Ace Combat has always been a bit of a strange series to explain. Look at a screenshot and you might think you’re dealing with a serious flight simulator, but once you actually start playing, things become a lot more explosive. You’re flying a fighter jet at ridiculous speeds, locking missiles onto enemies and pulling turns that probably wouldn’t make your pilot very happy in real life. That doesn’t mean it’s easy though, and after around twenty minutes with Ace Combat 8: Wings of Theve at Gamescom, I was quickly reminded of that.
I got to play Mission 4, The Fall of the Numbered Fleets, where my main job was to attack enemy fleets stationed around Newfield Island. It was a pretty straightforward introduction to Ace Combat 8, but that was enough for me. Give me a fighter jet, plenty of targets and some missiles and I’m happy.
Not quite a flight simulator
If you’ve never played Ace Combat before, don’t be scared by all those buttons inside the cockpit. This isn’t Microsoft Flight Simulator. Ace Combat wants you to feel like a fighter pilot without asking you to study for one. That doesn’t mean you can simply point your nose towards a target and press fire either. During my mission, I had to fly low towards the harbor, lock onto different ships and make sure I didn’t stay in one place for too long. Enemy missiles were constantly something I had to keep an eye on, while other aircraft could join the fight as well.
Most of my time was spent attacking the ships below. Flying towards the harbor, locking onto a target, firing my missiles and immediately pulling up before I got too close was a lot of fun. I could then turn around, line myself up again and go for the next target. The harbor itself has plenty of structures around it, so flying low also means you actually need to pay attention to where you’re going. There is some freedom in how you handle the mission too. The enemy fleet is spread across different parts of the island and there’s an airbase nearby. Taking out enemy aircraft before they can properly join the fight is one option, while an aircraft equipped for air-to-ground combat can make destroying the ships a lot easier. I didn’t have enough time to experiment with all those possibilities a lot, but even my straightforward approach kept me busy.
Ace Combat looks bloody good
That being said, something else immediately caught my attention: the sky. Ace Combat 8 looks fantastic. The aircraft are obviously very detailed, but it’s the combination of clouds, lighting and the enormous distances around you that really sells the idea that you’re flying high above an actual battlefield. Bandai Namco is using Unreal Engine 5 together with its own Cloudly technology for the clouds, and they aren’t simply pretty backgrounds either. The volumetric clouds can react to things happening around them, including explosions. During Mission 4, I spent more time closer to the ground because of all the ships I needed to destroy, but even there the scale was impressive. Flying towards the harbor at high speed before pulling away again looked great, especially when missiles, explosions and other aircraft started filling the screen.
The game also ran very smoothly during my session. With something moving this quickly, that’s obviously important. I never felt like I was fighting the controls while trying to line up another target, and it didn’t take long before I was flying around without thinking too much about which button I needed.
Twenty minutes went by quickly
There really isn’t much more I can say after playing one mission for around twenty minutes. I didn’t see enough of the story, other mission types or aircraft to start making big claims about Ace Combat 8. What I played was simply a lot of fun. Mission 4 gave me ships to destroy, fighters to deal with and a large harbor to fly around while trying not to crash into anything. It looked great, played smoothly and had that typical Ace Combat mix where everything looks serious until you realise you’re firing another missile while turning your fighter jet around at a completely ridiculous angle.