The thrill of shooting down A LOT of targets is fun, but it might get bored after a while. Dynasty Warrior in the Air!
Gameplay wise Heatseeker has done a not bad job. There are really A LOT of targets for you to shoot in every missions, and considering you have unlimited ammos for both guns and missiles, over 100 kills in a mission is nothing surprising at all. I personally love the speed feeling in Heatseeker, the developer had done a great job at developing the feel of high speed flying. Game controls are well done. It has a few different controller mapping for you to choose so either you are an seasoned Ace Combat player or a new comer to arcade simulation game, it will be very easy to pick up the controls. By the way my friend has Heatseeker's Wii version, I have tried it and the control is horriable
For seasoned Ace Combat player, Heatseeker will be a very easy games, and it won't be too bad for new players either. The unlimited ammo is one reason. Also the standard missiles are very good at tracking its target. Unless the bandit is using counter-measure or you fire at an extremely bad angle, the missile will very likely to hit its target. Moreover you don't really need to do any fancy flying to dodge the missiles, because as long as you are able to hit the "reaction buttons" on time you will dodge the missiles 100%, and it will not take you that long to get use to hit those buttons while still flying straight to you original target. One more thing makes this game easier is the check point system. That is right if your are shot down you can restart from the check point instead of the beginning of the mission. One thing I really don't like about Heatseeker is enemy's AI, first of all they are not that smart at all, and enemy Ace are not any smarter either, they just can take more damage before they are finally downed. Later in the game the missions get harder simply because the developer just dump hordes and hordes of enemy at you, and sadly their AI don't feel any better than the rookies you fought in the first missions. By the way I think your wingman actually do contribute something in Heatseeker though.
The story was not very impressive at all, and every mission is kind of similar to each others. Basically you are just trying to shoot down as much ting as you can in every mission, so it might bored after you have played it for a while, but don't worry because it won't take you very long to beat the game anyways.
Graphic is kind of cartoony in my opinion because of the very bright color, and I admit that the graphic was not as beautiful as Ace Combat series, but it is not terribly bad. I think the explosions are very nicely done though. Also damaged targets will trailing smoke which I think is really neat.
Sound effects and music is okay nothing special, but I hate Heatseeker's radio chatter (I loved the radio chatter in Ace Combat but that might just be me), Your commander just can't stop yapping at you. "Downtown (your call sign in the game)! shoot that plane down!" "Downtown! get here and protect our fleet!" "Downtown!!! intercept the incoming missiles!!!"....etc. Basically he just ask you to do everything for him and it feels really annoying after a while, and I really want to shoot a missile at the tower of our own carrier to shut him up.
There are quite a lot of planes to unlock in this game, and the weapon packs are kind of fun to play with. So Heatseeker can still last you a while after you beat the story mode
Overall Heatseeker is an okay arcade simulation game. If you just simply want to shoot a lot of stuff and rule the sky, yes go get this game. (Imaging playing Dynasty Warrior in an airplane) But if you are looking for a game that has the same depth with Ace Combat then you will probably get disappointed. It is still an okay game to kill some time out though. The thrill of shooting enemy down is always appreciated!