost both her husband and child. Then there’s a portion of the story that makes you /facepalm at the greed and stupidity of the characters, a tank squad who decided to raid a vault for some easy money and loot while everyone else is distracted with the war. Your character is faceless and nameless, being called Talisman, or your call sign Garuda 1, the entire game.
The story is simple enough, a war between the Emmerians and the Estovakians starts when the Estovakians attack the capital city of Emmeria . It follows several different people, on both sides of the war, giving glimpses of their wartime lives via cutscenes between missions. The cutscenes are utterly gorgeous, especially considering the game has a few years on it. The gameplay and story progression don’t really have anything to do with each other, I found a bit odd at first, at the same time I understand why they split it up how they did. Some of the story is heart wrenching, featuring a mother who’s lost both her husband and child. Then there’s a portion of the story that makes you /facepalm at the greed and stupidity of the characters, a tank squad who decided to raid a vault for some easy money and loot while everyone else is distracted with the war. Your character is faceless and nameless, being called Talisman, or your call sign Garuda 1, the entire game.
The controls are fairly standard flight, pitch, roll, and yaw. They’re laid out well on the controller, roll and pitch being controlled by the left thumb stick and Yaw being controlled by the shoulder bumpers. It all feels fairly natural once you’re in the air. I did enjoy the option to switch to the “Novice” setting, allowing you to turn the plane by moving the thumb stick left and right, instead of rolling, at the cost of maneuverability. While I didn’t have any trouble with the standard setup, once I got into the game a bit I switched over to the Novice setting because I prefer that type of movement unless I’m using a flight stick and throttle. Once you learn the HUD, and controls, even the longest missions seem to fly by.
The gameplay is fast and, at times, frantic with several enemies around at once. You’ll quickly find yourself feeling like you’re the only one actually accomplishing anything and, unless you order your wingman or allies to attack; you will be doing the majority of the heavy lifting. Making use of your allied support when it’s available proves invaluable in those missions that have several primary targets and objectives to deal with. Warnings and orders chime in over the radio constantly in battle and when you have a new objective, or when another squad needs support. There is also a good bit of battle-field banter that flows naturally during your missions. I found it a lot easier to keep track of the radio broadcasts with the subtitles enabled. For once the subtitles didn’t get in the way of anything on screen they appear in a neutral location at the top of the screen.
The game its self is beautiful graphically. The jets look as real as they can. The desert environments, water, and explosions all look great, especially in HD. The cityscapes, however, take away from this when you fly close to the ground. The game only draws taller buildings and targets in three dimensions with the rest of the city suffering from what I call the Google Earth effect, only drawn properly when looking directly down at them and becoming mush when you view them at any other angle.
My only major complaint about the game was the length; it was only 15 missions. Granted, some of those missions are fairly long, with up to six objectives to complete, but 15 missions seemed a bit short in my opinion. Since you can burn through them in less than 10 hours if you keep yourself intact, replaying the missions, or taking the game online is your only option for continued action. Once the game was over, I wanted to keep playing, which is a good thing. A lot of the replay value comes from running through those missions again in different ways to see how things play out when you take on an entirely different angle of attack. There are also several planes and weapon load-outs waiting to be purchased after you’ve given it the initial run through, with achievements to match.
Overall I enjoyed this game immensely. Having played this installment in the series, I eagerly await the release of seven. I’m also considering tracking down a backward compatible PS3 just so I can play the first 5 games in the series, which were PSone and PS2 exclusive.
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