Ace Combat soars past 10 million sold

Just ahead of next week's Ace Combat: Assault Horizon debut, Namco Bandai shared word today that the Ace Combat series has surpassed 10 million in sales worldwide. The publisher also revealed that the Assault Horizon demo has been downloaded more than 1.2 million times since launching on Xbox Live and PSN a little over three weeks ago.

The long-running Ace Combat series first debuted as Air Combat in arcades in 1992 and jumped to the PlayStation in 1995. Since adopting the Ace Combat name with 1997's Ace Combat 2, it has been primarily a Sony-specific brand apart from excursions like 2007's Xbox 360-only Ace Combat 6 and 2005's Game Boy Advance title Ace Combat Advance. Assault Horizon marks the first home console release to be available on multiple platforms.

Namco Bandai is looking to deliver a more action-heavy experience with Assault Horizon, saying it will offer a more realistic storyline, new pilotable aircraft including helicopters, a new close-range assault system, and new online modes. The publisher also stressed that no previous Ace Combat game has ever provided such a "fast and in your face" experience.

For more on Ace Combat: Assault Horizon, check out GameSpot's previous coverage.