History NightmareFuel / AceCombat

Despite your being the badass pilot of various, often advanced, jet fighters through the series, at times Ace Combat still depicts the very concept of war [[WarIsHell as terrifyingly as possible]], with the only way to sugarcoat them being making a lot of things implied. How the entire franchise (with the exception of Assault Horizon due to obvious presence of blood and human combatants in action and Infinity due to being an online game) got away with an equivalent of Everyone rating in Japan is anyone's guess...

Despite your being the badass pilot of various, often advanced, jet fighters through the game, the game at times still depicts war as it is with the only way to sugarcoat them being making a lot of things implied, WarIsHell...

How the entire series (with the exception of Assault Horizon due to obvious presence of blood and human combatants in action and Infinity due to being an online game) got away with an equivalent of Everyone rating in Japan is everyone's guess...

* You can hear the enemy chatter over the radio, often sounding distressed and desperate as the battle starts to go against their favor, and when you strike ground and naval targets you may hear the sounds of emergency sirens going off while the personnel in charge issue evacuation orders. While it can make you feel like a badass whose mere presence strikes fear in your foes, it's also a grim reminder that at the end of the day, many of your enemies are ''humans'' who are just serving their country much like you are.

* You can hear the enemy chatter over the radio, often sounding distressed and desperate as the battle starts to go against their favor. While it can make you feel like a badass whose mere presence strikes fear in your foes, it's also a grim reminder that at the end of the day, many of your enemies are ''humans'' who are just serving their country much like you are.

[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/acz_obc_news_belkan_nuke.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:350:''”I was still in school at the time, but I will never forget the images I saw on the news that day”''.]]

!Ace/Air Combat
* [[FinalBoss The Sky Fortress.]] It may not sound scary since superweapon airships have become the staple of the series, but in the first game, the Sky Fortress [[GiantSpaceFleaFromNowhere comes from completely out of nowhere]], with no information on who built it and why. [[NothingIsScarier The lack of information]] on the Sky Fortress is what makes it truly frightening.

!Ace Combat 2/Assault Horizon Legacy
* In the original game, the Z.O.E. was just a bonus boss that could fought on multiple levels, and served no purpose in the plot. But in the remake, the Z.O.E. gets expanded upon, and its all but implied to be an ArtificialIntelligence. What’s more, the Rebels don’t know anything about it. It just shows up to assist them, with [[NothingIsScarier little to no information]] on why its assiting them.
** The wiki itself reveals that the Z.O.E-integrated [[FinalBoss ADF-01 FALKEN]] contains battle data of both [[VideoGame/AceCombatZeroTheBelkanWar Cipher and Pixy]].
** Worse, the Z.O.E. is eventually revealed to be the [[PredecessorVillain predecessor]] to [[VideoGame/AceCombat7SkiesUnknown Hugin and Munin]], and [[VideoGame/AceCombat3Electrosphere Nemo]].
* The sheer length the Rebel Forces take to destroy Phoenix, eventually leading to them to '''[[NuclearOption FREAKING NUKE HIM]]''', along with all of St. Ark. Did these idiots '''NOT''' learn from what happened in the Belkan War?

!Ace Combat 3: Electrosphere
* In the mission ‘Bug Hunt’, Nemo, Rena, and Erich are tasked with destroying [[{{Nanotechnology}} nanobytes]] that have [[GreyGoo grown out of control]]. At one point however, Rena flies too close to one of the hives of nanobytes, and she gets infected with them, and they proceed to MindRape her, which messes up her memories, making her unsure of what’s her real past, and what’s not her past.

!Ace Combat 04: Shattered Skies
* The opening cutscene begins with the storyteller boy talking about how years before the war began, an asteroid called ''Ulysses'' had past by, and dozens of meteors rained down on the planet.
** Several missions take place in areas that were struck by meteors. Showing just how much damage ''Ulysses'' had done to the continent of Usea.
** In order to minimize the damage that would have been done by ''Ulysses'', the Useans had banded together, and built the Stonehenge Railgun battery to intercept and destroy the asteroid fragments. Then the war began, and the Eruseans started using Stonehenge to secure aerial supremacy over the majority of the Usean Continent.
* You get a taste of how ruthless the Eruseans are in "Escort". Mobius-1 is dispatched to fly escort for a pair of airliners carrying defecting Erusean scientists, and from the ''dozens'' of aircraft sent to intercept the airliners, they do ''not'' want them getting to ISAF custody alive. You can hear the panic in Flight 701's voice as she pleads with the Erusean fighters:
--> Flight 701: ''This is Air Ixiom Flight 701. We're carrying civilians!'' '''Don't shoot!''' ''I repeat, there are civilians on board!'' '''Hold your fire!'''

!Ace Combat 5: The Unsung War
* The mission "Powder Keg". The vast majority of spoken dialogue is from the mission's target, a massive underground weapon storage facility, and makes no attempt whatsoever to play down just how horrible it is for the fire crews inside. While you're playing the guy bombing it.
* Meanwhile, most of the rest of the spoken dialog is from the other members of your squadron, who by this point seem to be suffering from varying degrees of battle fatigue. You get the feeling that if they live they'll wind up as {{Shell Shocked Veteran}}s, although as of the final mission they're still perfectly combat capable.
* Just before the mission above is the no less horrifying "Chain Reaction" with the horrified airport personnel radio broadcasting all the time in response to a major terrorist attack.
* Also in ''Ace Combat 5'', there are the missions where you encounter the Scinfaxi. First, it manages to destroy two aircraft carriers and most of the Osean fleet. Then, you fight it again during the invasion of Sand Island. You kill it there, but hearing Kei screaming over the radio "Climb you Nuggets! ''Climb!''" and the rest of your wingmen screaming in much the same way, then hearing the screams of terror and anguish as the nuggets fail to do so.
** You see the nuggets (or fresh recruits in LaymansTerms) on screen following your plane as you take on the enemy. They're still following you when the Scinfaxi appears again, meaning that if you're looking at them when the missile hits, you get to watch their planes explode and disappear from radar. All of them.
*** "''The eject handle's stuck!''" Chilling.
* If TearJerker and SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome can also count as something scary, the mission Journey Home. Especially from the Yuke's\Grey Men point of view. After Chopper's death, the rest of Wardog become frighteningly competent, killing most if not all the invading forces on their own. Mix the frightened comments on demons from the enemy forces with the game's mythology and it's a not so subtle hint that you and your wingmen are no normal pilots, you actually are demons and at this stage they took over.
* The third mission "Narrow Margin", features a good bit of it in its mid-mission cutscene, when a downed jet crashes into the sea among a load of sailors who've abandoned their sinking ships, spreading burning jetfuel over the area. It's presented simply as a black screen with the sounds of screaming behind it.
-->'''Chopper:''' Please... somebody stop this... I can't take it any more...
* The missions after the first coin toss has your squadron stopping a Yuktobanian terror attack on one of the cities depending on which you got chosen. One has you stopping a terrorist attack on Apito International Airport. You can hear the controllers in the Control Tower freaking out as enemy tanks coming out of transport planes and start firing on the terminals, civilians in the terminals panicking as the airport PA tries to calm them down, enemy fighters targeting civilian jets that are flying above the airport which are low on fuel and needed to land quickly. The other mission, while more lighthearted compared to this one, still deals with the terrorists organizing a poisonous gas attack all over a city. Both situations are pretty scary terrorist attack scenarios. The fact that they both happened this deep into Osea, which should be a safe territory far away from the frontlines, gives a feeling that nowhere and nobody is safe from the terror of war.
* The SOLG (Strategic Orbital Linear Gun) is basically a representation of the hatred of war. It was abandoned and forgotten for 15 years but now this hulking black monstrosity is careening towards a city full of innocent civilians.

!Ace Combat Zero: The Belkan War
* Mission 12 seems like just another bomber intercept mission, albeit this time the bombers are carrying nuclear ordnance. At first success looks like success, all bombers shot down without any nuclear devices initiating. But then, there's a flash in the distance and the screen goes white...
** The story scene that would follow that mission depicted an act of malevolence that would break any hardened gamer's psyche. The nuclear detonation you just saw was followed by six more, and all of them were dropped on civilian cities. That flash you just saw was several thousand civilians dying. [[KickTheDog By the express order of their own government.]]
** If you played ''Ace Combat 5'' and happen to remember the dates of the seven nuclear detonations, loading the mission and seeing "June 6th, 1995" will send a chill down your spine.
** Even if you don't know about the nuclear weapons, it inspires some FridgeHorror when you think of that mission itself. It inspired utter terror in ''Belkan'' squadrons too. In the middle of that fight, [[MeleeATrois a squadron of Belkan planes marked with yellow crosshairs]] show up, who promptly tell the target Belkan aircraft to turn back, [[DefectorFromDecadence or they will shoot down the target aircraft.]] The actual destruction of the bombers is still up to you, but [[EvenEvilHasStandards imagine how horrible of a plan it would have to be for multiple squadrons of otherwise loyal Belkan aircraft to]] ''[[EvenEvilHasStandards all]]'' [[EvenEvilHasStandards decide that enough is enough.]]
* Mission 11 (also known as Operation Cannibal), where you are helping Allied forces destroy/secure a Belkan Industrial center via providing escort for bombers that pretty much carpet bombing the entire place. Keeping in mind that you are literally helping cause the deaths of untold military personnel and civilians.
** Lampshaded by Pixy. "I thought this was supposed to be a precision bombing mission..." In the mission briefing, you are told that the targets are inside a city. And then your bombers get there, where they promptly start dropping bombs all over the place, deliberately trying to destroy everything. Keep in mind, this is a ''city.'' Full of ''civilians.'' And you actually get to hear some of them die, having been right next to an exploding target. [[WhatTheHellHero Pixy and PJ are both completely disgusted.]]

!Ace Combat 6: Fires of Liberation
* The "Chandelier", not only was it designed as a last ditch effort to save Estovakia from devastation, even after ceasing construction before Ulysses, it was repurposed into a weapon of mass destruction only for destroying a capital city. One can only wonder what hatred concocted such a plan.

!Ace Combat X: Skies of Deception
* The '''Gleipnir''', an absolute ''monster'' of an airborne fortress. With its Shockwave Ballistic Missiles capable of [[TheresNoKillLikeOverkill decimating entire squadrons from long ranges]], an [[ParanoiaFuel optical camouflage system to render it undetectable until it attacks]], a Shock Cannon for vaporising ground forces below, and to top it all off, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJMtuzlo0aw a terrifying theme]] that sounds like it came straight out of a horror movie.
** Its first appearance is right at the end of the ''very first mission'', where it straight up '''annihilates''' the Gryphus squadron at Cape Aubrey with just one SWBM fired from the Puna Plains, leaving Eugene "Crux" Solano absolutely '''devastated'''.
-->'''Crux''': This...there's no way anyone could call this mission a success...I'm sorry.
** [[AxCrazy The captain of said airborne fortress]]. So determined in his cause to destroy the Southern Cross, that in one version of the battle over Santa Elva, ''Standoff in the Skies I'', he '''flips the Gleipnir upside down''' just to try and kill you with the shock cannon!
** In the ''Standoff in the Skies II'' version of the Santa Elva battle, you face off against the Gleipnir at '''full strength'''. Worse, during the Gleipnir's death throes, the captain pulls off one last ditch attempt to destroy the city with the shock cannon, ''just to spite Gryphus One''.
* The '''Fenrir''' superfighter is no better. Equipped with the same cloaking technology as the Gleipnir, this hellspawn of a plane can turn invisible during a dogfight, making you wonder where the thing went, until [[OhCrap suddenly you hear your missile alert blare out]]. Combined with the ability to VTOL in midair and COFFIN cockpit you ''will'' understand why [[BigBad Diego Navarro]] was certain it would be his trump card.
** The Gleipnir mentioned above? It was designed to '''collect battle data''' for this beast.
** In ''End Of Deception I'', Fenrir gets equipped with a high powered microwave weapon system to boil your jet's fuel tanks until they explode. Seeing a ball of lightning chase your plane around relentlessly unless you fly fast enough is nothing short of terrifying. And ''that's'' on top of the Fenrirs occasionally turning invisible mid air to throw off your radar lock on.
** You'd think at first in ''End of Deception II'', since there's no microwave weapon to melt your plane, it would be easier right? '''Wrong'''. The Alect Squadron, Leasath's elite pilot team, are behind Fenrir's controls this time around, and they fully exploit Fenrir's optical camouflage and VTOL abilities, making this fight absolute hell.

!Ace Combat: Joint Assault
* The attack on Tokyo as early as the second mission. After the mission, you are treated with a rather disturbing news report of how Tokyo is under attack, straight out of a disaster news report.

!Ace Combat 7: Skies Unknown
* [[NightmareFuel/AceCombat7SkiesUnknown Has its own separate page.]]


!In General
* Some music tracks can be scary as well, such as [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xjBSvJOsziI "Silent"]] from ''VideoGame/AceCombat04ShatteredSkies'' or [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xlFpMlAKqms "Zero Sum"]] from ''VideoGame/AceCombat3Electrosphere''.

[[caption-width-right:350:''”I was still in school at the time, but I will never forget the images I saw that day”''.]]

** You see the nuggets on screen following your plane as you take on the enemy. They're still following you when the Scinfaxi appears again, meaning that if you're looking at them when the missile hits, you get to watch their planes explode and disappear from radar. All of them.