The flight sim genre is one which has taken a lot of knocks, and is now roundly considered to mostly be something of the past, but there are a few games – like the Ace Combat series – which offer islands of perpetual hope for the genre, and it is that hope for resurgence which has clearly underpinned the decision to release this tie-in to the classic Tom Cruise air jocks film.
There are obvious attempts to trade on the Top Gun spirit – to be honest, using the title but ignoring the film would have been sacrilege – with the familiar music almost played on a loop, and a clear parallel in both film and game's spirit. It's all very macho in content, as you'd expect, but there's also an aesthetic agenda of familiarity: the visuals are played through a filter, which adds grain, robs very fine detail and gives everything that adrenaline soaked 80s action flick feel.
All in all it's not a bad looking game, environments are pretty enough without being horribly distracting, and the planes themselves are realistic and impressive. The effects too are well executed, and it makes for a strong surface for the flight sim – but really it's substance we are interested in.
The star of the game's substance is undoubtely the Hard Lock combat system, which certainly takes tips from Ace Combat: Assault Horizon's Close Range Assault mode. Manouevre behind your target and lock on and the game shifts to on-rails, during which the player only controls the aim, with the objective to stay on the tail of your prey achieved through following control prompts with the analogue sticks. It might not be the most complex control mechanic, but the resultant air acrobatics are fun and good to look at, and it's definitely Top Gun: Hard Lock's chief selling point (hence the title).
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