15-Aug-2001 Take to the skies in this ace sequel Not content with mastering the fighting and driving genres, Namco takes to the skies once more with this Air Combat follow-up. There are now 30 missions as opposed to the original's 16 but the premise of the game remains the same: Fly missions for money, then use the money to buy planes. This time, however, the missions are more complex and they get progressively tougher throughout.The missions take place as part of a large military campaign following a coup d'etat. As part of the special strikeforce 'Scarface', it's up to the player to help vanquish the enemy and free the country. To complete each mission there are a number of primary targets to destroy, including installations, such as radar sites, and vehicles, such as planes, tanks and ships. All missions start with the plane almost at the target area, getting straight into the action. Targeting is just a matter of getting in range and waiting for the firing tone before firing your missiles. If the missiles run out a machine gun with infinite ammo is available for close-up kills.Since most targets will be destroyed from a great distance, the main eye candy comes from the scenery. There are a lot of different terrain types, from arctic to desert as well as sea levels, and for the amount of ground detail the game moves incredibly quickly. Flying through a city at night has to be the graphical pinnacle of the game and squeezing between two buildings while flying at a high speed is also a great thrill, especially if you can survive it! Air Combat 2 offers a wide variety of challenging missions for budding pilots. Some levels require the plane to be landed on an aircraft carrier. One forces the player to stay below 600 feet in order to avoid radar detection, another, there's a power station which can't be blown up until a certain time, and then it's only vulnerable for 90 seconds. The game is structured so that players choose mission paths, some of which are only available with a selection of the available planes. This goes some way to addressing the brevity of play that plagued Air Combat.
Air Combat was a game attempt at an arcade jet shoot 'em up, and the sequel takes all of the good elements and fixes some of the weaknesses - namely the simplicity of the missions and the ease with which it could be completed. The amazing maneouvrability of the jet is coupled with some spectacular graphics and missions that really make the most of them, flying through cityscapes and into the heart of nuclear reactors. Stirring stuff from Namco.
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