Macross Ace Frontier (PSP)

[Keith]

4th Row:

Skill Name - Effect - SP Consumption - Duration(seconds) - Misc Notes

Bombardment King : 1.5x ammo

Two - 40

Absorb Spiritia : Fire ray that absorbs enemy HP (if it hits)

One - N/A

*Temptation of Sharon Apple: Switch all enemy units' up/down and left/right

control

Three - 45

*Hayase : Attack strength 3x, defense strength 1/2

Three - 30

*Last Supper : Deal large damage to surrounding enemies

Six - N/A

*Max World : Stop enemy unit movement

Six - 10

The trick to using the VF-25G's rifle is not to let go of the trigger immediately. Hold it, let it track the target, and when you feel comfortable, let go, you'll have a higher chance of hitting things that way.

As for sad sniper, once you get to the 3rd wave, you should be in a near constant state of boost. Fighter when you're running away, Battroid when you're attacking. Use the high manuever missiles, but note that you can't fire missiles "after" initiating a boost. You can start firing missiles first, continue to hold, and then boost while firing. Not sure why it's setup that way.

[Graham]

Is the skill you list as 'Hayase', the one that people have been referring to as the 'Misa' skill in recent posts or is that something different?

Graham

[CrazyMartian]

Yep, it is.

[Keith]

Is the skill you list as 'Hayase', the one that people have been referring to as the 'Misa' skill in recent posts or is that something different?

Graham

Yup, can't miss her, it's a picture of Misa right next to a picture of steak

[Graham]

Damn, Sad Sniper EX is hard.

Been playing it for several hours, played umpteen games and died everytime (E grade). Only ever got as far as the VF-27 one time and then died, as I only had a smidgen of life left.

Trying lots of different tactics.

Quite tricky to avoid getting hammered by the missiles from the first wave right at the very start.

Tried a tactic at the start of the game of breaking lock and running away to the edge of the map and sniping at long range. Worked great for one game for the first two waves, but I swear the bastards learnt, as the next few games they followed me at once rather than hanging about near the middle of the map.

The special attack, triangle + circle seems especially useless, as 90% of the time, it doesn't even connect and seems to be aimed wildly off target (am I doing something wrong?).

Graham

[Keith]

The first wave you shouldn't even need to transform. There's one large Vajra to contend with, and he should be your first lock (if not, up + target = L-Vajra), fire a few volley's of your rifle while in fighter, boost dodge if you need, and he's toast.

As for the SP melee, you need to SP boost into your target first, then immediately SP melee, it'll get you in so clsoe they won't have room to dodge.

[Graham]

Not the special melee, the special where you fire your sniper rifle. Most of the time it never seems to do anything, just swing your rifle around and shoot at empty space.

Graham

[Keith]

Not the special melee, the special where you fire your sniper rifle. Most of the time it never seems to do anything, just swing your rifle around and shoot at empty space.

Graham

Ah, that's because you can't aim it. Likely they gimped it in the game to intentionally make that specific mission hard. In reality, it should have been a movable blast, like with the Macross Cannon. Hopefully they'll change that in the sequal.

[D.D. Ivanov]

Ohoho! Man, one of those missions has the "My Boyfriend is a Pilot" straight from the Superfamicom Macross game that consisted only of a space mission and another inside a Zentradi ship. Hoho, I played that way back when I was a kid. Now I feel old. =P

Er, you're thinking of the never-ending 8-bit version of Shao Pai Lon. Too bad they didn't include a never ending stage of that game, just like how the game never ended. Ever.

[Graham]

Yay lived through Sad Sniper EX for the first time in 4+ hours of trying! Only got a 'C' & Brera escaped, but at least I didn't die. Graham

[Graham]

Yay, got a 'B' grade this morning on Sad Sniper EX and killed that pantywaist Brera.

I think you just need to get an 'A' grade to get the VF-27 right?

Is it even possible at all to keep Alto alive in this mission?

Graham

[Keith]

Yay, got a 'B' grade this morning on Sad Sniper EX and killed that pantywaist Brera.

I think you just need to get an 'A' grade to get the VF-27 right?

Is it even possible at all to keep Alto alive in this mission?

Graham

Yup, though it's just a matter of speed killing the toughies, and not shooting him yourself.

[Keith]

Something odd I noticed. You may recall how I was trying to figure out why I didn't have the Misa icon in my cards icon list. Playing around a little more today, she actually is there, when I access the card through the hanger menu options. when I go from the main menu to settings, it's still a question mark there. Stranger yet still, I can set it form in game hanger menu, but not from that settings option...?

[Gokurakumaru]

Need some help. I'm doing my first playthrough and am stuck on the First Contact mission in the Macross series. I do the first part fine and get to the part where you're inside the Zentradi ship and Vrlitwhai shows up. I take out the grunts with him so he's all I have to concentrate on, but try as I might I can't do enough damage to him without him charging me with his melee special attack which he seems to be able to do whenever he wants during the fight, usually whenever I finally get a bead on him (though he generally beats down my wingman first). He glows purple and all I can do is try to get away while it's happening (not easy as he moves fast and homes in on you during it) and hopefully get into position to pop off a few shots before it happens again. He doesn't seem to take any damage while he's glowing either which basically means I'm not even trading damage when I get backed up against a wall.

I'm flying the Max type VF-1A and have ballistic and melee defense boosted up to about 30 and my gunpod is amped up in damage. Any tips for killing this guy?

[Keith]

Best thing I can reccomend is to use a Valkyrie with a melee special on him, and don't waste any ammo when he turns purple, he's temporarily invincable, so just trasnform & dash away.

[Gokurakumaru]

Best thing I can reccomend is to use a Valkyrie with a melee special on him, and don't waste any ammo when he turns purple, he's temporarily invincable, so just trasnform & dash away.

That's not good. It means I'm not doing anything particuarly wrong, I just suck

[Keith]

That's not good. It means I'm not doing anything particuarly wrong, I just suck

It'll be easier once you unlock the era limiter (letting you bring in Valkyries from any era).

[Keith]

Wow, discovered a sure fire way to crash the game hard today. Freeplay + 4 Bodolza's + attempting any type of tentacle attack = Super crash & freeze. Hell, it even caused the graphics to freak out, and the hud to go all wonky. I haven't seen that since a cartridge game

[Graham]

Been playing Sad Sniper Ex for about 7 hours now and can defeat it more frequently, but still only getting Bs or Cs.

Any tips for quickly defeating Brera?

Graham

[Britai 7018]

I've been stuck on Sad Sniper EX for about 2 weeks now, still can't beat it. Not even once! I've gotten at least S on every other mission. I have until Ultimate Frontier comes out...

[Keith]

Been playing Sad Sniper Ex for about 7 hours now and can defeat it more frequently, but still only getting Bs or Cs.

Any tips for quickly defeating Brera?

Graham

After you take out the big bad large Vajra in the 3rd wave, hang out with the small fry until your SP fully refills. Take out the little guys, switch to Fighter, fire off HM missiles at Brera while charging at him, when you get close switch to Battroid, then SP dash until you're right in his face, then immediately SP melee and you should take out a good chunk from him. If you have enough SP repeat, if not, gtfo of there and go back to the missile strategy until he's gone. If you hurt him bad enough (a decent SP melee blow should leave him pretty low on HP), he'll turn tail & be easy pickin's for missiles or more SP melee.

Providfed Alto survives through the ordeal, you should S rank it. If Alto survives and your HP is high enough, you'll SS it.

Interesting note, I'm playing through the game again with the pilots I didn't choose the first time (since I didn't get the all pilot skill & all pilot hearts titles, which I STILL haven't gotten), and in doing so went through all the stages in order. It wasn't beating Sad Sniper with an S that unlocks the VF-27, Battle Frontier, & Brera, since I did that in stage order. It was doing that in addition to finishing all other stages that unlocks them, since all of that unlocked once I finished up the Frontier campaign.

Edited September 10, 2009 by Keith

[Omegablue]

Can anyone help out with the following please.

Recently got the game, but want to play it on the PC.

Where is a good emulator to download?

And is there a manual of the menus translated in English?

Thanx

[Renato]

There are no emulators, but if you have custom firmware, there is an application you can install on your PSP called RemoteJoy where you can hook up the PSP through USB and display the graphics on your PC monitor.

As for translations, I think you can find them on Gamespot, Gamefaqs, etc. They are out there.

[Keith]

I've done everything shy of 11 titles (3 of which I should have met the requirements for and still haven't been awarded), and officially call Shenanigoats on the Minmay durring freeplay thing!!

[bluemax151]

There are no emulators, but if you have custom firmware, there is an application you can install on your PSP called RemoteJoy where you can hook up the PSP through USB and display the graphics on your PC monitor.

Yeah, my custom firmware supports remote joy all I had to do was install it on my PC. It's kind of laggy though or maybe it's just mine? Pretty neat because you can record your gameplay.

[Renato]

Yeah, my custom firmware supports remote joy all I had to do was install it on my PC. It's kind of laggy though or maybe it's just mine? Pretty neat because you can record your gameplay.

I only tried that recording thing a couple of times before, because the file sizes become huge. Hundreds of megs for just a few seconds, crazy. I planned to make some youtube vids, but I thought, screw that.

On top of that, my PSP is crashing all the time recently, and I've barely had it for 10 months. Must.... last... until... Ultimate....

[bluemax151]

I only tried that recording thing a couple of times before, because the file sizes become huge. Hundreds of megs for just a few seconds, crazy. I planned to make some youtube vids, but I thought, screw that.

Well when I record it splits into 2 files. One is the video, the other the audio and I just run it through windows movie maker and when it comes out it's a pretty respectable size.

[Graham]

Took me 22 hours play, but I finally got SS on Sad Sniper EX. Now up to 114 hours in total. Graham

[Keith]

Took me 22 hours play, but I finally got SS on Sad Sniper EX. Now up to 114 hours in total. Graham

Just in time for Ultimate too, good job! Welcome to the SS SS club.. that just doesn't sound right...

[Graham]

Need advice on completing the Frontier EX mission 'My Boyfriend is a Pilot', where you play as Klan using the Q-Rea.

Having a hard tiome on this also.

Graham

[Keith]

Need advice on completing the Frontier EX mission 'My Boyfriend is a Pilot', where you play as Klan using the Q-Rea.

Having a hard tiome on this also.

Graham

I usually had the best luck going after Luca, then Alto, then Michel, stick with missile volley's, an dkeep moving. The trick to getting S/SS, is to take out all 3 before the Vajra show up (I think you have 2 minutes). If you don't, the upside is whoever's left will help you take on the Vajra, but you get a much smaller bonus. Also, once you do get to the Vajra, there's only one tough large Vajra to worry about, though there are a couple misleading weak ones.

[Graham]

A last appeal for help.

I’ve asked these before, but any new advice, tips, tricks, hints or cheats would be grealy appreciated.

I’ve nearly finished MAF, only 2 standard missions and 2 EX missions left that I still need to get ‘S’ grade on.

With the 2 standard missions that are giving me trouble, the problem is not that I can’t complete them, I can easily, but rather that no matter what I do, I can’t get above A or more usually B in them. In all other missions, I have S or SS grade. The missions I’m having difficulty with are: -

The SDFM mission - Kamjin’s Trap (Yes I know it’s the wrong spelling, but can’t remember how you spell his name with a ‘Q’)

OK, I’ve tried loads of different Valks and pilot combinations, but no matter how fast I pick up and return the crates to the green zone and I can do it really fast and no matter how quickly I destroy the enemy, I still can’t get above A. I’ve tried both melee attacking all the enemy or using range attacks. I've tried killing all the Regults first, leaving the Glaug to last, or vice versa, doesn’t seem to make a difference. MY normal MO, is to change to Gerwalk, dash to the crates and pick them up and then dash back in Gerwalk to drop them off. For the far crates, I’ll boost there in Fighter mode, only changing to Gerwalk as I get close. When the enemy appears, I can take them out really quickly, either using all melee attacks for extra points or all missiles/guns attacks, but I still can’t get that elusive ‘S’ grade. What am I doing wrong? What do I need to do? What's the best Valk/pilot combination to use?

The Macross Frontier mission - Get Set

This mission has you killing large and small Vajra in space, with Luca, Michael and some VF-171 appearing as allies about half way through. This is an easy mission, I can consistently kill everything quickly, either by using all melee attacks or all range weapon attacks and I can keep all the allies alive, even the VF-171s. Howver, no matter how quickly I complete the mission, I’m still stuck with an A or B grade. Again, I’ve tried loads of different Valk/pilot combinations. What am I doing wrong? What's the best VF/Pilot to use?

Graham

[Keith]

Easiest way I found to SS Kamjin's trap is to (after finishing the crates, and while you do, take out those regults that pop up before the last crate), kill Kamjin as quickly as possible. The method that works best for this, is to use the last supper skill (STEAK-Y) Right when the enemy warning pops up, you should have 2 full SP bars, unleash, and head to the area where Kamjin usually appears (somewhere northeast of the Macross's bow). It's a strong enough attack that you should be able to take him out no prob, but just to be sure, keep trying to lock onto him (target + up on the crosspad), and melee or shoot him while the barrier explosion is wittling him down.

Between the combo bonus (from the barrier explosion attack), and the quick kill of Kamjin (a must on this level), you should be S/SS. Take on the remaining Regult's after, they're incidental to the mission grade.

As for get set, while quickness & melee are important, so is "not killing the large Vajra" until nothing else is left on screen. The longer the large Vajra are around, the more small Vajra will appear. keep an eye on your targetting while melee attacking, if you see yourself headed for a large Vajra, target + down to switch to a smaller one.

Edited September 30, 2009 by Keith

[Graham]

Thanks Keith will try those suggestions tonight.

Graham

[Graham]

Heh, just finished and got SS on the EX mission where you unlock Roy's VF-1S without FPs. Second half of the mission was tough, until I remembered Max's special ability to stop time and used it to take out Milia.

Graham