One of Ace Combat 8’s Hardest Missions Was Inspired By Godzilla

Ace Combat is already known for being one of the stranger video game franchises narratively, but it has still tried to remain as grounded as possible in its gameplay, particularly when it comes to the design of its aircraft and their mechanics. Each entry has featured a wide range of authentic aircraft, and even its fictional jets usually look like something that could belong in the real world if military technology were pushed just a little further than it currently is. That balance is part of what makes the series work, and Ace Combat 8: Wings of Theve is continuing that tradition with a version of near-future warfare that feels just believable enough to accept, even when it’s asking players to go up against something as ridiculous as a land battleship tearing through a city.

I recently attended a First Look event at Orbital Studios in Los Angeles for Ace Combat 8: Wings of Theve, during which I got nearly six hours of hands-on time with the game and an opportunity to hear more about it from brand director Kazutoki Kono. Little did I know that one of the hardest missions I played during the preview, Mission 9, was apparently inspired by Godzilla, according to Kono. If that’s not an indication of how far Ace Combat 8 is willing to stretch its own version of reality, I don’t know what is. Still, what made that mission work so well is that it never felt completely out of place. It was wild, sure, but it still felt like Ace Combat, and that is a much harder balance to strike than it might sound.

Ace Combat 8 Walks a Fine Line Between Reality and Fiction

Ace Combat has always been a series that asks players to accept a very specific version of reality. Its aircraft need to feel recognizable, its warfare needs to feel close enough to something real, and its fictional ideas need to feel exciting without pushing the whole thing too far into military science fiction. That’s a difficult line to walk, especially for a game like Ace Combat 8: Wings of Theve, which is clearly interested in taking the series’ version of near-future warfare even further than Ace Combat 7 did. According to Kono, the team starts by making sure the world has a believable foundation before it begins stretching beyond it:

Well, first is establishing a baseline that is believable. So, we want to make sure that our reality line is something that can be imagined. That begins with a lot of research and just collecting data on what the current state of warfare looks like and then trying to imagine ever so slightly into the future what it might look like.

That foundation seems especially important because Ace Combat only works when players can believe in the world before the game starts bending it. No one is going into Ace Combat 8 expecting a military sim, but the jets, weapons, and battlefield still need to feel like they belong together. Once that part is established, the series has more room to introduce the kind of ideas that would probably feel ridiculous anywhere else.

Ace Combat 8’s Ninth Mission Was Inspired by Godzilla

That philosophy couldn’t have been more clear in one of the most challenging levels I played during the preview. This particular mission tasks players with taking down a land battleship that is tearing through the city of Theve, but what makes it so difficult is that it frequently feels like nothing can stop it. No matter how much you try, it just keeps mowing down everything in its path, and things get even more complicated when an army of Swarm Drones shows up to prevent your missiles from hitting the battleship. On top of that, you’re fighting against the clock as well as enemy UAVs that regularly spawn in the area. I didn’t get to play through the entire mission for spoiler reasons, but even after reaching the end of the portion I was allowed to preview, the ship was apparently still alive and well.

As Kono continued explaining how Ace Combat 8 blurs that line between fiction and reality, he actually began talking about what I’m almost certain was that ninth mission that gave me so much grief. He didn’t explicitly mention it was that mission, but after playing it and hearing his description, I’m convinced it’s the one he was referring to:

We have battleships that can go on the ground and land and surface, which, I know, is a bit further out in sort of that stretch of imagination. But that was something that our mech designer came up with, and he wanted some kind of scene where Godzilla destroys the city. So, that was almost an homage or throwback to Godzilla. So, we thought, how do we create that feel but make it at least within the realm of believability.

After playing that mission myself, I can see exactly what Kono means. A land battleship plowing through Theve should probably be too much, even for Ace Combat, but it worked because the game never presented it like a joke. It was a ridiculous premise, but it was also a serious threat, and that made all the difference. I was too busy trying to survive, clear a path through the Swarm Drones, and keep the thing from reaching its target to stop and think about how absurd the whole setup was.

That’s why Mission 9 feels like such a clear example of how Ace Combat handles fiction. It’s outlandish, but it’s not random. The game is still pulling from the same military foundation as the rest of the series, then pushing it far enough to create something players will remember. Kono described that approach as a matter of knowing how far reality can bend before it breaks:

We try to take what we know is real and believable and then kind of bend reality to the point where it’s a bit of a stretch, but okay, I’ll let it slide. We dig pretty deep in our research and how we convey that across the screen, which ultimately, I think, lends itself to Ace Combat’s own sort of reality line that people have come to like.

Regardless of how difficult it was, that’s ultimately why Mission 9 made such a strong impression on me. The idea of a land battleship tearing through a city because the team wanted something that felt like Godzilla could have easily sounded ridiculous in the wrong hands, but this is the team behind Ace Combat we’re talking about. With eight mainline entries on its belt now, the developer seems to know what it’s doing. Wings of Theve is still grounded enough to make its world worth buying into, but it’s also strange enough to give players the kind of over-the-top action and spectacle this series has always been known for. If Mission 9 is any indication, Ace Combat 8 isn’t backing away from that identity but is instead leaning into it with more confidence than ever.