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With the Ace Combat series transitioning to the improved power and graphical capabilities of the PlayStation 2 for the first time, Namco decided that the 4th entry in the series would serve as a pseudo-reboot. Though the third entry, Electrosphere, is now commonly praised as one of the franchise greats (provided you are playing the original story and not the translation), at the time, reception was modest, and it failed to grow the series on a commercial level as well.

The branching story paths in AC3 were ditched in favor of a more streamlined narrative, and missions leaned more heavily towards the arcade aspect of the "simcade" flying game. It paid off; not only did Ace Combat 04: Shattered Skies become the series' bestselling title (a distinction it held for almost two decades), but it also heralded the start of what many fans refer to as the PS2 Golden Trilogy. Offering Ace Combat like it had never been seen before, AC04 successfully built the foundation that its sequels would follow, offering solid mechanics and tight controls, while also stripping back just a bit too much from its predecessor.

Ace Combat was already pushing the graphical capabilities of the PS1, but on new hardware, the series was really able to shine with a much longer draw distance, a rock-steady 60 frames per second, and much more detailed geography. The game looks great, and even more importantly, it controls great. Traversal can vary a great deal depending on the type of plane you're piloting, but movement is slick, turns are responsive, and you always feel like you are in absolute control of your aircraft.

Dogfighting as a result feels great in AC04, and as a bonus, it allows for players to more heavily rely on their machine guns, encouraging a more natural and satisfying feel for aerial duels. You're also given a more than suitable roster of potential planes and weapon upgrades, allowing you to choose those that better fit your style and your mission. On their first step into the new generation, Namco delivered a nearly perfect-feeling simcade experience.

Whether that experience is utilized properly in the relatively limited mission structure of Shattered Skies is more of a point of contention. Part of the simplification of gameplay means that most of the missions are score-attack based with a time limit. It's one of the only titles in the series where both its predecessor and successor have more complex mission structures. That doesn't mean AC04's base gameplay is bad; far from it. Its length is short enough that it can easily justify its mostly arcade-style gameplay, and it does help accentuate the unique missions more.

But it should also be noted that a lot of these score attack missions focus largely on air-to-ground combat, which means you both spend less time engaging in high-stakes, high-intensity air combat that Ace Combat prides itself on and also means that you might lose out on a chunk of the exhilaration that comes with destroying an enemy that can actually fight back. In fact, your most likely foe in this title is likely to be the environment; crashes via terrain are an order of magnitude more likely than you being shot out of the sky. It should go without saying based on the previous comment that air-to-air fighting in this game is not quite as enthralling as it should be.

There are moments, though, when you get a taste for the thrill that Ace Combat has to offer, and those most often come at the arrival of the enemy Yellow Squadron. Their first arrival is particularly tense, especially as they are the first enemy you are advised to flee from instead of confront directly. (They are, as it turns out, impossible to down in their debut mission, so those who try will certainly get a feel for their aerial prowess.)

This is amplified by squadron leader Yellow 13's role in the story, who features prominently in narration between missions. But while Y13 is a fine character, Ace Combat 04 doesn't push the envelope in regard to narrative weight nearly as much as Electrosphere did. If you're coming to Ace Combat for the series's well-established nuanced narratives and takes on war in general, a rebel force overcoming a unilaterally evil fascist regime (Yellow Squadron notwithstanding) is unlikely to meet your expectations.

That is a sour note of Ace Combat 04's status as a soft reboot, and it's one that would certainly be paid more attention to in its sequels. But while it might not have the story or challenge that you might have hoped for from an Ace Combat title, it still marks potentially the best entry point in the series for newcomers, providing modern controls and impressive PS2 graphics while also establishing a gameplay and worldbuilding foundation that future games could add on to. And though those PS2 sequels are a bit more beloved, Ace Combat 04 will always be fondly remembered as the game that kick-started an iconic trilogy.

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