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Hunter.Requiem's Ace Combat 5: The Unsung War (PS2)
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| [March 6, 2008 04:02:37 AM]
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GAMEPLAY
Now that I'm near the end of the game, things have picked up since my last entry. I've gotten past the hurdles of the early and mid game, and levels are much more a test of my flying skills then my ability to manage my resources to get a plane that would let me dominate a level. The level I started with was an interesting one. I had to fly through a network of radars while remaining undetected. As I flew closer to the ground, the radius of the radar decreased, opening small holes that I could slip though. Sadly, the radar can only been seen on the "radar" screen, leading most of my level to be played as a small red triangle avoiding various sizes of circles. In another level, where I had to shoot down an orbital laser platform, I began to feel that the with the large target on the underside labelled "Laser" and the dodgeable bullets, it almost felt like I was playing a 3D shmup. The other level that really stood out to me was the last level. Though the begining of the level is trivial (simply shoot some ground targets) the most annoying thing about the level is its opening, which takes several minutes. This would not be much of a problem if not for the second stage of the level, which requires the player to fly quickly through a narrow corridor. As mentioned before, the collision detection in this game is a little quirky, and the control scheme tends to fall apart when trying to maneuver through tight corridors. Crashing is common, and to crash sends you all the way to the begining of the level, much to your chagrin.
DESIGN
In general, Ace Combat is one of the few remaining flight simulation series. Its success is attributed to its strong story, realism, and incredible gameplay.
When it comes to realism, Ace Combat does not disapoint. The aircraft's parts move realistically as you fly, missiles behave reletively realistically; even the Prandtl-Glauert singularity can be seen when you hit mach 1 in your fighter. Mission objectives are now much more focused; where AC4 would simply have "Score so many points in this time limit" AC5 chalenges you to protect friends, destroy enemy contingents, break through fortresses, and even fly in formation. With its story, Ace Combat 5 has a number of realistic cutscenes which depict your fighter wing. The many characters have a realistic feel to them, and make you want to get farther into the game. The story's few downsides are, without a doubt, the miserable poetry your wing mates spout during missions. When you're in an intense dogfight, a wingman breaking in to eloquently (and sometimes ineloquently) describe the snowy terrain below really kills the mood. Otherwise, the controls are well thought out, and the camera system, which allows you to follow enemies and missiles, is a joy. The only issue I had with camera was with bombing, as when in 3rd person view, it was often difficult to get the bombing indicator on the target without loosing a good deal of altitude, leading me to either crash on bombing runs, or drop my bombs point blank onto their targets.
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| [March 5, 2008 04:46:03 PM]
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SUMMARY
Ace Combat 5: The Unsung War, is a Fighter simulation game by Namco. The series is well known for its realistic game play and engaging stories. In Ace Combat 5, the player controls "Blaze" a fighter Ace from the country of Osea (which is similar to the United States). Unlike its predecessor, Ace Combat 4: Shattered Skies, The Unsung War has replaced the point system often used as mission objectives in the former game with more focused mission objectives. The game has a very focused and realistic story, following the members of the Wardog (and later Razgriz) squadron that your character is a member of.
When actually playing the game, the player flies a single fighter jet, using the control stick to adjust pitch and roll, while using the R2 and L2 buttons to adjust yaw. With the simple control scheme (offered in the options menu) control is simpler, though advanced maneuvers are not possible. The player's fighter jet can carry an unrealistically large number of missiles and special munitions; late game fighters can carry upwards of 80 basic missiles.
A number of aircraft are available to the player, all based on either actual aircraft used by real-world militaries, or concept aircraft that were designed but never entered production. When engaging air targets, the player must maneuver to where the enemy plane is in front of them, then either lock on with missiles and fire, or close to close range and use its machine gun. Missiles can typically turn sharply about once, and inexperienced players may find themselves missing enemy planes with their missiles at first. Planes also have special weapons, which range from unguided bombs to quick air to air missiles. In Ace Combat 4, many aircraft were equipped with missiles that could easily target multiple enemy aircraft at long range, but in Unsung War, early fighters that specialize in anti-air typically come with SAAMs (long range, single target, easy to miss with) out of the box, making mid-game antifighter combat difficult at times.
GAMEPLAY
I decided to replay through Unsung War on Very hard mode for this game assignment. My missile-launching skills have been getting rusty, and I trashed a number of my missile shots. The most difficult missions, hands down, were those where I had to protect something from attack. This was often a helicopter under attack from fighters, or some sort of structure. At this point, my fighters did not have multi-shot missiles, which made defence difficult because killing the attacking fighters requires damage output that is difficult to get. Interestingly, I've found that using my wingmen is very important, especially because its quite easy to run out of ammunition. Luckily, unlike AC 4, I have infinite machine gun, though hitting with that can be a challenge. On very hard mode, enemies take many missile hits, dodge like crazy, and missile evasion, unlike the easier difficulties, is a challenge. Collision detection is a bit better over AC4; I don't crash into things like telephone wires any more, though its still very, very easy to crash. The ground attack missions were mostly fun: my favourite mission pits you against an entire fleet and later, a gigantic submarine armed with ballistic missiles.
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Hunter.Requiem's Ace Combat 5: The Unsung War (PS2)
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Current Status: Playing
GameLog started on: Wednesday 5 March, 2008
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