I was a big fan of Ace Combat 6, and have loved Clancy material for years, so was excited for the release of HAWX.
Here's my assestment:
First off, HAWX is supposed to stand for High Altitude Warfare eXperimental squadron. Why then does most action take place below 10,000 ft, and the hard-ceiling seems to be about 16,000 ft? I consider High Altitude above 40,000 feet. And frankly, flight at that altitude is boring. Its hard to bomb from up high, and dog-fighting in the narrow flight envelope at altitude doesn't allow for extreme maneuvers. This kind of sloppy thinking is prevalent in the game.
Another problem comes from the HUD, which shows decidedly less information than the AC6 HUD. Many of the more important pieces of information are shown on overlaid boxes rather than in the HUD, this includes weapon choice and remaining quantity. This creates a strong sense of "video game" rather than "flight sim" (even if it is meant to be an easy-to-fly, highly accessible flight-sim).
The HUD also suffers from extremely bright icons. Enemy targets are highlighted as Red and Yellow diamonds. The diamond highlighting is so bold and bright, it becomes almost impossible to see the enemy behind the icon. This creates a feeling that I'm playing Asteroids, shooting at various diamond shapes rather than attacking tanks, planes, facilities, etc. The HUD would be much improved if the icons were semi-transparent overlays , making it possible to still visually track targets. This is especially significant in one-on-one dogfighting, where it is difficult to see and respond to the target's maneuvers when they are obscured by a HUD icon. The HUD is supposed to ADD information to the battle, not obscure it!
I personally find an important highlight of many flying games to be the take-off and/or landing. This is an area for a game to show off its flight-sim abilities, and seamlessly merge flying with ground-activity. AC6 does a great job with landings, including a carrier landing, and mid-air refuelings. HAWX has nothing close. Every mission begins and ends in the air. Although there are Carriers in some missions, you can't touch them. Who doesn't love a challenging carrier landing after a tough battle.
One of the winning points of HAWX is that it includes an enormous collection of aircraft, from classics like the A-10 Thunderbolt to new modern craft like the F-22 Raptor, and futuristic, and even unrealistic planes. Visually the wide selection of planes is very nice. However, most of the planes have extremely similar flight characteristics. It just seems wrong when an A-10 can dogfight on par with an F/A-18. AC6 had much greater differences between aircraft choices. In that game, if you picked the wrong plane for a mission, you were pretty much guaranteed to fail the mission. In HAWX, any plane seems viable for any mission. Add on to this that the game takes place around the year 2020. Even though many of these craft are contemporary classics now, I think a realistic world view is that these planes would be aging, out-moded planes by 2020. The idea that the player is in an experimental flight squadron of the future is damaged when the planes are put in the context of the larger story.
Another innovation in HAWX is the ability to switch to "Assistance Off" mode, which is an external view of a dog-fight, and the ability to perform more extreme maneuvers, accompanied by increased risk, especially stalling. The switch between a cockpit view and the external view is extremely jarring, and breaks up the action. I wish for a "bullet-time" transition that would freeze time momentarily, while the camera makes a smooth transition between view points. Once in the external view, the dog-fight view is very impressive, but it is also difficult to keep a good view on which direction both you and your target are heading. I frequently over-turn, passing my target, then have to correct back the other way. Strangely enough, some maneuvers in the external view, especially a barrel-roll, or any inverted flight, seem impossible. This makes even a Hi-Yo move impossible. While the external view is a great new take on dog-fighting, it actually hinders the potential of a good hairball.
Overall, the game is a fun time for flying, shooting, turning and burning. But the dissonance between the squadron's apparent mission, the games limitations, the weaknesses in the flight model, and some of the over-the-top graphics end up detracting. I feel like I'm playing an advanced version of Asteroids, rather than a real action/adventure simulator-game. This game is close to excellent, and I encourage Ubisoft to come out with a sequel with the kinds of improvements that would make it excellent.
For now, I give HAWX a Good score: 6.5