User:TheZig34
Hello there!
After making my share of contributions to Acepedia, I figured I can write my user page, if anyone's interested in my person.
I come from northern Poland, Pomeranian Voivodeship. Ace Combat is a very obscure franchise around here. I've met less Polish fans than I can count on my fingers. Despite those odds, my first contact with Ace Combat was in October 2017, in a video made by a duo of Polish Youtubers from KieubasaPlay channel. However back then it didn't spark my interest. How little I knew...
Around February/March 2022 I've grown interested (due to certain event, east of Poland, but I don't want to invlove politics on Acepedia) in military tech, mainly tanks and other ground vehicles, but also history, mostly WW2, filling a spot after my dying interest in automotive and cars, or Fallout series (which today I strongly dislike, save for Fallout 2). At the time I started feed my thirst for tank battles in World of Tanks Blitz. STAY AWAY FROM IT! It's a horrible and extremely addictive game that isn't worth your time. I regret every second I wasted on it. However an unexpected rescue came from my friend, who recommended me a inconspicious indie game, Ravenfield. It was like a gift from god. Super moddable, and very fun. I could play whatever tank battles I imagined, between any nations, factions, and vehicles (Centurion tank my beloved <3). Later in the year I've become more fascinated by aircraft however. In addition I begun to play more cold war, and eventually, modern warfare battles. Then the day came...
Entymology
Before that, origin of my nickname. I used to be a car guy (well, still AM, but only slightly), but left because current car community is toxic as hell. I ran a vehicular RP Discord server with my friends. One day I have created a parody of Top Gear's The Stig in GTA 5, a guy in aqua blue racing suit and black helmet. My friends named this character, "The Zig". At the time I was also looking for a way to separate from my old edgy nicknames. Thus I figured The Zig is a great candidate. I don't know if I will ever change it, doubt it. And 34 comes from R34... No, not the green site, the Nissan Skyline R34.
First contact with the series (for real this time)
November 2022. I finally get my hands on Ace Combat 7: Skies Unknown for the first time. I never knew that it will leave such huge impact on me. Huge universe, lots of planes and special weapons to play with, beautiful graphics, tons of small details, and addictive gameplay. I rate Ace Combat 7 9/10 today. Phenomenal game.
I don't remember which game I have played next, when I decided to explore the games. Therefore I'll put them in the order in which I believe I have played them.
- Ace Combat Zero: The Belkan War - 11/10. My absolute favorite game in the series. Played via PCSX2 emulator. Great characters, plane list, dark, gritty setting, heavy morals, world burning around you, and Cipher who cannot withdraw and has to carry on no matter what, and the bitter pill to swallow in form of Pixy's final interview. To this day Zero remains my favorite Ace Combat, and game ever.
- Ace Combat: Assault Horizon - 7/10. Played on PC, Enhanced Edition. Say whatever you want, but I did enjoy this game at first, and still do. Great visuals, fantastic sound effects and soundtrack, and decent (but not staggering) characters. DFM is purely optional, and most of the game can be played without it, so I don't hate it as much as most fans. I still play it from time to time, and find it to be a good entertainment. No regrets.
- Ace Combat X: Skies of Deception - 8/10. I've played it on my phone for the first time, and bounced off it. The touchscreen controls on PPSSPP were unbearable so I voided this game for a while. Returned to it on PC, and loved it at first, on normal difficulty. I think it did a fantastic job at porting ACE04 experience to PSP. It has good story, fine characters, and great plane list, altho upgrade system is bad, limited only to original aircraft, which wastes its potential. However my opinion changed on it when I begun to 100% the games, and i tried Hard, and Ace difficulty... Oh boy it was a torture. Sluggish controls, paired with emulator's input lag. I begun to hate this game from this point. No game before or after X was such a pain to play. Thus I avoid it nowadays, I just don't enjoy playing it. Anymore.
After those 3 games, I have decided to play the strangereal games in chronological order. Today after playing all of them, I think that most games are pretty self-contained, so you don't need to play earlier games to understand their stories.
- Air Combat - 5/10. Played on DuckStation. I didn't expect much and still got disappointed. Even for 1995 the graphics are terrible, and draw distance gives me a headache. Compare it to stuff like DOOM and DOOM 2, which are even older and not 3D, and still look much better. First half of the game I find really boring, and want to skip through ASAP. In second half I find it more and more enjoyable with every mission and better plane. I also like Phoenix paint scheme a lot. Soundtrack is fine too, but overall I don't enjoy this game. Played it only twice and probably won't try it again.
- Ace Combat 2 - 10/10. Played on DuckStation. After Air Combat, my expectations towards ACE2 have been vastly lowered. To my shock it turned out to be a phenomenal game, and I played through it without a break. Fantastic soundtrack (Second only to MGR:R imo), much better missions than Air Combat, nice graphics, great plane list, and of course Phoenix and Scarface Squadron, with their awesome paint schemes, and the introduction of original planes, Falken and XFA-27. I replay it to this day, because I love it.
- Ace Combat 04: Shattered Skies or Distant Thunder here in Europe - 10/10. Played on PCSX2. Masterpiece of gameplay. Powerful SP Weapons, great but small plane list, nice graphics for 2001, and X-02 Wyvern of course. Loses to Zero only because of less engaging (at least for me) story and not-so-memorable characters.
- Ace Combat 5: The Unsung War or Squadron Leader here in Europe - 6/10. Played on PCSX2. I believe I wasn't disappointed only because people warned me a lot about it. Unnecessarily stretched story, bloated plane list, useless cutscenes, and loooots of padding (I'm talking about you Final Option). Story in general is okay I guess, but OH GOD I HATE YOU SO MUCH NAGASE! I play this game even less than X and AH, let that sink in.
- Ace Combat 6: Fires of Liberation - 9/10. Played on Xenia. Massively underrated, but only due to Xbox exclusivity, not game quality. Easily my favorite gameplay in the series. Gigantic battles, cool ally characters, allied support mechanic, and graphics that hold up very well even today. However it loses to 04 because of its abysmal cutscenes, Melissa's terrible and boring character arc, and everyone repeating this stupid GO DANCE WITH THE ANGELS-
Between 6 and 3, I have played through Joint Assault. I'll not waste my breath (or keyboard to be realistic) on this game. It's horrible. 1/10.
- Ace Combat 3: Electrosphere - 8/10. The most... esoteric(?) entry in the series. With 5 different storyline branches, lots of cutscenes, and really deep lore, that puts you before many questions, about your own morals and ideals. Story itself is great, I think it's a masterpiece of writing in the series, and characters are very well written as well. However its gameplay is a huge letdown. For some reason this game went for more realistic physics, and missile lead mechanic, which makes enemy missile impossible to dodge at times, which results in 90% of deaths in this game, other than crashing. Plane choice is even more limited than in Assault Horizon, locking lots of planes behind certain factions, and even tho it makes sense from plot standpoint, it still limits the player's freedom a lot. Glad there's mission simulation to make up for that. Still I wasn't blown away by this game as much as I hoped to. Perhaps it was because I have spoiled most of it, thinking I will never play it in my life, and ruining the experience. Who knows.
I won't play Advance, Northern Wings, or Assault Horizon Legacy, at least not any time soon. Two first games are somehow worse than JA, and AHL just doesn't interest me.
On the other hand, Infinity, oh boy Infinity... I owned a PS3 at the time it was still up, but didn't know about the series, so sadly for me, I've missed this opportunity, probably forever. However if Infinity servers will ever be up again somehow (emulators or modding or whatever) I will play it, to see what I've been missing.