How to play
SKY ACES is an arcade dogfighting game in a bright cartoon sky. A little pilot in goggles and a flapping scarf flies an open cockpit over a sea of islands, a harbour town and a lighthouse. Your first visit drops you straight into the first mission.
With the default mouse aim, click the game to lock the mouse, then move it to put the white circle where you want to go and the plane rolls and pulls to follow it. If the mouse is not locked, how far the cursor is from the middle of the screen steers instead. W A S D fly the plane directly whenever you hold them (S pulls up, W pushes down, A and D roll), and Settings can make keyboard flying the default.
Left click or Space fires the guns, which heat up: watch the GUNS bar, because an overheat stops them for a moment. Right click or F fires a missile. Shift boosts, Q and E do a barrel roll, C looks behind you, Esc pauses and M mutes. On a phone, your left thumb moves a stick that steers the aim circle, and buttons on the right cover FIRE, BOOST, MSL and ROLL.
Tips and strategy
Lead your shots. Bullets take time to fly, so a small marker appears ahead of the enemy nearest your aim. Put that marker in your sights, not the plane itself.
Lock before you launch. Keep a target inside the dashed ring until the LOCK label shows, then fire. A missile fired without a lock just flies straight. Locked missiles still turn slowly, so a target close up can out-turn them.
Roll when you hear the beeping. A red warning and a beep mean a missile is on you. A barrel roll timed while it is within about 280 metres shakes it off four times out of five, and rolling also throws off enemy gunners.
Watch your speed. Climbing costs speed, diving gains it and hard turns bleed it. Get too slow and the plane stalls: the nose drops and the controls go soft.
Break off to repair. In the campaign and endless mode, six seconds without being hit lets your plane slowly patch itself up.
Airships: turrets first. The hull takes only a third of the damage while any turret is still firing. Shoot the turrets, then hit the two engine pods, which are weak points that also slow the ship.
What's in it
Campaign: ten missions that unlock in order, from three rookie raiders over Gull Bay to a duel with the ace Red Baroness, bomber raids on the harbour that you must stop, armoured airships, three top aces at once, and the raider flagship, the Leviathan. Each mission pays money and earns one to three stars for the health you kept and how quickly you won. From mission 4, blue friendly wingmen fly with you.
Endless waves: survive as long as you can. Bombers join every third wave, an ace every fifth and an airship every tenth, and your best wave is saved.
Online: up to eight planes, peer to peer. One player hosts and friends join with a room code or link, with bots filling the empty slots. Play free-for-all to 10 kills or two teams to 20, with a four-minute limit.
The hangar: money from kills, missions and online placings buys five planes, the Sparrow biplane, the Kestrel fighter, the heavy Bulldog, the twin-boom Hornet and the Comet jet. Each has seven upgrade tracks, from gun damage and extra wing guns to armour, engine and missiles.
Enemy pilots range from rookies to named aces. They line up shots before they fire, climb away to regain speed when they are slow, break and jink when you sit on their tail, and fly with wingmen. Hits show on the planes too: smoke, then fire, then a burning spiral and a fireball.
Questions
Do I need an account? No. Your money, planes, upgrades, stars and best wave are saved in your browser.
The mouse is too fast or slow. Settings has an aim sensitivity slider, an invert pitch switch, and a choice between mouse aim and keyboard flying.
Does online need a download? No. It needs an internet connection to find other players. Campaign and endless mode work offline.
Is it violent? Planes are shot down in cartoon explosions and falling wreckage. No people are shown being hurt.