Ace Combat 7

[AN/ALQ128]

I'm glad they buffed the TLS now. It feels somewhat usable instead of the glorified flashlight it was on release.

[AN/ALQ128]

https://twitter.com/Nassault/status/1132506116900904960

I never even noticed that AC5 had animated wing flex.

[David Hingtgen]

I think AC5 peaked in several categories.  I think it was the only one to truly do the F-14's flight controls right, and how nozzles work.  (sad that things have regressed---it's obvious some of the more plane-minded people on the team are gone now)   

[AN/ALQ128]

11 hours ago, David Hingtgen said:

I think AC5 peaked in several categories.  I think it was the only one to truly do the F-14's flight controls right, and how nozzles work.  (sad that things have regressed---it's obvious some of the more plane-minded people on the team are gone now)   

Your airplane detaching drop tanks at the start of some missions was a nice touch too, and I'm still baffled why Project Aces seems to have forgotten about the existence of vapour cones after the PS2 era games.

[kajnrig]

Doesn't AC7 feature them? Could've sworn...

Edit:

Speaking of the F-14, it did my heart good to see the little "winglets" that slide out after the plane enters its high speed config. I forget if they reused the model for the D variant and thus mistakenly recreated it for that, but seeing it at all was lots of fun.

That said, the PS2 games had their share of mistakes, too, such as the placement of the F-35C's machine gun.

Edited May 26, 2019 by kajnrig

[AN/ALQ128]

4 hours ago, kajnrig said:

Doesn't AC7 feature them? Could've sworn...

Edit:

Speaking of the F-14, it did my heart good to see the little "winglets" that slide out after the plane enters its high speed config. I forget if they reused the model for the D variant and thus mistakenly recreated it for that, but seeing it at all was lots of fun.

That said, the PS2 games had their share of mistakes, too, such as the placement of the F-35C's machine gun.

There is one shot, in the first cinematic where Avril is flying her F-104C where they portray vapour cones forming, but it never shows up in-game.

 

[David Hingtgen]

5 hours ago, kajnrig said:

Doesn't AC7 feature them? Could've sworn...

Edit:

Speaking of the F-14, it did my heart good to see the little "winglets" that slide out after the plane enters its high speed config. I forget if they reused the model for the D variant and thus mistakenly recreated it for that, but seeing it at all was lots of fun.

Glove vanes are nice (still present in 7 IIRC), but getting the primary roll controls and nozzle movements wrong more than counters that little detail. 

[AN/ALQ128]

1 hour ago, David Hingtgen said:

Glove vanes are nice (still present in 7 IIRC), but getting the primary roll controls and nozzle movements wrong more than counters that little detail. 

The Tomcat model in 7 is the F-14D, so no glove vanes. That said, could you elaborate on how 7 gets the primary roll controls and nozzle movements wrong? I'm not much of an expert on the Tomcat.

[electric indigo]

Didn't the glove vanes got shut down even on the A-series?

[kajnrig]

Eventually, IIRC. Apparently you can easily tell the A-to-D conversions by the fact that the opening for the glove vanes (thanks for giving me the correct terminology) were simply welded shut.

At least that's what I remember from hearsay. Could very well be wrong.

[David Hingtgen]

I believe it's true, based on the few number of B/D Tomcats I've been able to get close enough to, to inspect the vane area, to try to confirm it.  Most museums have A's, and the few D's on display tend to be 'roped off'.   I don't know of any B's around nowadays.    

As for roll control:  Tomcats mainly use their tailplanes to roll.  The spoilers are only supplemental, and only when the wings are out.  When the wings are back, the spoilers never raise, it's purely tailplane movement.   WAY too many F-14 sims/games, use only spoilers, all the time, or use spoilers+tailplanes, all the time.   It really should be tailplanes all the time, and sometimes add in spoilers. 

Nozzles:  this goes for all jets that can adjust it:   Open at idle.  As throttle increases, the nozzle tightens closed, up to "full military (non-burner) power".  Then, once you go into afterburner, it starts to open up again.   So basically the opposite of how a lot of games do it.   Open "at the extremes" (idle, and full burner) and closed "near the mid-point" (full throttle but no burner).  

[AN/ALQ128]

12 hours ago, David Hingtgen said:

I believe it's true, based on the few number of B/D Tomcats I've been able to get close enough to, to inspect the vane area, to try to confirm it.  Most museums have A's, and the few D's on display tend to be 'roped off'.   I don't know of any B's around nowadays.    

As for roll control:  Tomcats mainly use their tailplanes to roll.  The spoilers are only supplemental, and only when the wings are out.  When the wings are back, the spoilers never raise, it's purely tailplane movement.   WAY too many F-14 sims/games, use only spoilers, all the time, or use spoilers+tailplanes, all the time.   It really should be tailplanes all the time, and sometimes add in spoilers. 

Nozzles:  this goes for all jets that can adjust it:   Open at idle.  As throttle increases, the nozzle tightens closed, up to "full military (non-burner) power".  Then, once you go into afterburner, it starts to open up again.   So basically the opposite of how a lot of games do it.   Open "at the extremes" (idle, and full burner) and closed "near the mid-point" (full throttle but no burner).  

I see, thanks for the clarification.

Checked the Tomcat in game again, and it does appear to have the correct control surface animations, where the spoilers are only used during low speed manoeuvres, and only the tailplanes are used at high speeds, so it appears they got that right.

Edited May 28, 2019 by AN/ALQ128
updated info

[electric indigo]

Ace Combat 3's 20th anniversary is near, and  some early concept art popped up on Twitter:

 

[kajnrig]

The PC version has plenty of custom skins now, but this I think is the first Macross one, a YF-29 skin for the X-02S.

https://www.nexusmods.com/acecombat7skiesunknown/mods/171?tab=description

[Chronocidal]

Ah-hah... so, the big question, how difficult is the mod process for this game, and how much can you do with it?  Because while I'm sick of DLC, I'll happily generate my own content, if it's not too much of a pain to implement.

[AN/ALQ128]

1 hour ago, Chronocidal said:

Ah-hah... so, the big question, how difficult is the mod process for this game, and how much can you do with it?  Because while I'm sick of DLC, I'll happily generate my own content, if it's not too much of a pain to implement.

https://imgur.com/a/6scAGXP

A twitter user by the name of Dantofu created this guide for texture mods. So far, the only moddable elements of the game are skins, the in game character portraits, and text as seen in the squadron intros before certain missions.

[Chronocidal]

Fair enough, though I expect if textures are accessible, it's only a matter of time before someone edits the models as well (assuming the effort isn't excessive, or the format isn't exceedingly rare/convoluted).

This is the kind of thing that gives me serious pause about buying into DLC on the PC though.  If I can make my own textures, it makes me really hesitant to pay money for extra skins of any type.

I do hope we get a "collectors edition" sooner rather than later though.  I'd love to play the game someday on PC, but I'm really not in a rush.

[AN/ALQ128]

https://www.aclighthouse.com/sa-volume127-interview.html

Translated interview with Shoji Kawamori on AC7's VR mode, along with the lead mechanical artist Masanori Ninomiya and art director of AC7, Masato Kanno.

Mostly pertains to things related to scale models, but it does dip into the background processes Project Aces uses for aircraft modelling.

[AN/ALQ128]

Release date for Kotobukiya's 1/144 X-02S Strike Wyvern model is November 2019, and preorders are now open.

https://www.kotobukiya.co.jp/labo/labo-178825/

[AN/ALQ128]

https://twitter.com/kazutoki/status/1149341253860876290

Looks like Kazutoki Kono got to visit BAE Warton.

Perhaps we might see the Tempest in the next Ace Combat.

[AN/ALQ128]

First look at the season pass mini campaign.

That BGM track sounds like it was ripped straight out of a mecha anime, I'm loving it already.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LW_-hiBDBAA

 

[AN/ALQ128]

On 7/2/2019 at 9:32 PM, AN/ALQ128 said:

Release date for Kotobukiya's 1/144 X-02S Strike Wyvern model is November 2019, and preorders are now open.

https://www.kotobukiya.co.jp/labo/labo-178825/

https://twitter.com/Task_Force23/status/1156235154794397698

Some more details on the model. Lots of options it seems, very nice.

There's also a snazzy jacket being released by Alpha Industries (manufacturers of genuine bomber jackets) with Trigger's "Three Strikes" markings on the back.

 

[electric indigo]

I got the XFA-27 and decided that they're asking too much money for those tiny kits. I might get weak for a Morgan, though...

And I'm counting on Hasegawa to bring us the AC7 Flanker in 1/72.

[Chronocidal]

I'm still dying for Hasegawa to give us 1/72 kits of everything.  I don't know what made the AC: Infinity plane so special for it to get a full blown double release.

I think I'm just going to start converting AC models into 3D printables and build my own fleet.  

Edited July 31, 2019 by Chronocidal

[electric indigo]

May I suggest that you start with the AC3 designs...?

[Chronocidal]

Heh.. I need to actually play that one first.  I'm really not familiar with any of the content from that one, except that I know most planes used the enclosed canopies like the Falken.

I'm personally really just after a good Morgan model at this point, though, possibly with a few custom tweaks to the airframe I have in mind to structurally reinforce it, so it doesn't look like the engines are going to snap off.

[AN/ALQ128]

2 hours ago, Chronocidal said:

Heh.. I need to actually play that one first.  I'm really not familiar with any of the content from that one, except that I know most planes used the enclosed canopies like the Falken.

I'm personally really just after a good Morgan model at this point, though, possibly with a few custom tweaks to the airframe I have in mind to structurally reinforce it, so it doesn't look like the engines are going to snap off.

Just a heads up on AC3, if you didn't already know, but the original NA release cut a ton of content from the game. 

Check out Project NEMO, a fan translation of the original JP release of AC3.

[wm cheng]

18 hours ago, Chronocidal said:

I'm still dying for Hasegawa to give us 1/72 kits of everything.  I don't know what made the AC: Infinity plane so special for it to get a full blown double release.

I think I'm just going to start converting AC models into 3D printables and build my own fleet.  

YES!!! 

[Chronocidal]

15 hours ago, AN/ALQ128 said:

Just a heads up on AC3, if you didn't already know, but the original NA release cut a ton of content from the game. 

Check out Project NEMO, a fan translation of the original JP release of AC3.

That's actually the one thing I do know about that game.   I didn't get into the AC series until AC4, so I skipped the first generation, and found out about that mess in retrospect.

I'd love to play a properly ported version, or a full translation, so I'd been keeping my fingers crossed that news of such a thing would pop up here.  

[AN/ALQ128]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGJa5fkOWB4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WLvXs7sIHaw

DLC trailers are up. We're getting the first mission this month.

[Shadow]

I picked up AC7 on sale last week. Finally beat it. Used the Su-30SM in the final fight. All I can say is that this AC title was probably the hardest out of all the ones I've played. I liked the setting and themes going back to AC4 in many ways. The story is still, very Ace Combat but the character dialogue didn't drive me up a wall some others in the series did. Music was excellent and the air combat was great, particularly with the weather elements. I missed being able to give orders to my wingman though as the friendly AI was pretty bad.

 

As for AC3. How awesome would it be if they remade the original JP version and released worldwide.

Edited September 20, 2019 by Shadow

[AN/ALQ128]

https://www.dropbox.com/s/4q3lhs1nr5cyhw9/Kanno_Regarding%20AC7s%20Revolution%20of%20the%20Sky.pdf?dl=0

Translated slide presentation created by Masato Kanno (art director/mechanical designer for Ace Combat) on the effort went into creating the clouds and weather system in AC7.

Translated by Taskforce23 on twitter.

Edited September 22, 2019 by AN/ALQ128
gave TL credit

[kajnrig]

I feel like Bioware should have taken a lot from AC7 for its Cataclysm update. To wit, in Anthem you play as basically Iron Man suits, and in its Cataclysm event, you're supposed to fly through a massive thunderstorm to get to each mission(?). Anthem being notoriously unfinished and horribly optimized, this "thunderstorm" took the form of basically some clouds and a blue tint to the screen. I'm comparing that to the lightning strikes amd icing effects of AC7, which was undoubtedly made on a much smaller budget, and the difference in quality is astounding.

[AN/ALQ128]

3 hours ago, kajnrig said:

I feel like Bioware should have taken a lot from AC7 for its Cataclysm update. To wit, in Anthem you play as basically Iron Man suits, and in its Cataclysm event, you're supposed to fly through a massive thunderstorm to get to each mission(?). Anthem being notoriously unfinished and horribly optimized, this "thunderstorm" took the form of basically some clouds and a blue tint to the screen. I'm comparing that to the lightning strikes amd icing effects of AC7, which was undoubtedly made on a much smaller budget, and the difference in quality is astounding.

When the staff are passionate about the game, a lot can be done on a limited budget. I get the feeling no one at Bioware cares about Anthem to the degree that Project Aces cares about Ace Combat.

[AN/ALQ128]

The Japanese State Minister of Defence is an Ace Combat fan.

https://twitter.com/ty_polepole/status/1187308197607919616?s=19