Technologies

Ace Combat 8 Will Incorporate Dogfighting Tips From Real Jet Pilots

Ace Combat 8: Wings of Theve’s top developers chat about cloud technology, drones and all the world-building players don’t see.

Next year, I’ll be sitting on my couch with a controller in hand, but on my TV, I’ll be up in the sky, chasing enemy planes through the clouds at 10,000 feet. In 2026, Bandai Namco will launch Ace Combat 8: Wings of Theve, the next game in the near-future air combat simulator series.

Hours before The Game Awards, held Dec. 11 in Los Angeles, I walked into a nearby hotel room and sat down with Kazutoki Kono, Ace Combat series brand director, and Manabu Shimamoto, producer of Ace Combat 8: Wings of Theve, to chat about the game. As the game’s predecessor, Ace Combat 7: Skies Unknown, came out in 2019, this will be the first game in the franchise to come out on this generation of consoles (as well as PC).

Ace Combat 8 includes a virtual hanger full of new features. The team behind the series, Project Aces, pushed the visuals to harness modern gaming hardware and developed a graphics technology to simulate cloud physics (called, yes, Cloudly). This not only realistically trails your aircraft wings through the clouds as you carve a path through the sky, but this also allows for the tactical advantage you’ll get when picking out an enemy plane in the distance by its contrails after leaving a cloud bank.

That’s the kind of true-to-life realism that Project Aces sought out, which is why they interviewed former combat pilots to advise them on the modern realities of flying fighter jets.

«What they told us is that it’s too scary to go into clouds; [they] actually avoid it altogether,» Shimamoto said through a translator. «Which means the players and the pilot in the game actually have a lot more courage than the real fighter jet pilot!»

Jokes aside, it reflects the careful line that the Ace Combat series has walked between slavish simulator and unrealistic arcade game. It gives the games serious stakes while loosening up some of the more tedious realities of flight (to say nothing of a near-endless bay of missiles).

«We are going for a certain level of reality, but we do want to give the player a lot of decision-making agency for Ace Combat 8,» Shimamoto said.

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When to keep it real and when to get Strangereal

Consulting pilots provided the Project Aces team with air combat details they could incorporate to boost realism — like being able to spot distant enemy aircraft from the sunlight reflecting off their cockpits, much like sniper scope glints in first-person shooters like Battlefield 6. But that realism is tempered by another feature of the Ace Combat series: Its setting, Strangereal, is a world of fictional nations that play host to an ever-churning war that swings one way or another from game to game.

Ace Combat 8: Wings of Theve takes place 10 years after its predecessor in the somewhat far-off future of 2029. The Federation of Central Usea (FCU) has been defeated and completely subjugated by the Republic of Sotoa. The player, an unnamed pilot, wakes up floating in the ocean after a fierce air battle, only to be rescued by an outdated aircraft carrier filled with the last holdouts of the FCU forces.

Forced on the back foot with an antiquated aircraft, the player starts Ace Combat 8 off in a scrappy situation with a ragtag crew their everyman pilot will grow closer to. It’s clear the Project Aces team is shooting for more interpersonal experiences on the ship to contrast with fast-paced air combat. To add to the underdog feel, the player’s character takes on the mantle of the titular Wings of Theve, a heroic pilot from yesteryear.

The setting of Strangereal in the Ace Combat series has become a beloved fixture of the franchise. Filled with vague analogues to modern nations and multinational alliances, the countries of Usea, Osea, Erusea, Sotoa and others sound straight out of George Orwell’s 1984, yet the fictional veneer gives the games license to stage international clashes with high stakes and melodrama.

In each game of the series, players are treated to twists and turns of global politics and military turnabouts. This is all the result of laboriously intensive background lore and world-building that may not even be represented in the game.

While still in the planning stage of the game, the team physically pulled out a map of Strangereal to plot out invasions. They roleplayed different nations as they invade and counterattack across their world’s geography, Kono said. All of which contributes to the game’s world but isn’t seen. As an example, the team built out the antagonist country Sotoa’s culture and history, but players may only get hints of that in the country’s flag.

Of the planning done, «10%, I want to say, is what you see in the game,» Kono said.

What to take and what to change from our world in Ace Combat 8

Ace Combat 8’s new Cloudly and graphics tech push the game closer to photorealism, and the game’s litany of fighter jets are meticulously re-created from their real-life counterparts. However, the Project Aces team backed away from reality in certain areas. The game’s setting of Strangereal allows them to shape their use of warfare tech that veers from real-world battlefields in specific ways to make gameplay more fun for players — something they’ve learned from how players have reacted to previous games.

«In Ace Combat 7, we actually included a lot of UAVs [unmanned aerial vehicles], but the feedback from the fans that we got was that they actually enjoyed the man-on-man dogfight experience with the radio chatter and the heated discussions and conversations,» Kono said.

Even as the real world of aviation shifts to unmanned drones and firing missiles at unseen enemy aircraft far over the horizon, Ace Combat still needs to preserve a level of game-ness for players to enjoy.

«There is always going to be this reality line that we’re going to want to aim for. That being said, we still can’t go for that line at the expense of the player experience. For the player to have fun is always going to be a priority for us as a game design philosophy,» Kono said.

While the game will come out at some point next year, there are more aspects that the developers couldn’t talk about, including how many planes will be in the game. But both Kono and Shimamoto agree on one thing: their favorite plane.

«Ace Combat takes a lot of real-world fighter jets that exist and integrates them into the game, so of course, I love all of them. But I’m going to specifically call out the F-18E Super Hornet,» Shimamoto said.

It helps that the F-18E is heavily featured in the trailer, and it’s no coincidence that as one of the most famous jets stationed on aircraft carriers. It fits Ace Combat 8’s setting on its own venerable aircraft carrier. Kono, as director of the Ace Combat series, admits that he tends to fall in love with the jet used as the key visual for each game — like the hero you see on the box art — spending so much time looking at it that he starts noticing and appreciating granular details.

«For example, looking at the F-18’s nose cone, I notice this little hole. What is this hole for? Or the way the bolts are lined up, or where the parts meet. I begin to notice that type of stuff,» Kono said.

When I’m on my couch, controller in hand, I’ll try my best to look for details like that, but something tells me I’m going to be locked in evading enemy Republic of Sotoa jets trying to take advantage of those beautifully rendered cloud edges.

Technologies

The New Year Will Kick Off With a Supermoon. Here’s When to See It

January’s Wolf Moon will be the final of four consecutive supermoons.

Supermoons tend to come in packs, and Earth has just experienced three of them in a row, dating back to October. The final supermoon of this sequence is happening on Jan. 3, and it also happens to be the first supermoon of 2026. Skygazers will want to catch this one, since the next one won’t occur until next November.

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The moon tends to spend three to four months at a time in perigee, a fancy term that means it’s as close to Earth as its elliptical orbit will allow. During this time, humans refer to full moons as a supermoon. Since the moon is physically closer to Earth than it normally is, a full moon appears brighter and larger in the sky.

The difference can be a moon that is up to 14% bigger and 30% brighter than a micromoon, which occurs when the moon is at apogee, or the furthest point away from Earth. That brightness is the real differentiator, as a supermoon is bright enough to light up your backyard, especially if there is snow on the ground.

The odds of this are pretty good, as it is expected to snow in a few parts of the US between Christmas Day and New Year’s Eve.

To see the moon at its brightest, you’ll want to stay up late on Jan. 2 or wake up very early on Jan. 3. According to The Farmer’s Almanac, January’s supermoon will rise from the eastern horizon and streak across the sky to settle in the west around sunrise. The moon will reach peak illumination at 5:03 a.m. ET. It should still be dark outside for the entire US during this time, so everyone will have a chance to see it.

If you can’t due to weather or other engagements, the Wolf Moon will be over 90% full from Dec. 31 through Jan. 5, which gives you almost a week at near-maximum illumination.

Since the moon is the largest and brightest object in the night sky, you also won’t need any special magnification devices to see it. However, a good pair of binoculars or a telescope makes the moon’s surface details easier to see, and helps photographers take some impressive moon shots.

The full moon in January is commonly called the Wolf Moon, and it’s due to increased activity from wolves during this time. Not only does January mark the beginning of the wolf’s winter mating season, but wolves are also typically more active during the dusk and dawn hours, and dusk happens pretty early in the day, right after the winter solstice. In the old days, this meant that people were much more likely to see a wolf or hear wolves howling during January.

Technologies

The FCC’s Foreign Drone Ban Is Bad News for Anyone Who Wants a DJI Device

The US government is making good on an anticipated ban on the import of foreign-made drones, including those from the world’s top seller.

If a DJI drone was on your list to buy going into 2026, you might want to act quickly. The Federal Communications Commission has made good on an anticipated ban on the import of foreign-made drones, including those made by DJI, the world’s top seller of the flying devices.

The FCC on Monday added uncrewed aircraft systems and their components that are produced in a foreign country to its Covered List, a record of gear and services deemed to «pose an unacceptable risk to the national security of the US.»

According to the FCC’s public notice, that includes but isn’t limited to data transmission devices, flight controllers, sensors and cameras, batteries, motors and other drone components.

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In late October, the agency voted 3-0 to «close loopholes» that allow tech deemed a «national security risk» to be sold in the US. In plain English, the US government cleared the path to give DJI the same treatment it gave Chinese phone-maker Huawei, effectively banning its products from the American market.

In a statement, DJI said it was disappointed by the decision. «While DJI was not singled out, no information has been released regarding what information was used by the Executive Branch in reaching its determination,» a spokesperson said. «Concerns about DJI’s data security have not been grounded in evidence and instead reflect protectionism, contrary to the principles of an open market.»

DJI said it remains committed to the US market and that it’s possible future products could be cleared for launch here at the discretion of the Department of Defense and Department of Homeland Security.

Drones already in the hands of US consumers aren’t impacted: «This action does not affect any previously-purchased drone. Consumers can continue to use any drone they have already lawfully purchased or acquired,» the FCC said in a fact sheet about the change.

In its announcement, the government cited upcoming high-profile events including 2026’s FIFA World Cup and the 2028 Los Angeles Summer Olympics as mass-gathering events that could be put at risk by drones.

«The federal government is taking additional actions to safeguard Americans and restore American airspace sovereignty,» the FCC said.

The FCC has also been considering a separate ban on TP-Link routers, but that was not included in this December update to its Covered List.

DJI asked for a security audit before any ban

In October, DJI told CNET that the FCC appeared to be making its decision «without any evidence of wrongdoing or the right to appeal.»

Adam Welsh, head of global policy at DJI, said the company has repeatedly said it would be open to audit, but that «more than 10 months have now passed with no sign that the process has begun.»

«The US government has every right to strengthen national security measures, but this must go hand in hand with due process, fairness, and transparency,» Welsh said at the time.

Will DJI drone owners need to give them up?

Because the ban applies to new sales, not drones that have already been sold, a DJI drone you already own is still be legal to use — at least under current rules.

Government agencies, however, were already prohibited from purchasing or using drones from Chinese companies, including DJI.

DJI’s drones consistently rank high in their product category. In January, they dominated CNET’s list of best drones for 2025. But some of the company’s newest products, such as the DJI Mavic 4 Pro, haven’t been available for sale in the United States.

Even before the policy change, some DJI products were hard to find. The website UAV Coach has posted a guide to the bans and reports that, due to inventory issues, most DJI drone models were sold out at retailers.

Technologies

AT&T Just Revealed Which Holiday Has the Most Calls. And No, It’s Not Christmas.

You might be able to guess the biggest texting day of the year, but the Holiday with the most phone calls gave me chills.

The holidays are a time for connecting with friends and family, either by gathering in person or checking in remotely. So, naturally, you might think phone calls would be at their highest during the festive stretch at the end of the year. But according to new figures shared with CNET by AT&T, another holiday got the highest number of calls in 2025. Which one?

The answer might give you chills: AT&T’s subscribers conjured up around 651 million phone calls on… Halloween. The company shared no other data besides the massive number, leading me to wonder why the spooky season inspired so many calls. Lost trick-or-treaters calling their parents for rides? People in costumes at parties accidentally butt-dialing their friends? Poltergeists pilfering people’s phones? Only the spirits truly know.

Despite that one-day call volume, texting is vastly more popular than phone calls over the course of the year. Through Dec. 9, 2025, the network registered almost three times more texts than calls: 525 billion texts sent vs. 181 billion calls made during the year.

And the top texting day? Dec. 1, 2025, with around 2.3 billion (specifically 2,264,041,461) messages sent.

These figures represent traffic on AT&T’s mobile network, which does not include its home or business broadband services. And, of course, it’s a snapshot of just one provider. AT&T has around 119 million subscribers, according to Wikipedia.

When you’re looking at phone plans, even unlimited phone plans, using tens of gigabytes of data during a month sounds like a lot. But at the network level, the scale is staggering, even in limited areas.

For example, AT&T also broke out its three largest data events in 2025: Mardi Gras (March 4) logged 57.5 terabytes; South-by-Southwest (SXSW) (March 7 to 15) went through 34.1 terabytes; and the Formula 1 Miami Grand Prix (May 4) burned 24 terabytes. (One terabyte is roughly equal to 1,000 gigabytes.)

Overall, across all of AT&T’s networks — mobile, broadband and enterprise — the company reported average data traffic of 1 exabyte per day. That’s 1 million terabytes.

With massive communications infrastructure built over the last few decades by AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile and others, we’re likely long past the days of phone networks getting clogged by the surge of calls on Christmas Day.

So make a point of calling your family this holiday, or at least send a text. The network should be able to handle it.