Almost everything about the title screams mediocrity.
Kuju have developed the title as a purely arcade experience, which is sensible considering the lack of complex control inherent in handheld devices and the absence of a second analogue nub on the PSP. In terms of single-player options, from the main menu you can access an arcade mode which drops you straight into the action, a somewhat deeper Career mode, and a ‘challenge’ option with a series of 5 mini-games to compete in for high scores. The career mode is the main meat of the offering, and sets you up with a series of structured tiers which increase in difficulty level, but with no story or narrative in sight. Each progressive section unlocks new planes and money to buy upgrades, allowing you to build and customise a speedy, death-dealing flying machine over the course of the few hours this will take to complete.
There are only two core game mechanics across all the single and multi-player variants; races and dogfights. Both involve the same basic control scheme. The analogue nub controls the direction and pitch of the plane, with the face buttons mapped to acceleration, air-brakes and weapon controls. It’s a simple system that works pretty well for the most part, and won’t cause too much frustration. Everything you’d want to do is available and responsive, and the planes manoeuvre nicely once you reach the higher spec’d machines.
The race mode comes across as a mess of ideas culled from games such as Burnout, Mario Kart, and Wipeout. Competing against 7 other racers, you can employ a variety of weapon-based pickups (missiles, cluster bombs etc) to battle your way to the front of the field. Unfortunately once you become the leader of the pack it’s very hard to lose a race as long as you utilise the barrel-roll procedure to avoid any incoming ordinance, which kills the challenge somewhat. The afterburner gauge is located on the lower-left hand side of the screen and is activated via double-tapping the X button, giving you a short burst of speed. This meter can then be recharged by flying dangerously close to the ground and avoiding obstacles with a near-miss. Sound familiar? ‘Afterburner Revenge’ would have been an apt title.
Race environments are fairly well-designed linear maps with differing themes, but with only a few on offer you’ll tire quickly of racing the same lines again and again. Once the corners of any given track have been memorised the challenge swiftly depletes, and as long as you keep upgrading your chosen aircraft the races can be polished off quickly and easily.
Dogfights again utilise a similarly limited selection of maps. Your job here is to outgun your opponents over a timed round without any linear restrictions. You can fly anywhere in the somewhat claustrophobic environments and pickup the same variety of missiles, cluster bombs and mines, with the only difference being that the right shoulder button is now used to activate a basic machine-gun cannon. The dogfights suffer from the same ‘rinse and repeat’ problem as the race mode, but can at times be excellent fun. Executing a barrel-roll to avoid an incoming missile, locking on and letting loose with your own brand of death-from-above can be very satisfying on the later difficulty stages. During a missile lock the camera focuses on your opponent, with your plane in the foreground, which is a nice little aesthetic touch. Being able to see your target squirming and rolling away before hopefully exploding in a ball of fire is fairly cathartic.
Graphically the game doesn’t push the boundaries of the PSP hardware but does contain some nice environmental effects. The glare of the sun or the light reflecting off snow and ice can dazzle for a while, and the smokey sunsets of some of the courses are very atmospheric. As good as these examples are a little more variety would have been appreciated, as once you’ve seen the same sunset for the 20th time in career mode the effect is somewhat lost. Crucially for a game of this type, the sense of speed is faltering at best, and whilst some of the later races are exhilarating at times, there seems to be a general lack of adrenaline throughout. Motion blur post-processing effects are used liberally to attempt to increase the sensation, but you get the feeling that handheld platforms will never be able to convey this type of dynamism very well. Audio throughout is functional, without ever being remarkable.
Multiplayer support encompasses ad-hoc play with support for up to 8 users, and a full variety of race and dogfight options are available. However if you only have one UMD to share between you, play is limited to dogfighting on one map. Some infrastructure options would have been a nice addition to the longevity here, with the ability to show off your custom-built plane online and maybe trade decals with other users.
Overall there is some fun to be had with M.A.C.H. The planes control well, and for the initial 2-3 hours of play the game can be exciting and will evoke pure arcade nostalgia in places. Unfortunately almost everything about the title screams mediocrity, and as a full-priced game with essentially only two core modes stretched over a small number of maps it’s hard to recommend. That type of basic structure can be fine if the gameplay on offer is fun enough to be replayable, but in this instance a general lack of AI and some obvious rubber-banding knocks you out of the experience. In Top Gun terms then it’s less of a Maverick and more of a Goose, however just like Kelly McGillis if you can pick it up on the cheap you’ll be able to stretch it to a couple of nights of non-complicated pleasure.
Note: This text was originally written by myself and published over at strategyinformer.com