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Who is the best Ace Combat protagonist? This poll is closed. |
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| Cipher |
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79 | 32.24% |
| Phoenix |
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9 | 3.67% |
| Mobius 1 |
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84 | 34.29% |
| William Bishop--lol get out |
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24 | 9.80% |
| SHOOT VISARI |
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49 | 20.00% |
| Total: | 245 votes | ||
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they didn't bind gunpods to the same key as guns, so you had to hold two buttons to get MAXIMUM GUNPOWER and that was annoying also SAAM sniping to get the killstreak reward repeatedly was magical. MiG-21, PAK-FA. MiG-21, PAK-FA.
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Oct 6, 2016 18:22
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| # ? May 9, 2024 22:22 |
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daily reminder that Assault Horizon is bad
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Oct 6, 2016 18:30
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The way secondary weapons are assigned to planes in AH makes me angry. Only the MiG-21 and the Su-25 get the gunpod, only the Su-25 gets the UGBs, and no attack plane gets Trinity. And the lack of Napalm is shameful because the game engine can draw some beautiful gasoline explosions
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Oct 6, 2016 18:56
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the Ka-50 gets UGBs. It's hilarious.
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Oct 6, 2016 19:59
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drat! Pity it's DLC, the Moscow mission must be a literal blast with bombs
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Oct 6, 2016 23:15
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I just realized that the Tornado DLC plane must never have been released for PC (it's not in the Enhanced Edition anyway). What a strange omission!
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Oct 7, 2016 14:12
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Shattered Skies Mission 8: Operation Countdown – December 31st, 2004 Overview: ISAF plans to launch a new reconnaissance satellite from Riass Space Centre in the Comona Islands on New Year’s Eve. Mobius 1 and the ISAF air strike team engage in the largest aerial battle since the end of the Belkan War as they provide top cover for the rocket launch and guard it against an Erusean air assault spearheaded by Yellow Squadron. The following day, back in San Salvacion, Yellow 13 and Yellow 4 review the combat results of Comona mission, with keen interest in the standout enemy pilot of the engagement: Mobius 1.  Guest Commentator: We leap from one Electrosphere LPer to the other as Lunethex joins me for this mission. In addition to guesting on frozentreasue's run through Electrosphere, he's also in the midst of LPing the both the final game in the Colony Wars trilogy, Colony Wars: Red Sun, and is doing an LP of both Battlezone 98 Redux and its expansion, The Red Odyssey, along with the old Syphon Filter LP crew: Coolguye, TheLastRoboKy, and Jade Star.   RIASS SPACE CENTER We return yet again to the future home of Once one of the most active spaceports on the planet, Ulysses Day and the subsequent Shattered Skies crisis saw a moratorium on all launch activity enacted at Riass Space Center by both the local Comonan government and the FCU parliament. Furthermore, Erusea’s declaration of war on the FCU and the Independent States of Usea created significant internal upheaval at Riass, as the Erusean Air and Space Administration (EASA) and all its personnel and equipment were forcibly removed from Comonan territory by the FCU and taken into custody and held as prisoners of war. Since Ulysses Day, Riass Space Center has been on the frontlines of the continuing spaceguard efforts to protect the Earth from the lingering threat of Ulysses 1994XF04. It currently forms a pivotal link in a chain of national space agencies around the globe responsible for detecting and tracking the countless asteroid fragments left behind by Ulysses that have settled into orbit around the planet and still pose a risk to satellite traffic, the International Space Station, the proposed International Space Elevator construction site, as well as the Earth itself. The New Year’s Eve launch of the ISAF recon satellite marks the first space launch undertaken since Ulysses Day, and also highlights just how desperate the ISAF is for actionable intelligence over the Usean mainland, as even in orbit the satellite will be incredibly vulnerable to both stray asteroids, rouge space debris, and to being shot down by Stonehenge, should it pass within the STN’s firing radius.  NARRATIVE CONVERGENCE The interlude for this chapter highlights, among other things, the accelerating intertwining of the narratives of Mobius 1 and Yellow 13. The New Year’s Eve furball over Riass is the second time they’ve met in combat so far, and 13’s review of the mission the following day is the first time he acknowledges Mobius 1 as a potential rival, albeit obliquely. This is also, for the record, the Storyteller Boy’s first exposure to Mobius 1, through Yellow 13’s second-hand account of the Comona engagement. The initially distant plot threads the game began with are slowly beginning to weave together. Yellow 13 and the Storyteller Boy are now aware of Mobius 1, and we as the audience are aware of Yellow 13 and the Storyteller Boy, and meanwhile Mobius 1 the character has been aware of Yellow 13 since Lifeline, and the bond between all three of them is going to grow ever tighter as the game progresses. We also see more conflicted loyalties begin to play out in this interlude. The Storyteller Boy reveals that the Barkeep’s Daughter—an active member of the San Salvacion Resistance—has a teenage crush on Yellow 13, despite the fact that he remains her hated enemy. Just like the Storyteller Boy, she has found herself disarmed by his personable charms and the fact that he just so happens to be a decent and upstanding human being in general. The Storyteller Boy’s conflicted loyalties are borne out further as well in this interlude. You can hear the trepidation in his voice as he relays Barkeep’s Daughter’s hopeful nugget of intel, “the Allies are coming to our town.” The ISAF counter attack on the Eruseans is imminent. It won’t be long now until they make landfall on the mainland. To run out the Eruseans, and liberate San Salvacion, and kill his newfound friend and role model Yellow 13. And Mobius 1 is coming with them.  SHATTERED SKIES This mission provides our title drop for Ace Combat 04: Shattered Skies. Or rather, our first title drop. The term will crop up at least once more in-game, and I’ll be sure to point it out when it does. The Golden Trilogy games were noted for their title drop missions. We saw “Zero” as the name of the hidden 18th mission of Ace Combat Zero: The Belkan War, and there will be a mission coming up in Ace Comabt 5 subtitled “The Unsung War,” and the opening mission of Ace Combat X is titled “Skies of Deception,” while “Skies Unknown” is referenced several times in Ace Combat 7's dialog as well, but that’s all spoilers for where we are right now. And no, despite our joking, the mission is not called “Distant Thunder” in the European version (where the game is known as Ace Combat: Distant Thunder). That said, Distant Thunder does indeed get its own title drop in the opening cutscene of the game. When the Storyteller Boy describes the aerial battle between ISAF and Yellow Squadron above his house, he describes the roar of the plane engines as “A sound like distant thunder.”  
Kadorhal posted:Ace Number Eight is Vaisala. Named for Yrjö Väisälä, born September 6th, 1891. Finnish astronomer and physicist, primarily known for his work in optics. Nevertheless, he discovered 3 comets and 128 asteroids/minor planets, which he usually named after personal friends, between 1935 and 1945. In particular, this is the reason the Palomar Mountain Observatory in California does not have an asteroid bearing its name, due to Väisälä naming one of his discoveries after a professor named Palomaa and the rules against asteroid names sharing all but one letter. He was nicknamed the Wizard of Tuorla, which was later used as the name for a book describing his works. Died July 21st, 1971, at 79 years old.   Tracks featured in Mission 8: DISC 1  Concept art of Riass Space Center, storyboards and rough drafts for the interlude sequences up till now, and a promotional shot of Mobius 1’s ISAF Navy F/A-18C being transported via a patrol boat through a city canal     
nine-gear crow fucked around with this message at 01:08 on Nov 30, 2022 |
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Oct 8, 2016 11:01
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Oct 8, 2016 11:07
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I might have to do a write up on the X-32 now since we shamedropped it in the video 
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Oct 8, 2016 11:10
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I USED TO RUUUUULE THE WORLD https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HXvodWzb2HQ
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Oct 8, 2016 11:15
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ar-poc38C84 https://theaviationist.com/2014/07/16/c-130-land-on-carrier/ So yeah, they have successfully managed to land a Herc on a carrier before.
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Oct 8, 2016 11:50
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The moral of the story is: planes are loving awesome.
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Oct 8, 2016 11:57
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Comona! Hell, yeah!  Right up there with Fire Youngman as my favorite Top Gun-esque BGMs.
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Oct 8, 2016 14:08
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It got a remix in Infinity: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dE7udx4RTj8 It's.... meh. The only song actually improved by the Infinity remix is a few missions away.
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Oct 8, 2016 16:50
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ninjahedgehog posted:It got a remix in Infinity: We still have so far to go if we want to get to the best Infinity remix, honestly.
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Oct 8, 2016 17:03
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Loved this game, played it a lot. My favorite Ace Combat, and a difficult mission to get an S.
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Oct 8, 2016 17:06
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benzine posted:Loved this game, played it a lot. My favorite Ace Combat, and a difficult mission to get an S. Not that hard! you just need to not waste 5 minutes on trying to kill a yellow!  Also having the F-14 instead of F/A-18 helps too.
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Oct 8, 2016 17:34
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16 QAAMs do the trick handily
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Oct 8, 2016 18:06
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ACES CURE PLANES posted:We still have so far to go if we want to get to the best Infinity remix, honestly. Well done. 
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Oct 8, 2016 19:19
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ACES CURE PLANES posted:We still have so far to go if we want to get to the best Infinity remix, honestly. No way dude. You must be STONEd, or clearly unHENGEd. Either way, I find your opinion OFFENSIVE. Wow, I'm not good at this.
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Oct 8, 2016 21:32
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The cargo plane that landed on a carrier was a C-130 back in 1963. IIRC they were considering using it for replenishment rather than the tiny C-1s they normally used. Obviously that didn't go anywhere, and the navy chose a cargo variant of the E-2 Hawkeye, the C-2 Greyhound, instead. There's a couple of videos around showing the landings. I chose the one with the most 60's voice. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZGy2ppViCck Also, IFF won't really prevent you shooting someone. Exactly how it works is pretty well classified, but in any case you can just turn it off and it can't do anything.
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Oct 8, 2016 22:51
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Ace Number Eight is Vaisala. Named for Yrjö Väisälä, born September 6th, 1891. Finnish astronomer and physicist, primarily known for his work in optics. Nevertheless, he discovered 3 comets and 128 asteroids/minor planets, which he usually named after personal friends, between 1935 and 1945. In particular, this is the reason the Palomar Mountain Observatory in California does not have an asteroid bearing its name, due to Väisälä naming one of his discoveries after a professor named Palomaa and the rules against asteroid names sharing all but one letter. He was nicknamed the Wizard of Tuorla, which was later used as the name for a book describing his works. Died July 21st, 1971, at 79 years old. If I ever get around to actually LPing HAWX, we're going to see this paint scheme again real soon. On the subject of this mission's song, I can't tell you how many versions of this song I've found on Youtube that are "extended", but only in the sense that the guy putting it up just made the second part repeat. There's two parts to the song, you jackasses!  And on the subject of arrestor hooks, way I remember it is a lot of planes do have them, but the ones on Air Force planes aren't as strong as those on Navy ones - it's more of an emergency thing for if they land too fast (recall the one-winged F-15 story from back in Zero, where the Eagle's hook got torn off), whereas Navy planes need to land as quickly as possible given the much shorter space carriers have (10,000 feet is adequate for a runway to accommodate just about anything landing at sea level; a Nimitz-class flight deck is only about a tenth of that), so their hook is stronger to better handle the sudden stops. Not that there are many flight sims that tell the difference, I know I've landed on carriers with F-15s and the like in some old freeware one called YSflight. Kadorhal fucked around with this message at 23:07 on Oct 8, 2016 |
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Oct 8, 2016 22:59
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ACES CURE PLANES posted:We still have so far to go if we want to get to the best Infinity remix, honestly. Until someone remixes The Journey Home we still won't have gotten to the best song 
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Oct 9, 2016 04:16
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You're in your plane and not even a minute into the mission you're thrown into a gigantic air battle and you managed to damage a Yellow plane, you just hear enemy radio chatter asking who managed to actually get the drop on him and Yellow squadron subsequently retreats.
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Oct 9, 2016 06:14
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I'm pretty sure the F-5 is the only non-carrier capable plane in the Ace Combat series that consistently gets modeled with an obvious arrestor hook. Since the Navy operates the F-5N aggressor squadrons IRL, I wonder if they are meant to be able to land on carriers? They certainly seem to be small enough that it might work. Relatedly, for some weird reason, the PSP titles made the X-02 carrier-capable. Although I guess since by the time of ACX it's been around for at least 25-30 years, more than enough time for a country inclined to make it carrier-capable to find a way.
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Oct 11, 2016 15:02
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The Wyvern is carrier-capable in 04, too. They took that out in 5, which is annoying because AFAIK 5 is the only AC game to date where, for plot reasons, some missions require you to take off from a carrier.
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Oct 11, 2016 17:58
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If I remember right, none of 5's superplanes are carrier capable, you're stuck with things like the Rafale at the high end for a few missions. Which seems like a weird choice, given the occasional plot elements mentioned above.
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Oct 11, 2016 18:12
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You can just play Free Mode if you want the ranks.
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Oct 11, 2016 18:13
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I mean, if you couldn't S rank Sea of Chaos in a Rafale, then it's not like the FALKEN was really going to help you.
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Oct 11, 2016 18:28
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Well, it's been almost a month, but I finally got around to writing up up the full post for Lifeline, so here it is for posterity's sake for those who are interested, seeing as how this update contains actually a fair deal of interesting behind the scenes tidbits compared to a usual update. I'm also going to be including Kadorhal's write ups for each mission's ace from here on out: Lifeline Mission 5: Operation Early Bird – November 19th, 2004 EXTRA: Tagging A Yellow Overview: ISAF moves to further cripple the Aegir Fleet at Comberth by striking an Erusian-controlled petrochemical plant and off-shore oil drilling complex along the east coast of Usea, south of Expo City in an early dawn raid. As the mission draws to a close, Mobius 1 comes face to face with the dreaded Yellow Squadron and its ace Yellow 13 for the first time. Meanwhile, in San Salvacion, the Storyteller Boy encounters 13’s wingman, Yellow 4.  NOTE: Be sure to also catch Blastinus's ill-adviseded trip into Ace Combat: Advance. Guest Commentators: I am joined in this video by Lazyfire, who is our second Ace Combat LP commentator hattrick after Jobbo_Fett in the second video. Lazyfire has recently started work on a LP of Call of Duty: Black Ops III, in addition to wrapping up Call of Duty: World at War recently, meaning that barring Advanced Warfare, he is officially out of Call of Dutys to LP!    AQUILA (YELLOW) SQUADRON Federal Erusian Air Force, 156th Tactical Fighter Wing, 1st Tactical Fighter Squadron Members:
Formally known as Aquila Squadron, the 13 plane division code named Yellow Squadron is, by all accounts, the crown jewel and pride of the Federal Erusian Air Force. No single squadron on Usea since the end of the first Continental War of 1998 boasts a more impressive and deadly combat success ratio than Yellow Squadron. Their name sends ripples of fear through ISAF pilots and soldiers, and their appearance on a battlefield is often enough send enemy planes running without a fight. The squadron was originally founded after the end of the Continental War in memory of the former top ace of the FEAF, Col. Edgar Grint, who had died in combat during the war. The Erusian military government, however, covered up the fact that Grint had defected to the Usean Rebel Forces during the war, instead emphasizing that he died a hero, rather than died fighting for the wrong side. When Erusea launched its surprise attack on the rest of Usea at the start of the Shattered Skies crisis, Yellow Squadron acted as the tip of the spear for its aerial assault on the ISAF member states. Yellow Squadron alone accounts for almost as many confirmed aerial combat kills as Stonehenge. Despite having a thirteen plane pool, the principle core of Yellow Squadron is a five-plane formation headed by Yellow 13. The remainer of the squadron operates on detached service elsewhere around Usea conducting missions of lesser import than those that require the attention of the “proper” Yellow Squadron, primarily acting as a morale booster for Erusian troops and pilots on the battlefield more than anything. In the months since ISAF was driven off the mainland, Yellow Squadron has since been recalled to the Erusian occupied San Salvacion City in western Usea, within close intercept range of Stonehenge in the Delarus desert. There the squadron acts, officially, as the principle guardian and interceptor flight for the Stonehenge Turret Network itself, and as well as a last line of defense for the Erusian homeland itself. A motion re-assign a squadron of newly developed EASA X-02 Wyvern fighters to the Stonehenge guard position in order to free up Yellow Squadron to conduct mobile operations elsewhere on Usea, however, is currently tangled up in the Erusian parliament, which is reluctant to place the fate of a vital weapon such as Stonehenge in the hands of an as yet unproven X-plane super fighter. As such, Yellow Squadron remains on guard near Stongehenge at all times. However, now that ISAF has begun its counterstrike operations against the Erusian military, Yellow Squadron finds itself deployed on increasingly longer range strike and intercept missions to counter its aerial presence on Usea. In terms of behind the scenes trivia, Yellow Squadron was at one point going to be called Gold Squadron. The localization staff of the American version of Shattered Skies believed that Yellow was “too weak” of a name for the principle antagonist squadron of the game, but Kazutoki Kono, the game’s art director, and other members of the 04 production staff insisted the name remain Yellow Squadron, which it ultimately did. Yellow Squadron itself was actually one of the first things created for Shattered Skies, according to the game’s director Sunao Katabuchi. His development of Yellow Squadron inspired the rest of the production team to create Mobius 1 as a character who would be a fitting rival for not just Yellow 13, but the entirety of Yellow Squadron itself. Katabuchi explained in a Reddit AMA, "...when I came up with the idea with the Yellow Squadron the developers came up with [Mobius] 1. It was a good environment where we were able to [inspire] each other." Yellow Squadron as a whole, and Yellow 13 in particular, is one of the most iconic and enduring elements of the entire Ace Combat franchise. The Yellow Squadron colours have appeared in nearly every post-04 Ace Combat in the franchise in one form or another, both on enemy Aces and as playable alternate paint schemes or DLC. And for the record, I try to make use of the Yellow livery as often as I can in multiplayer situations, as glimpsed in the Ace Combat Zero Multiplayer Disaster video and the Good Friday 2016 Extra Life stream of Ace Combat: Assault Horizon Legacy with Cirv and ACES, aka “the last thing I did before I went in the hospital and almost died of H1N1.” And I assure you that if we ever do dip into multiplayer for Ace Combat Infinity and Ace Combat 6, I will be flying Yellow colours there as well. And one last thing to point on w/r/t Yellow Squadron’s proper name. “Aquila” is Latin for eagle, and Yellow Squadron’s mission patch depicts both an eagle and the constellation Aquila itself. So you can clearly see what Albireo Squadron from Assault Horizon Legacy was trying its damndest to ape in retrospect, huh?   YELLOW 4 Real Name: Katie W[NAME REDACTED]* Callsign(s): Yellow 4 Age: Mid 20’s Sex: Female Nationality: Erusea Signature Plane: Su-37 Terminator Voice Actor: None The precise identity of the pilot known by the TAC name "Yellow 4" remains a mystery due to the Erusian government sealing, and in some cases destroying, the records of many of its top pilots and soldiers out of tactical paranoia. Partially recovered documents released by ISAF Intelligence reveal a portrait of by all outward accounts a model soldier, the envy of any military around the world. Flight Lieutenant Kathrine W[LAST NAME REDACTED] serves as the second-in-command of the vaunted Aqulia Squadron aka Yellow Squadron, the guardians of the Stonehenge superweapon and the crown jewel of the Federal Erusian Air Force. Unlike her fellow pilots on Yellow Squadron, and just like her commander, Yellow 4 forswore a pilot callsign and instead preferred to be referred to by her TAC number. Along with 13, she was one of the continuous presences on Yellow Squadron's roster. While other pilots would rotate in and out of Aquila, or head up other divisions of the squadron elsewhere on Usea, 4 remained a member of the core five of Aquila. Yellow 4, beyond that, serves as the eyes in the back of 13's head, protecting him from any and all threats both in the air and on the ground. The two have an inseparable relationship. She has been under 13's tutelage or command for nearly all of her career in the FEAF since graduating the air force academy in Farbanti, and rumor has it within Yellow Squadron and its on-ground flight crew that their relationship extends beyond that of commander-second or mentor-student, possibly into the realm of romance. Though with 4's stern professionalism and 13's aloof geniality, it's hard to tell, really. * The name "Katie W" comes from the behind the scenes storyboards showing an ad hoc kill count/squadron roster for Yellow Squadron written on the wall of the Sky Kid bar. While in the actual cutscene, many of the names are just scribbles, in the storyboard, multiple names are clearly legible including one that spells out Katie W--the rest of the name is covered over with a piece of paper tacked to the wall. It's the only female name included on the wall, and the Storyteller Boy notes that Yellow 4 is the only female pilot on Yellow Squadron's roster. Ipso facto...  VIDEO GAME CENSORSHIP Oh god yes let’s touch this topic with anything but a 30 foot pole.  Anyways, Shattered Skies has the distinction of being one of the few, if not the only game in the Ace Combat franchise that got whacked with the censorship stick. 04 had the unfortunate distinction of coming out hot on the heels of the September 11th, 2001 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington D.C., so certain intestinal elements were altered for its North American release which we will cover in a subsequent update. Beyond that, the frame narrative of 04 was also slightly darker in the Japanese version, which was altered in the North American and European releases to comport to, for lack of a better term, “Western” cultural sensitivities and to prevent the game from getting an M rating from the ESRB or an 18 rating from the PEGI, both of which would have severely limited the game’s mass market appeal. The scenes in question involve the Storyteller Boy’s various confrontations with Yellow 13 across the game. In the original Japanese version of this mission’s interlude, the Storyteller Boy is described as having pickpocketed both a knife and gun from an Erusian soldier, either of which he intends to kill 13 with when he confronts him. The vignette in question was edited and the line and frame depicting and describing the acquisition of the gun is removed. A subsequent frame showing the Storyteller Boy hiding the gun under his jacket as he prepares to face 13 is also redrawn to show his hand clearly visible over his coat and no gun in his possession. The remainder of the scene plays out as normal, but with the added tension of Yellow 4 managing to intimidate what she doesn’t even realize is an armed potential threat. Personally speaking, I think the censored version works a lot better than the original version. While the gun and knife may give the Storyteller Boy a degree of increased agency as a character, as well as show that he’s actually got a level of skill, determination, and perception beyond what you’d normally expect an average 12 year-old boy to possess, it also takes the story in an unneeded direction, in my opinion. The Storyteller Boy works better as a character driven by impotent and futile rage who learns to put that rage aside as he comes to see both Yellow 13 and Yellow 4 as people and eventually as friends. While the element of the knife and gun adds tension to the situation, it weakens the characterization over all. But that’s just my opinion. Additional instances of alternations to the game between versions will be highlighted as they appear, but they’re few and far between. 
Kadorhal posted:Ace Number Five is Mrkos. Named for Antonin Mrkos, born January 27th, 1918. Czech astronomer and, again so far, the most active of the game's namesakes, discovering thirteen comets and 274 asteroids between 1977 and 1991. He was also the second Czech citizen to set foot in Antarctica, and the first to reach the southern pole of inaccessibility, as a member of the 3rd Soviet Antarctic Expedition from 1957 to 1959; the second flag to ever be raised in Antarctica, in fact, was a Czech flag (after that of the USSR). He also came along with the 7th Expedition from 1961 to 1963 to study auroras. Died May 29th, 1996, at 78 years old. Tracks featured in Mission 5: DISC 1
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Oct 12, 2016 06:13
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Out of curiosity, did you get Jean-Louis and Gene's callsigns from storyboards as well? For what it's worth, their Terminator skins in Infinity show them as Yellow 21 and Yellow 18, respectively. But I'm confident we'll talk about these two a lot more later in the game.
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Oct 12, 2016 18:35
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ninjahedgehog posted:Out of curiosity, did you get Jean-Louis and Gene's callsigns from storyboards as well? For what it's worth, their Terminator skins in Infinity show them as Yellow 21 and Yellow 18, respectively. But I'm confident we'll talk about these two a lot more later in the game. No, unfortunately. I just pulled those out of my rear end because I wasn't aware they had actual canon numbers. Their names aren't shown on the Sky Kid wall roster in either the legible draft version or the semi-legible finished one, I just threw them up there because I had three spaces left over after adding in all the names that were visible/discernable. Plus it makes Megalith all the more hilarious if you imagine poor Jean-Louis and Gene to be the basement dwellers of Yellow Squadron 
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Oct 12, 2016 21:41
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Chapter 6: Bridge Convoy I have no idea what they're talking about. There's going to be a lot of destroying, mind you, but it's by no means mandatory.  These next two missions ought to be short and sweet. Definitely worth waiting two weeks for.  As mentioned, we're taking the Talon II for a spin this time around. Seems to be an okay machine, a definite all-rounder, but what does it have under the hood?  Why, only the best kind of missile, of course. We'll be needing this.  Because this mission is a bit heavy on the land units.  Looks like a lot of nothing to me, but if this is strategically valuable somehow, who am I to argue?  So yeah, nothing whatsoever about clearing a base out. We're actually protecting a truck convoy.  There's they, going at about the speed of a turtle on crutches. If you want a general idea of how long this mission takes, the timer will be at 30 seconds by the time we're finished. That's a lot of flying around in circles.  Our primary enemy will be our old friends, the tanks, driving slowly towards the convoy in the hope of taking potshots at it. Naturally, we need to head them off at the pass, and in doing so, we also can rack up the points for our sub-objective super quickly.  There are planes too, but as far as I can tell, they're never outfitted with bombs, so they're only a threat to us, personally.  Now as you may expect, not all of the tanks are within spitting distance of the convoy, so you have to abandon it and fly a distance away if you want to kill enough targets in time for the goal.  Still though, that 1200 point requirement is pretty generous with all the targets milling around.  With a minute and a half to spare, we're already at our quota, and it's just a matter of waiting.   Let's not do this mission again.  Ever. Mission 7: Airport Attack   Oh boy, we're bombing stuff again.  And wouldn't you know it, but the game's decided to give us just the right plane for the job.  We'll be going with napalm for this sortie, because all the targets are bunched up together, and it makes the level go by super fast.  You remember how Ace Combat 4 had an early mission involving bombing an airport? Good times.    : Aim for the control tower! Prevent the alarm!Sure thing, Chief, just so long as they don't-  Yeah, that.  I have never been able to do this mission without getting enemy reinforcements called on me. The radio tower is that radar dish-looking thing right there, I think, but before I can even get there, the planes always bust me. It's annoying.  On the plus side, all the structures and airplanes are lined up close together in an easily-bombable clump. A quick napalm sweep takes them out in short order.  As for the secondary targets, it's just about half a dozen SAMs in a perimeter around the site. This mission requires almost no flying at all.  That is quite a lot of planes though.  One refill later, we're already done, and thank goodness for that, since this mission only gives you about two and a half minutes to get it done in.   We are scary efficient at what we do. Coming Up: In a game about airplanes, we finally get an aerial target. I hope you're as excited as I am!  F-E Talon II Speed/Air-to-Air/Air-to-Ground/Mobility/Speed: Take everything that the Talon did and add numbers to it. Doesn't matter what numbers, just add them. 40 Air-to-Air Heat Seeking Missiles 20 Unguided Air-to-Ground Missiles 30 Homing Air-to-Ground Missiles 20 Precision Guided Bombs Analysis: Definitely an improvement over the original design. If the S rank planes didn't exist, this is the one that I think I'd be most comfortable using on a regular basis, since it does a good show at everything. UG-16 Hawk Speed: Eh. Air-to-Air: Not happening. Air-to-Ground: Best of all non-S Ranks. Mobility: Actually usable. Defense: Even sturdier than the last bomber. 40 Unguided Air-to-Ground Missiles 60 Homing Air-to-Ground Missiles 20 Napalm Bombs 20 Precision Guided Bombs Analysis: Hope you like anti-ground, because that's all you're getting with this one. Unlike its embarrassing cousin with the same name, this guy's actually good for something, and that something is blowing stuff up.
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Oct 14, 2016 06:01
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I keep feeling like I need to apologize to you every time you post one of these updates, Blast.
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Oct 14, 2016 10:07
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Is there a reason you posted about the oil bombing mission again?
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Oct 14, 2016 14:28
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nine-gear crow posted:I keep feeling like I need to apologize to you every time you post one of these updates, Blast. Well, if it's any consolation, the game only has 12 missions. We should have this thing wrapped up in 3-4 more updates.
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Oct 14, 2016 17:37
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Ah, another busy week for me. Missions 17 to 19: One-Way Ticket, Bug Hunt, Blackbird Part 06: Planes, Trains, and Deadly Nanobots (wingman: Kadorhal) Not sure what happened over the past few days, we went on a massive bender. For all I know we were in space, but that's not important. What is important is how we missed the train to school this morning, and no amount of toast in our mouth was going to make it any easier catching back up. Apparently that stupid nerd Neumann tried to impress Megan with his computer skills by putting a virus on the school's network, and then had the nerve to ask us to help fix it all when it got out of control. Of course we helped, since it gave us an opportunity to go "we're in" in a hacker voice, but then our friends at the General Resources frat house decided we were friends with Neumann and threw stuff at us from the rooftop on the way home. This is all getting so confusing. Maybe it would just be best to not align ourselves with any particular group of people, and be a mysterious loner instead. Seemed to work out well for Nighthawk.  This set of missions, and the one in the previous video, are good examples of what happens when you have to create a new framework without the same story, but still using the same missions. On the one hand, you get Reaching For Stars and Guardian Angel, which were in different routes in the original game and also work with the narrative of constantly working for a wholesome UPEO. You help the shuttle take off, and you help it land again; makes perfect sense. On the other hand, you get the unique missions, like Bug Hunt, Zero Gravity, and the Blackbird missions, and they were obviously inclined to keep them in, because they were really cool, yet there is no good way to do so and keep it logical with the meagre story the game has. The only reason Blackbird is a handful of missions after Stratosphere, practically, is because the Blackbird controls so terribly that they clearly needed to give players a break between the two missions. On the plus side, the gameplay in all of these gimmicky missions is still really fun, so it just about balances out the lack of an engaging framing device or much else going on.   (Does this break tables? Is that still a concern?) Buggy Huntsman is a special nanovirus created by that stupid nerd Neumann, in efforts to woo Megan Float. I guess by deleting her term paper. Things went awry, and Buggy became sentient, and tried to shutdown power for several city blocks, shoot individual people with space lasers, turn off gravity; you know, the usual stuff. Long story short, we stepped in to help for a couple of hours, made friends with them, and now they live in our computer as a Bit-Beast. This has been a bit of a weird school year, all told. frozentreasure fucked around with this message at 11:38 on Jan 4, 2017 |
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Oct 15, 2016 04:53
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frozentreasure posted:(Does this break tables? Is that still a concern?) http://i.imgur.com/l3ljyEJ.mp4 no, it doesn't--and i don't think anyone is bothered anymore
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Oct 15, 2016 06:50
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Operation Bunker Shot Mission 9: Operation Bunker Shot – January 24th, 2005 Overview: ISAF’s long-planned invasion of the Usean mainland begins as ground troops make landfall on the Seal’s Bridge peninsula, just outside of Stonehenge’s firing radius. Mobius 1 and the ISAF air strike team are tasked with providing top cover for the landing operation as well as eliminating Erusean artillery positions further inland to clear the way for the ground troops.  Guest Commentator: We welcome yet another newcomer to the commentary stable with this mission. Today I am joined by LEGO Genetics, because he volunteered to be here. He doesn't have any LPs to plug either his own or anyone else's, but if he eventually wants me to plug something here I will edit this line in the update... (If you're still reading this line on the LP Archive, you can infer how this bit went ) BUNKER SHOT Today’s “Crow Explains Things That Are Out Of His Depth” is all about golf. And my exact experiences with golf involve many rounds of minigolf as a small child, a few sporatic weekends with my father swigging a club in a field or at a driving range, touring a few local golf courses but not actually playing on any of them, a Saturday night binging Kuvo’s Neo Turf Masters LP, and a few disastrous games of Golf With Your Friends with a select core of the Team Frog Nugget Discord crew. Mission 9, meanwhile, takes its name from a particularly tricky golf shot known as, pointedly enough, the bunker shot. In the loosest possible terms, a bunker shot is any golf swing made during a golf game in order to get a golf ball out of a sand trap (formally known as a bunker) after it has landed one from a previous swing. Getting a ball out of a bunker is a particularly difficult task in golf, due the bunker’s sand lining and often its craterous shape. The loose sand often makes getting clean contact with the ball difficult thereby diminishing the power transferred from the club to the ball and other physics type stuff that ultimately translates to you having a hell of a time trying to get the ball out of that hole. They don’t call them “hazards” for nothing, people  An “Explosion Bunker Shot,” meanwhile, is described as a bunker shot that sends both the ball and an accompanying spray of sand onto the green.  ISAF COUNTERSTRIKE This mission in particular is one of the major turning points of the war with Erusea. With the Erusean bomber flights and the Aegir Fleet destroyed, ISAF GHQ is safe from any foreseeable attack by the Eruseans, taking the pressure off the Allies to allow them to plan and conduct this invasion attempt. The satellite launched from Comona has already provided valuable intel on Erusean troop positions and movements, as well as allow for clearer and more frequent communication with ISAF and civilian resistance fronts behind the Erusean lines in places like Los Canas, and San Salvacion. However, ISAF still faces an intense fight ahead of it. Though similar landing efforts to Operation Bunker Shot have been made along the entire east coast of Usea, ISAF’s ground forces are still vastly outnumbered and outgunned by the Eruseans, and at present only 20% of the continent can be viably liberated. The rest of Usea still remains largely inaccessible under Stonehenge’s firing umbrella. Any attempt to push inland beyond the Tango Line and hold territory remains doomed to failure until Stonehenge is destroyed.   ACE COMBAT DOES HISTORY Yep, it’s time once again for Ace Combat Does History… Poorly. We return to Ace Combat’s favorite historical haunt, World War II, for this mission, specifically the D-Day landing. This mission is basically “D-Day With Modern Fighter Planes,” in terms of historical replication. Much like the actual Normandy landing operation from World War II (codenamed Operation Neptune), it revolves around a massive allied force making landfall from the sea at a set of strategic beaches in order to establish a foothold on an occupied continent in an effort to repulse the invaders and liberate the continent. This mission as even features the exact same troop carrier landing crafts originally used in World War II itself, as seen in the concept sketches down below. The three codenames of the beaches featured in this mission; Crowne, Halle, and Cranada; are reminiscent of the six codenamed beaches that the Allies landed on in Normandy; Utah, Pointe du Hoc, Omaha, Gold, Juno, and Sword. The landing resulted in a decisive Allied victory and the establishment of a foothold on mainland Europe and set the Allies on the path of beating back the Nazis from all occupied areas, eventually leading to their downfall and a complete Allied victory in Europe. So you can probably see where things in 04 are going to be going from here on out…  PRIMING THE FIRES One of the real fun things about playing the older games for this LP project has been going back and finding the DNA of what would eventually become other Ace Combat games hidden in plain sight throughout Shattered Skies. Every modern Ace Combat, for better or worse, has been built on the bones of 04. After playing the later games and then coming back to 04, certain parts of the game really stand out and you can go “oh, so THAT’S where that comes from.” We saw the genesis of the massive air battles in Zero last time in Comona, and the inspiration for certain big giant superweapon boss battle missions is coming up in the near future. But for here and now, this mission primarily played a big role in inspiring a large chunk of Ace Combat 6: Fires of Liberation. Fires of Liberation features several missions of this sort where you are playing air support for the soldiers on the ground and hopping between different parts of the battlefield essentially carrying out sub-missions on a pop up basis. And just like in this mission, you get the sense that while you’re playing an important part of the battle in your own right, the real meat of the mission is actually taking place on the ground outside your purview. All the base elements of 6 are there in this mission, they just need a little more mechanical refinement before they assume the form we see them in in Fires of Liberation. 
Kadorhal posted:Ace Number Nine is Tuttle. Named for Horace Parnell Tuttle, born March 17th, 1837. American astronomer and Civil War veteran who served the Union, first in the Army, then as a paymaster for the Navy, primarily stationed on the monitor ship USS Catskill. Discovered two comets and fifteen asteroids between 1857 and 1888; in particular, in January 1866 he independently discovered the same 55P comet previously discovered by Tempel the prior December; the comet is now named for both of them. Died August 16th, 1923, at 86 years old. Tracks featured in Mission 9: DISC 1 Concept art of the gameplan for this mission and shots of the three beaches:      
nine-gear crow fucked around with this message at 06:16 on May 3, 2021 |
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Oct 16, 2016 09:08
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nine-gear crow posted:
 Pointe du Hoc isn't a beach, or indeed codenamed. Rather, it's the cliff face and high point between Utah and Omaha fortified by the Germans as an artillery and observation post, and officially part of Omaha's purview. This is one of my favourite missions in the game, mostly for the "shooting fish in a barrel" section taking down the A-10s
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Oct 16, 2016 12:59
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