Suggestions for Ace Combat 7

As you may or may not know, I am a fan of Ace Combat. I've played about every entry into the franchise since I first saw 3 in a store window in New York City as a kid. With 7 on the horizon, I can't help but think of what it has in store for the franchise next.


Every game system has a title or a few that drive people to adopt that system. It's the blockbuster that drives folks to the store to get their hands on it as soon as the system comes out, and the game you're often most looking forward to playing. For me, Ace Combat was that title. I fell in love with 3 immediately, even though when I first got my hands on it I had no idea what it would be like or if I'd even like it.

If you pop over to the Ace Combat wikia, Acepedia, you will see that there are discussions already under way regarding what an Ace Combat 7 will feature, and wishlists of what should be in those games. These are usually in good fun, daydreams from fans about how to craft the game they'd like to see. Sometimes folks tend to get a bit too impatient and heated about ideas they'd like to see. nevertheless, I thought I'd avoid over populating the forum pages there and list my own wishlist in my blog here.

Now, my vision of how to go about such a wishlist is a little different. I think pegging the goals to what is actually feasible and reasonable makes the most sense. There is little point in making a wishlist for things that can never be, or that can't work, or that the team behind the game can't make happen for various reasons. Asking for a Call of Duty level production is improbable due to the financial aspects that made the existence of this game doubtful for so long. Asking for real-to-life plane physics is against the fact that this is an arcade-style fighter game, not a simulator. So, with that, here's my Ace Combat 7 feature wishlist.

Friendly Fire

Here’s how it would work; you drop a bomb, there is a risk of it doing to an allied unit or structure ~85% of the damage that it would do to an enemy. This would mean that gameplay-wise the player would have to be careful of using weapons like the FAEB, UGB, RKTL, SFFS, or SOD when allies are in close proximity to the targets. There would be an assumption of the accuracy of guided weapons like the LAGM, LASM, or GPB, thus no collateral damage or fratricide if it is launched, guided, to a target close to an ally.

For air targets, the ability to shoot with the plane’s gun or when “air bombing” as is frequently done against flying fortresses, or use of all-range weapons like the TLS, ELM, MPBM, or LSWM will also pose a threat to allied aircraft. Guns, the TLS, and ELM will do the same kind of damage as they would to enemies (given it’d be fairly deliberate to strike an allied plane with these three weapons) while the MPBM and LSWM will do damage similar to the previously noted level for ground targets and weapons.

Re-Deploy

A hallmark of past AC games has been the return line. In 6 there was the added twist that during some missions if you took control of the area around an airfield you could land at that airfield and resupply or repair your plane. I propose a return to this old system, but with a tweak.

When you start a mission, you can select two “load outs” to take into a mission. The first will be the plane you start the mission with, equipped however you chose. The second will be your “backup” – another plane of your choice, or even the same plane, but with a different set of parts and/or SPWs. If you use the return line, you have the option of repairing and resupplying your plane or switching to your backup plane, both options with a time penalty (which would have the potential of effecting your mission score). If you use an airfield on the mission map, the only option will be to resupply/repair your plane, again with a time penalty that may affect mission score. There will be a limit on when you can use a return line/F.O.B, something like not within the first or 2-5 minutes of the mission.

Emblem Effects

Taking the idea of the emblem effects from Infinity and combining them with the datalink effects, emblems will have a suite of effects similar to the way datalink works in Infinity. However, these effects will be persistent to the aircraft the emblem is one for the duration of the mission (i.e, no delay start at the beginning of the mission, or need to maintain proximity to linked allies). Emblems will carry 1-3 effects total, including some of the special effects like different colored smoke trails for missiles.

Creating Emblems and paint schemes

The emblem creator should be relatively straight forward. They should use somewhat general elements (shapes, numbers, letter presets) and allow layering for creation, similar to using Photoshop or other similar image editing software. Each layered element or layer itself should have the full availability of the RGB color spectrum. Furthermore, when creating emblems, you will have the option of adding up to three effects. To support the unlocking and use of official emblems, the power of these effects will be lessened from their official counterparts (ex., increased homing for the official emblem has better homing than the player original).

I would advise against the idea of a system for uploading emblem creations. I know a system like this has been used in other game series in the past (C.O.D I believe) but this seems like too complex and expansive a system for PA or Bandai Namco to invest in right now.

Expanded weapons roster

Bring back a few classic weapons (in a AC series sense) like the Napalm, and particularly some from AC3 like the MIRV, or the varying types of guns. Make the equipment of these items to a plane part of the plane’s cost, and place cost limits on missions.

Additionally, I think the like-weapon roster should be expanded for all planes. In other words, all fighters should be able to equip all air-to-air weapons. All attackers should be able to equip all air-to-ground weapons. Multiroles can equip any weapons entirely. However, all planes will have what I term “Designed loadouts” being a set of three weapons they are “best” suited for. These will basically mimic the usual three SPW options most AC games have kept up with for all planes. Using any other SPW will result in a penalty in terms of ammo count and parameters of weapon performance (damage, range, blast radius, etc). Multiroles will face a stiffer penalty due to their ability to essentially equip any weapon in-game.

I personally disagree with the idea of completely opening this up, or in other words letting any plane equip any weapon. I think that would be a bridge too far and all but completely ignores the fact that aircraft have roles. The only way to make this distinction sufficiently clear would be for very steep penalties on this practice, but that would render the practice all but pointless. It would also overly disadvantage attacker aircraft as the majority of their weapons are unguided, thus short of steep ammo limits or otherwise excessive power drops, they would be overly outmatched by fighters.

Online Multiplayer
I have two ideas on this one. The first assumes the more obvious likelihood that Infinity's servers are shut down soon after 7 launches. Allow for complete room settings control - I mean everything, from Cost, MR, planes, weapons, everything. Also, make every mode from Infinity available, meaning Co-op, TDM, and Naval TDM. They should also still hold tournaments to win some special planes, emblems, or skins. I know this last part would be a bit complicated as there would certainly be some things that should be unlocked in-game through the campaign, as well as the likelihood of their wanting to monetize others via DLC. Would like, however, to avoid a repeat of the nuisance that is the lockout of many emblems and planes from players due to the reliance on spending so much to rank in tournaments.

Option two is on the off-chance they choose to keep Infinity's servers up and have 7's online component piggyback off that. This option is least likely because of the different in-game worlds, the fact this would in effect be cross-platform play, and the complication of the fact that 7's online will almost certainly be free (except of course the PS+ subscription fee) while they'll likely maintain the fuel system for Infinity. However, I think they can manage both if they cut the price on Infinity's Fuel, shorten the replenishment period an hour or two, and increase the supplied fuel cap from 3 to 8. Furthermore, by changing how tournament points are calculated, such that a personal mean of some sort is used rather than a simple best total, the necessity of continuous spending to out-sortie other players is reduced.

Alright, that's all for now. I'll create a new post if I get any new ideas I want to discuss at length. Otherwise, check out this LINK to see the ideas others have come up with.