I was starting to think that AC was dead and then they go and announce a new one returned to all its former glory! After the CODified the series with assault horizon and then did a F2P game with solid gameplay but set in the real world they are going back to Strangereal!

I really hope they put out the PS2 games on PS4 as well.

Is there any actual gameplay yet or just this?

@mike: Just this but I heard that the trailer is real time. Though no confirmation. Still there is enough in this trailer worth getting excited over.

• Its numbered
• some kind of space elevator
• the above suggests strangereal

I played a crazy amount of 6, and liked Assault Horizon but never finished it (PC version has weirdly out of sync dialogue in cutscenes to where it ends before they're done talking and literally like 3 people on the Internet apparently had the issue, so I never found a solution). Never tried the F2P one.

If it's more like 6, I'd probably enjoy it a ton.

Edit: I hope they have the CFA-44. ADMMs are the best.

This is the first time I've ever felt any amount of excitement about virtual reality stuff. The idea of a flight combat game with a working integrated helmet HUD is awesome.

Its funny looking back that Ace Combat 4 was advertised as supporting a Sony made VR headset which either never came out or was stupidly expensive. But I remember being really excited about the VR thing back then reading PS2 magazine articles about it.

Was that a real thing? I have no recollection of a PS2 headset of any kind. Google is no help.

@spoonman671: http://playstationcollecting.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=75&threadid=74177

I really hope this a return to form. Strangereal has been confirmed on twitter so it will be interesting to see what they do going back to that universe. I didn't think the trailer was brilliant but I reckon it was probably put together quickly for a PSVR announcement. I will be more optimistic when I see gameplay. I hope at the very least, with Namco not considering the franchise dead, that we will get the PS2 games on PS4.

@mike: I want that.

Come get me when you have news about the return of the real AC.

Great! I like that franchise quite a bit. I should go back and replay 6.

Will this game feature a song by Puddle of Mudd and if not then why not.

@mike: I knew I was remembering a real thing. Thanks for finding that.

I have no nostalgia for the series, I just randomly decided to play the ps2 games a few months ago and really enjoyed them. They hold up so well that AC 7 is now in my top 3 most anticipated games.

Even if VR fails I'm happy it helped justify one final round of fun space/flight combat games.

Dang it, I told myself I wasn't going to get excited for this...then they teased the Razgriz theme at the beginning of the trailer and I was instantly back on board (I can't help it, AC5 was my first and favorite AC game).

Glad to see that they are going back to the fictional universe so they can do crazy superweapons and stuff like that again. Assault Horizon was alright but I didn't play it near as much as I did the other games in the series. I'll definitely be keeping my eye on this. As crazy as it sounds, AC6 was what pushed me into getting a 360 before getting a PS3, and AC7 might be the nudge I need to pony up and get a PS4.

...I feel like I am probably the only person on the face of the Earth that considers Ace Combat to be a killer app. I don't know what that says about me.

This quickly turned into one of my most anticipated games. It'll probably be more than a year though before we get to play Ace Combat 7, because otherwise they probably would've slapped a "2016" on that trailer. I was a real big fan of Ace Combat 4, 5 and Zero. Six was alright as well but I was sorely disappointed by Assault Horizon. I'm glad they tried out new things, but they didn't pan out in the end.

Fucking hell, this makes me want a new Macross game for current consoles.

Looking forward to this!

I've been hoping for a proper insane follow-up to AC 4-6 for years. This (in addition to the other stuff announced so far) has me pretty firmly on board with PSVR.

I'm ready for 3-mile-long superfortresses and anime megalasers in VR.

Man I used to loooove Ace Combat, some of the best graphics I'd ever seen for a game of its time in AC3 and AC4. Really hope the new installment does the series justice.

Realistic jet fighting just is't for me so I really hope they make this arcade-like to an extent. This could be so much fun on VR. I'm looking forward to seeing how it turns out.

its probably as arcade-like as the series has always been. Its not afterburner but it isnt digital combat simulator either. I would say its exactly half way in between those two.

Kinda makes me want to go back and play 4. I loved that game a great deal.

4 is so great. If I could write well I would write about how great the story is in that game. How do I put it... Its one of the best games to make you feel like you are actually the person you are controlling. Like the screen/controller are a window and interface to a real place that you are participating in. And in the last mission where everyone changes their callsign to mobius, its one of the best moments in a videogame.

@devil240z: Couldn't agree more. I almost feel like the simple and more focused story of 4 (compared to 5 on) really helped put the player in the moment. You were Mobius 1, and things were happening on the ground that reflected the plot, but you were just a fighter pilot doing his job. Separating the story like this makes the missions feel more like, well, missions instead of story beats. You enter the area, complete your objectives, and barring any mission updates, RTB to a carrier or airfield.

There are no conspiracies or double crosses, you just go through every mission decimating the enemy and the campaign progresses. Final mission is really just a clean up operation to deal with the officers that didn't surrender and went crazy with missile launches. It's a great feeling of closure. You clean up and the job is done, Mobius Squadron, heroes do exist, etc. Mobius 1 doesn't know about the story of the kid with the barkeep's daughter, he just fucks shit up and goes home.

Ace Combat 4 is the best (despite my username).

I am so ready for more Ace Combat. I too hope they bring 4 and 5 on ps4.

I just get annoyed when Ace Combat turns too melodramatic with the story lines. They need to get back to making stories where missions are the focus of the story and not interpersonal 'soap opera'.

KEEP IT SIMPLE: This country is attacking this country. This is who you are and why you are at this point in your life...very simply told. These is your mission.

These games should be simple and fun! Cool planes with missions which feel authentic without being a sim. Better modeled cities and landscapes, and interesting challenges in missions that make you feel like a hotshot pilot.

I was very surprised and thrilled to hear that the game is now coming out on the PC and Xbox One as well. The latest trailer nails the look and feel I want out of an Ace Combat game. And this bit should excite all the other Ace Combat 4/5 fans out there.

Ace Combat 7: Skies Unknown also marks the return of Sunao Katabuchi as the lead writer behind the fictional storyline that players will experience in the game. Previously, Sunao Katabuchi wrote the storylines for both Ace Combat 4: Shattered Skies and Ace Combat 5: The Unsung War.

Eurogamer

@galmactual: LOL that is a great summary of AC4.

I like a lot about AC4, particularly the sleek atmosphere that it had compared to AC5/AC0. The intro screen alone with seagulls and that Blue Skies song just sucks you in right off the bat.

But geopolitics is my thing, and AC5 is easily the best plot and gameplay combination I have ever experienced in any video game ever. I can't even get through watching all of the FMVs on youtube without tearing up because of how bloody awesome and epic the story really is. The intrigue beats any Tom Clancy story, gameplay feels more solid than Metal Gear Solid. I don't know why, but I find stories where ships from opposing forces joining together to form a third force to be the greatest of plot devices, and that mission where you have to fight both the Yuktobanian fleet AND the Osean fleet simultaneously was easily one of the best moments in gameplay history IMO; it just says so much about the surrealism and absurdity of real world politics and conflict as well.

I never understood why they never released HD version of AC4, AC5, and AC0 back when they were releasing HD remasters of other big series like MGS or Silent Hill. I would have bought that shit the moment I saw it. Instead they produced that UTTER GARBAGE known as Assault Horizon. I tried replaying it again like a year ago, and I just didn't have it in me to get past the first helicopter mission. It was just that fucking bad.

Another thing that has always appealed to me about Ace Combat is that this is a series that I can only play on Ace difficulty. I can't stand anything easier. Knowing that I can be downed in like one or two hits makes me fly better. There's that mission in AC5 where you are low on ammo and run into the 8492nd; you're supposed to just fly low and avoid them until you fly off the map, except I used to just shitkick them instead.

Oh and did I mention that these games had like the best video game soundtracks ever? I used to have an ipod with all of the soundtracks in my truck. I remember my ex used to bitch about how I would drive too fast when it was foggy on the highway, so I would tell her to shut up and put on the Ace Combat.

@vovin: I get the feeling that whichever game you entered the series at will be your favorite, and the one that is "the way Ace Combat is supposed to be." Mine is 4. Did you start at 5?

After re-reading my comment from a 18 months ago, I feel exactly the same. There is a raw savagery in the way Mobius 1 casually obliterates every adversary in that game. AC5 didn't capture that same arcadey, clear-the-map feel that AC04 had.

I agree about the politics in the game, and would add that the player being a jet pilot fighting a war over political squabbles often literally happening below them is still a great setting.

After watching that E3 trailer, I got hit with that Ace Combat fever hard. Even though it has been years since I've played 4/5/0, the tone and setup they are establishing felt right at home. The only thing I'm wondering if they're going to go with a 'morality' system that 0 kind of had with shooting down extra targets/ejected pilots, seeing as they seem to keep mentioning the whole 'what would you do?' idea.

As far as the other Ace Combat games go, 4 was my first and probably still favorite. I briefly looked up a couple of videos and the tone, style, and sound of the mission briefings and radio chatter still just feels so iconic. With that being said, I don't think they can ever recapture the feeling of being Mobius 1. Just that steady build up and elimination of the Yellow squadron felt so good from a narrative perspective. Mobius 1 and the idea of the lone unstoppable pilot should just live on as legend in the AC universe. If I remember right, 5 even had a couple of one off missions where you played as Mobius 1 with something along the lines of 'This mission is crazy and impossible as shit, not to mention off the record black ops, which is why we called you in'.

All that being said, I think that 5 and 0 setup a much more sustainable tone for the franchise that 7 seems to taking from. Shifting the focus away from the pilot onto the war makes some of those surreal battle scenarios that much more crazy and meaningful. 0, from what I recall, struck a nice between the pilot and the war. While the whole setup was trying to track down the story of the player, it was told through a bunch of secondhand reports of people describing the conflict as it went on. Of course, this is all based on memories from a long time ago so I could be completely wrong about everything. Either way, here's hoping this next game is good.

Cool. I only have The Unsung War on PS2 and Xbox 360's Fires of Liberation and think both are great games. Come to think of it, now that I'm looking it up, there are a lot of them that I didn't play, but like the ones I did, most of them have great soundtracks so I've listened to them all before. I didn't play Assault Horizon since I heard it was going too far into a wrong direction, but I don't know, I could have liked it for what it was maybe. I can believe this game looks as good as it does if it's the real thing, but not sure about that frame rate (though if I remember correctly, The Unsung War was as well). Perhaps! Looks good, though hopefully, they go to a less scripted game than the last big game in the series.

@galmactual: I honestly do not remember if it was AC4 or AC5 that I started with.

In terms of that arcadey-destroy everything on the map feel, I made it a habit to destroy everything possible on every AC5/AC0 mission simply because it was possible lol.

It was AC4 where there was so much going on and optional objectives that I couldn't do everything. AC6 was similar.