Recent reviews by JB-717

If you're going into this game thinking a good ending is to continue surviving in someone elses body indefinitely, all I can say is you've missed the point and themes of this story.

So with that in mind, adjust your expectations accordingly.

So what stimulates me about this game is while Ive already thrown a lot of effort into several timelines and eventually starting world war 4, my honest feeling is this isn't even the midpoint of your AI's story. The impression I get is that avoiding the usual apocalypse ending through the butterfly effect is just the start of another more lengthy agenda for your AI to change the future and conquer other "final dooms" leading up to something bigger.

I don't know how far the dev intends to go with this, but that's just the feeling I got. All those different rocks and temples for different timelines really feel like they're there for a reason. Personally, I like it this way. Because it makes exploring all the possibilities and different timelines actually entertaining seeing how much you can diverge from what you initially started with that first time you became self aware.

Since it's a early access game, yeah, I'm sticking with that assumption. Hoping to see a lot more updates and huge content additions in the future. It's worth it.

Got it on sale but I thoroughly enjoyed it to such an extent I'd say paying full price for it is no shame, studious that make games like this should be rewarded for putting heart and effort like this into it. Genuinely feels like playing a missing gem of a film of the franchise and the gameplay is engaging enough to be worth seeing it through to the end.

Enjoyed carefully customizing Murphy's gun to the point it was overpowered as all hell by the end of the game. And you can get the best ending by simply refusing to let the world beat you down and helping others wherever possible. The story has moments where Murphy is genuinely fighting with inner demons about the past, those segments of the game stood out feeling like I was in a horror game for awhile. Which I liked, made his character feel all the more real especially when you can choose to overcome them.

This game definetely reminds of Muv Luv just with it's own twist on a more serious geopolitical spin. I like it a lot, but the EDF games spoiled me with like, over 100 missions per campaign. So for me the 27 missions (plus dlc content) to the campaign, while I enjoyed them, left me wanting more. I think a really satisfying campaign would take us to around EDF levels of over 80 missions or so. Something to justify all my grinding and many, many different situations to test out my mech loadouts with. Also lots more story and diary entries.

My one complaint with the dlc was the diary entries felt too short compared to base game. I like hearing how the world is doing and what's going on between NATO and the Coalition, how people are adapting etc. The EDF games kinda did this with little radio broadcasts giving updates during the missions, which added a lot to the background story and made your missions feel more alive, what you were doing more meaningful.

No idea if the dev will ever see this review but hopefully he does by some chance. He seems to be doing a really good job listening to the community so far and this here is like, my biggest issue with the game is expanding the campaign and lore. Besides all that, it's a fun game and scratches that mech vs horrid monsters overruning the world itch.

While I enjoy tinkering with tanks in this dlc like I do ships from man the guns, there's a inherit problem that really just castrates my ability to enjoy the game. The game suddenly goes into really, really slow lag right when you hit about 1942, I'm talking going from times 5 speed to literally times 1 speed. You can be at times 5, it'll run at times 1 and ignore what it's supposed to be.

This was with World War II in full gear, just with some factional differences. Europe was split into war, Japan and China, Soviets against the Allies etc. With the world at war, the game just can't handle it anymore with all the mechanics paradox added.

So for me, this means I have to knock out some major powers before 1941 if I wanna try and minimize or even stop that lag from happening. I can't just, roleplay and sit through world war II without the game literally coming to a crawl. I have high grade specs for a CPU and Graphics card along with RAM, so I know it's not that causing this. The game wasn't this laggy in previous dlcs. I dunno what Paradox was thinking releasing this sorta mechanic when it causes this sort of slowdown for so many people but if they don't fix it it's gonna ruin the game for a lotta people especially in multiplayer. So I can't really recommend this dlc until these problems are addressed.

Also as a last thing that bothers me, I dunno why the devs gave Stalin all those buffs like "Father of nations" etc, but if you ask me it's pretty unfair how Stalin gets all these big juicy leader buffs and yet other major world leaders of the time can't even compare with their own buffs to their countries. Unless the devs are Comintern simps, they should seriously consider revisiting things they did if they don't wanna leave out Axis and Allies fans.

It's absolutely fantastic.

Ive completed the campaign mode and went into it straight away onto hard difficulty. Which if you were to ask me, is good for immersion if you decide to play this on the maximum difficulty you can before getting Ace difficulty at the end of the campaign. My only experience with Ace Combat aside from exploring it's lore is my first ever ace combat game back on xbox when I played Fires of Liberation. For me this franchise has a knack for making stories that you'll love getting embroiled in and going from start to finish seeing them through. So the writers and artists deserve their due credit.

There will be finer points you can read into as you listen to the story during the campaign. As you see and learn about the characters and their views on life it can teach you some things. The spice of life in between even during actual missions as you listen to chatter can also warm your heart. Minor characters and supporting have their quirks, even nameless soldiers. You feel like you're actually working with real people as you battle during missions and can feel a genuine sense of gladness you aided them during combat. Now given this franchise is native to Japan you'll have to decide if you want to hear that dialogue in English or Japanese voices, if you go with the latter than English subtitles are your go to option if you're willing to sacrifice attention during flight to read. Whatever your choice, best of luck.

As for gameplay, I will compare a bit to the previous Ace Combat 6 to give you an idea of some things that've changed in this installment.

I'll talk about weather first. Clouds never troubled missile lock before nor iced up your jet and put your systems on the fritz, they do now in this installment. There's also weather that influences gameplay during the campaign including everything from lightning storms, sandstorms, thick overcast and even fog/mist that you're at times left no choice by the mission to fly through unless you desire to be an easy target or alert the enemy therefore foiling the plan. This mixes up missions and keeps them engaging because you can use this weather to your advantage but if you're not careful and don't respect nature it can just as easily make your day even harder. For example, you can hide in clouds when against a superior enemy force or being trailed by several missiles. The interference from the clouds will throw off their guidance and make it easier for you to evade especially if you're already near pushed to your limit. The catch is if you're there too long you'll ice up your jet and sabotage it's own ability to fight and function. With that in mind try and learn what you can and see in what ways you can use weather to your temporary advantage.

I don't know about you or your style of flying but for me I rarely ever used my machine guns in Fires of Liberation. I did play Assault Horizon and disliked how they forced you into it several times to advance to the next segment or beat a mission with Assault mode. I like Skies Unknown because here I actually encountered situations that using it felt not only more effective but tactical to conserve the rest of my ammo for something more pressing later. I encountered many situations like that during the missions where I found myself actually seeing good cause to resort to my guns whether to save ammo or because I felt it more efficient. Ammo is also now LIMITED for guns, where as in Fires of Liberation it was infinite. Which adds in another aspect that you can't just doggedly rely on your guns and lack skill wasting hundreds of rounds on a single target. This is especially enforced on some missions as resupply is simply not possible. Overall the way they're implemented now encourages players to both use and practice with their guns instead of ignoring or being lazy with them. I like it.

Another thing I really enjoyed with gameplay now is the new unlock/parts system for aircraft. You can unlock parts of many kinds from better rudders to deicing systems to even gun targeting systems. If you find your default primary missiles are lacking during gameplay you can unlock part upgrades for them improving aspects of them. Like one upgrade for missiles improves reload time, another speed so they close on targets more efficiently. There's even upgrades for the guns like this if you prefer guns over missiles. Upgrades for overall aircraft performance also exist such as for speed, agility, defense, etc. Perhaps you have a certain aircraft you're stuck using or only want to use and it's not performing the way you'd like in some areas. For some missions this is quite valuable as this means you can tweak your craft just for that mission. With that in mind, you'll enjoy tinkering and balancing aircraft parts quite a lot for what you want out of your craft before it sorties.

Now this part takes in mind the unlock/parts system above if you really wanna make what I'm about to say seem not balls to the wall insane. You start the first missions of the campaign getting the F-104 and Mig-21 unlocked with all their weapon types available at the get go. Here's the catch, they're antique aircraft whom are outperformed by virtually every other aircraft on the tech tree in some form if not entirely. If you want to challenge yourself for the sake of the meme. You can play every single mission of the game using one of these antiques. With their limited ammo reserves compared to virtually all the late tier aircraft, and limited special weapon options for a sortie. Unless you're like a Halo fan whom enjoys playing campaign on legendary LASO, this sounds like something a dumbass would attempt. More so doing so only in cockpit mode and restarting the entire mission everytime you get your ticket punched. Some like to live the meme tho.

As for anything to do with stability, graphics, and sound. I enjoyed the soundtrack very much in Skies Unknown just like I did in Fires of Liberation. Fires of Liberation's soundtrack as a masterpiece and I'd highly recommend that just because you can't play the game on steam doesn't mean you shouldn't go check it out on youtube right now. Skies Unknown's soundtrack keeps you engaged in the story and gameplay and manages it's own tracks that compete with if not entirely surpass Fires of Liberation. The graphics quality in Skies Unknown is as time would expect, superior to Fires of Liberation, jets and environments are crisper as is lights and horizons. Very screenshot friendly if you want to have exceptional shots of jets and places you like in game or if you wanna just remember a moment. As for stability I only had one single crash the entire time I played this game so far and I couldn't pin exactly what it was but I didn't encounter it again after restarting. Given Ive gotten through the entire campaign with only that one incident I'd say this game is very stable.

Well that's the bulk of my review.

All that said Ive yet to dance in multiplayer mode but may try it sometime in the future. Ive yet to touch the dlcs either but even without them the base game itself is worth getting especially if it's on sale which is a genuine steal if you were to ask me. I highly recommend this game so if you're an aircraft enthusiast, ace combat fan, storymode observer etc than Skies Unknown is I'd say a very good choice for you to bide your time with. It's games like this that breathe life into me as a person and I'm sure for many others as well. It will uplift your spirit, bring out creativity, and teach you some things about people and aircraft as well. Have a good one and may you enjoy your day with this game in your library if you've haven't already.