Forget the bad reviews, this game is by far the best sim on console, I played Wing Over 2 back on PS1, Energy Airforce and also Birds of Steel on PS3. Aero Elite beats each one of them when it comes to flight physics. **** aren't too special that's its biggest downside and BoS does that better but If what you're looking for is the best simulation of flight then look no further. Each plane feels different and they take practice to land, specially carrier landings, there's also a pretty decent roster that includes some popular planes like the F86, Mirage2000, F104, Harrier, and so many more, there's also a couple choppers and heavy planes. You can change the loadout of your craft too effectively changing its weight and feel, for example, landing an F4 Phantom fully loaded on a carrier is really difficult. If you compare it to Energy Airforce, in EA it's a walk in the park.. this is the ultimate sim for console and a real shame SEGA abandoned the series.

The game is truly held back by it's frustration factor. The game itself tries to be a more realistic sim, in which it does succeed. The scramble missions are a lot of fun and the flight model itself is fairly responsive. However, the arbitrary speed limit is a huge downer. Even in electrical system failures which knocks out your airspeed indicator and altimeter (Something that wouldn't happen in a real aircraft as the pitot-static system is mechanical) you still have that asinine speed limit. To make matters worse, there's an aircraft that needs you to hit Mach 2 to acquire it. Have fun constantly going into free flight over and over and over again trying to break mach two, but not go over the speed limit. This strikes me as the developers attempt to add challenge and it just comes off as inane. The murky scenario descriptions do nothing to aid you at all and the finicky system in which the completion of objectives comes off absolutely arbitrary as well. This is especially an issue in the Recon missions. The rotary winged vehicles are beyond awful. Why did they even bother adding them to the game? To try and squish down the complex workings of a helicopter's throttle collective into two buttons is, in itself, unrealistic and stupid. They should have either just kept the controls simple (as they did with a jets and not include a spool up time) or not include the choppers at all. The visuals are lack luster but given it's age that is to be expected. The aircraft are modeled very accurate and it doesn't look so bad as to repulse, so the visuals have aged in a satisfactory fashion. What good can be said about the game is often over shadowed by the bad. Enemy aircraft all seem to handle the same and enemy ground targets see you through mountains and hills (yet another reason why the rotary winged section is not worth your time. The developers should have spent more time with making missions for the utility craft (US-1A and C-1) and perhaps a campaign as opposed to even including helicopters. In the end, AECA tries to appeal to both Ace Combat and Sim fans, and fails at both. AC fans will cling to their great trilogy on the PS2 and sim fans are incredibly better off with Lock On: Modern Air combat.