Ace Combat: Squadron Leader PS2 Review San Francisco CA

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Flight Simulators - One of the oldest video games known to man but still only really retaining its niche market, even more so on consoles. The fact is control pads make for quite possibly the worst control system for the genre and thus up until now they really haven't taken off very well, if you'll excuse the pun. Namco have really done their homework and have gone the hard yards with AC5 as quite frankly this is a game that can turn a non-flight sim fan into a fan overnight, that's how polished, how easy to play, how impressive and just how complete the game feels.

The storyline behind the game may come as a little disappointment to flight sim fans and this is because it's completely fictional. So fictional it doesn't even involve earth, rather another world with countries and land mass quite similar. The world is divided into two areas due to a war which raged for a long time. The world has been at peace for fifteen years now and your character is stationed on the closest airbase to the border and after a sudden attack you must find out what happened and ultimately fight yet another war.

The game is divided into two sections; arcade and campaign. It could be argued that campaign is an arcade game with a storyline but there is much more to the game than flying the planes. As the name implies you will be commanding a squadron of fighters eventually and it is this which differentiates it from other titles. The flying model is extremely well done and suits the console style of play well. You're not going to find a need to switch fifty zillion buttons just to start the engines like Flight Simulator. In fact you can even skip take off and landing if you don't feel like doing it. There's no doubt this is for the action fan and not someone wanting a true sim.

In the campaign game mode you progressively work your way through levels taking out enemy bogies and completing missions. Usually you begin with one task, something major happens and before you know it, you're flying for your life. The one annoying thing about this particular feature is that the game does not save checkpoints; crash at anytime and it's back to the start for you. Considering some of the missions are quite long, this can be enough to give up. The arcade mode is more for those who want quicker goals and quick gameplay. You begin and play through various levels with goals given a time limit for completion. This makes it great for quickplay and extends the longevity of the title. It is not however enough to make the game warrant a purchase if you're not into campaign style play.