Time Ace is one of Konami’s new franchises for the Nintendo DS, and it is a good example of how good ideas cannot work without good execution. Developed by Trainwreck, Time Ace is a shooter/flight simulator that tells the story about a scientist called Dr. Hugo Clock, who developed a time machine capable of flying around several historical eras. Unfortunately, the scientist (that’s you) discovers that his assistant Dr. Klaus Scythe turns out to be a very capable thief. He steals the time machine to further his plan for world domination. Because Clock’s plan was to stop World War I, it forces him to grab his old plane (which also has time traveling powers) and fix things once and for all.

If Time Ace reminds you of Star Fox, it’s because it plays a lot like it. Its roots are in rail-shooting, but like Star Fox, there are some parts of the game (specifically the boss sections) where you can fly in a free, open environment. The game is mission-based, and will have you flying across many historical places, and utilizing plenty of historical aircrafts as well. In each of the levels, you have to use your guns to kill enemies, a mid-boss and a final boss. Standard stuff. You will also be able to use rockets to fire at enemies, turbo to squeeze some power into the flight, and even collect gun upgrades -- basically, you can upgrade your blaster in each level several times (a la old-school shooters, like Gradius), so by the time you finish the level, you’ll have a monster arsenal at your disposal.

Time Ace has a major problem and that’s the uninspiring difficulty. You will fly through the game (no pun intended) in less than 5 hours if you really play non-stop. Even without using the power ups (which is another uninspiring aspect of this game), you’ll breeze through the levels in no time.


Fly through time

Graphically speaking, the game is a mixed bag. On one hand, you have the main ship -- which actually looks pretty detailed -- but on the other, the enemies are so flat, that you’ll probably understand why third-parties prefer to work their Nintendo DS magic in 2D. The backgrounds are also blurry, but you won’t even notice because you’ll be so busy looking at the ugly enemy planes. However, Trainwreck deserves some credit for designing a 3D engine that had little slowdown, if any. The music in this game was actually the most surprising part of the game, with its pseudo-orchestral score that’s actually out of tune when compared to the rest of the game package. But it is still nice to see that developers can really make great music with the DS hardware.

What about multiplayer? Well, Time Ace does include a multiplayer mode -- but with a catch: you can only play against someone who also owns a copy of the game. Meaning, you will probably not get a chance to play some multiplayer Time Ace, unless you got the game at a “Buy 1, Get another for free” promotion and gave a copy to one of your friends. It’s still there, so if you have a chance to try it out; it is your usual free-for-all multiplayer mode.

Worth Your Time?
Time Ace isn’t a bad game, but it has a long way to go before turning into a classic DS title. Its biggest problem is that it takes a lot of sweet ideas together, but doesn’t particularly mix them up in the right way. The game has an interesting premise, but doesn’t reach the high levels of polish that other Konami games like Lunar Knights have. But even with all its drawbacks, Time Ace is an all-new, original franchise that still deserves a rental -- just as Konami deserves credit for at least trying something new in a time where publishers only go for the safe bets.