Hands on with Above & Beyond Air Combat on iPhone

Aerial dogfighting sequel SciFly II has transformed into a totally new game: Above & Beyond Air Combat. And after going hands on with it, it's easy to understand why. This airborne shooter looks to exceed expectations in every area, jetting in with slick graphics, hours of aerial exploration in seamless world, and challenging combat.

Conquest, the game's main mode of play, has you piloting a sleek fighter jet across an expansive ocean dotted with islands. Your goal lies in eliminating occupying enemy forces on each isle, obliterating the stationary turrets, aircraft, and naval patrol vessels holding the territory.

Only one island is free of bogeys upon entering the massive map, the others unlocked as you annex nearby islands. Amazingly, you're able to fly between islands without any loading screen or pause in the action.

Much like Glyder, Above & Beyond seamlessly links together scores of individual locales into one gigantic world. It's an impressive technical accomplishment, particularly given the visual quality and amount of activity that plays out on the screen.

Flying to one early island, for instance, put us up against a cadre of enemy jets, a couple mountainside turrets, and a well-equipped naval carrier. As soon as we came into view, the squad of aerial fighters focused their fire on us. Tightly tuned motion control enabled effortless dogfighting.

A full suite of options is available, too, so you're free to adjust the sensitivity for turning, pitch, and calibration of the handset's neutral position.

A virtual key for thrusters in the upper-left corner helped propel us out of range when in critical condition, while a deceleration key in the lower-left allowed for a sharp turn around to head back into the action once our health (displayed on the right side of the reticle).

No one enemy proved especially difficult, though the sheer number of foes did demand careful engagement. Taking out the stationary turrets lightened up the resistance, after which we could dogfight with the enemy jets before targeting the carrier.

This is just one scenario in the first half of the game. Above & Beyond promises a whole lot more of these intense battles, even upping the ante with more advance foes and greater enemy numbers. Fortunately, you're able to customise your aircraft with new weapons, thrusters, and shields. Entire new ships can even be bought using energy earned from combat.

Currently, there's no option to access the customisation menu from within Conquest mode. Any decisions regarding your fighter's paint job and weapons loadout have to be completed from the main menu. We'd like to see an option added in the pause menu from within Conquest mode so that you can make changes and upgrades without having to quit out of the game.

Joining the massive Conquest mode are two additional one-off arcade games, Gauntlet and Survival. The former has you flying against the clock, zipping through rings placed in tricky formations designed to test your piloting skills. We found the length of these runs to be too long, the number of rings needing to be flown through too large. Cutting the number of rings per stage would be preferable.

Survival mode follows convention by throwing you against neverending waves of enemy forces. The goal, obviously, is to stay alive for as long as possible. OpenFeint support enables you to post your best performance online.

Ahead of its planned September release, Above & Beyond is gearing up for performance optimisation and other minor tweaks. While we'd like to see a few changes - namely access to customisation features during play and tuning of Gauntlet mode - the fundamental gameplay looks exceedingly solid.