"kick the Tires and Light the Fires"
Now, I was never cool enough to have a PS", so I missed out on all the previous incarnations when they switched platforms. So for this to be released on the 360 was excellent for me.
The basic premises of the game, is you're a fighter pilot trying to retake your country that has been invaded. By using many different real world jet aircraft. An edition to the AC series is a multiple choice operations, meaning a mission can be completed in a very free form manner.
Now the game play. Fast and exciting is the only way to some it up. As you tear through enemy squadrons at mach 2 firing mini guns a missiles at anything that presents itself as a target. Tanks and ships firing anti aircraft guns at you and explosions everywhere. It can at points get confusing as to much is going on. I feel that speed is very well incorporated into this game say compared to Over G, in which aircraft didn't feel very fast. But on this you can really kick in the burners and scream towards enemies.
Graphics are superb. The Aircraft in which there are 15 overall, all modelled expertly. So if you are a plane buff (like myself) you will relish gunning down F-4s in F-16s and Tornado's. The ground looks amazing from altitude but as you drop to the deck it can be slightly blurry, but still pretty good considering the amount of other things going on around you. The aircraft are the real stars of the game though. The amount of detail put into them is enormous. Even the air intake fans spinning inside the air intakes, all the little details add up.
The audio quality is also top notch. The aircraft engines are loud. Pilot's radio chatter is also very believable. But the dialogue during the cutsceanes is very ace combat, bearing no particular reason to what's going on. The new orchestral soundtrack also gets the blood pumping.
The story is possibly the most pointless story ever. For some reason a small girl called "matilda???" was separated from her mother at the start of the war. And for some reason we have to follow the mother on her journey to find her. Now none of this has any relevance to what you are doing in the air. So only ever watch them once, then for comical value afterwards. Otherwise its very basic shoot the other people, go yay when you win.
Multiplayer is covered very well with basic team and free for all death match. Then there is siege; where to opposing teams have to destroy objectives in order to win. Though the only real downside is the learning curve is very steep. YOU will die on your first match. But when you get used to it, you can pretend you are Maverick.
The only thing that really annoyed me was the usage of the apparent catchphrase, insult and propaganda line "dance with the angels." The continued use of this drove me mad at points. Were its use made no impact to the conversation. It really hit a low when a captured pilot insults and enemy pilot with it. WTF, that's like the most pathetic thing ever. He should have done something cool, like Arnie, pin him to a wall and say stick around and run off, find and m-60 and shoot anything that moves. Not some pathetic little name???
Besides that the game is overall excellent and was worth the 5 years of waiting. See you in the sky