There are a few other little tricks and changes too (like the ability for the popular replay mode to finally save replay tracks for later viewing, and a new controversial “High-G Turn” button to turn insanely fast at a severe cost of airspeed), all of which make for a pretty novel campaign experience. Adding onto it is a tremendously gorgeous graphics engine which takes just the right balance of detailed texture-work and motion blur effects to create a convincing real-time drama. The framerates stay high too, and I was also happy to see much more detail added to the cockpits (including animated gauges), though surprisingly the game still lacks any real form of damage detail or modeling beyond some slight flame effects on the wings after heavy damage is taken. However, we are sadly still stuck in the “bloom is the new lens-flare” stage of the industry, and the missions in the game either offer an array of carefully-balanced beautiful colors, or an arsenal of ungodly lighting effects that can literally blind you and make it impossible to target or fly properly when looked at the wrong way. Some if it is realistic (and may even be implemented for tactical or gameplay reasons), but I kept feeling a lot of the bloom could have been scaled back ever-so-slightly to keep a more consistent artistic feel and to avoid impacting the gameplay so negatively.

As a nice bonus, the game also finally offers some online multiplayer support. On paper, Fires of Liberation has an impressive resume, with promises of general and team-based deathmatches, an objective-based “Siege” mode, and even co-op support. However, in practice there are a few evident problems. The very first is that no pre-mission briefings or snippets of information for the various levels are available, which isn’t really a problem for deathmatch, but can prove to be an issue when you’re getting a group of players together to square off in “Siege” mode for the very first time and don’t know what kind of planes you should be taking.

A second complaint is the simple lack of content; disappointingly the game only offers a pair of co-op maps and a single Siege level, with only a smattering of secondary missions for the more generic gameplay modes. Match-making also feels flimsy (there is no way to change missions without re-hosting an entire session, for example), and I generally found that the entire match would end if a single player dropped from the match. Multiplayer shows a lot of promise and novelty, but is in a very undeveloped state right now and needs far more work and content to really feel practical for long-term gameplay.

Now let’s discuss the most interesting part of this game: the controller bundle. Much like its predecessor, the “Ace Edge” is literally a slightly modified Saitek X36, but this time they took the changes a bit further to add some practicality to the bundle. A microphone jack and integrated “Guide” button are both thoughtfully included to let you access voice chat and your friends list, without having to grab a normal controller first (and the joystick works just fine with the Xbox dashboard). Ace Combat 6 also takes native advantage of more buttons on the stick than previous games, even setting the otherwise-useless “mode” switch to a function that turns the microphone on or off. The stick seems to emulate normal Xbox input bindings, so it could even be theoretically used in other games; though I haven’t heard terribly fond results yet of attempts to use it with, say, Chrome Hounds.

More importantly however, the joystick works out of the box with any PC with an installation of Windows XP or Vista and a free USB port. Simply plug the stick in and have it look online for drivers, and it will install automatically as a usable input device. The fact that I didn’t have to wait for hacked drivers filled me with initial glee, but this very rapidly turned to disappointment. While the stick works fine for basic tasks, a silly thing you’ll quickly pick up on is the fact that the rudder controls, and the throttle itself share the same input axis. This makes it literally impossible to configure that side of the stick for, say, separated torso-twisting and speed control in Mechwarrior 4, and in fact makes the stick otherwise useless for most complex games. The lack of effort put into any PC drivers cheapens the experience considerably and seriously damages the lasting value of the new controller bundle; I do hope considerations are in place to put out a proper driver package in the future.

Ultimately, the game provides beautiful graphics and (with the controller) an intensely immersive experience, but just keeps tripping over itself in its attempt to excel or provide new and interesting features. It’s a great game that I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend in an instant over the other flight-combat games released for the Xbox 360 to date, but only as a standalone product. If paired with the controller bundle, it’s only worth purchasing if you’re a die-hard for getting the most immersive experience possible out of a game (like me), or just happen to lack any other decent controllers for your PC and are optimistic that a decent driver release will come out soon. Otherwise, just stick with the non-controller bundle for now – your wallet will thank you.