Ace of Aces Returns to the Skies with Two More Deluxe Editions

First published in 1980, Alfred Leonardi’s Ace of Aces was originally released by Gameshop, the company that shortly afterwards became Nova Game Designs. Ace of Aces was a two-player game which recreated a First World War dogfight with two books book and a remarkably clever system of cross-referencing. It’s original Handy Rotary Series put one player in an Allied fighter and the other in a German aircraft, with each receiving a separate ullustrated book showing the battle from the point of view of their own cockpit.

Both players began on corresponding pages, each showing where the opposing aircraft currently appeared in relation to them. Along the bottom of the page were possible manoeuvres you could choose to do - turns, slips, dives, stalls, and other aerial moves. Each player secretly chose one and gave their opponent the corresponding page number. The two choices are then cross-referenced, both players turned to the new page which then showed the resulting positions, and gave a new set of options.

Get the other aircraft into your sights and you could open fire, lose sight of them and you have to work out what manoeuvre might bring them back in to sight. The basic rules were very easy, but intermediate and advanced versions adding extra complications such as altitude, ammunition, wind and jammed guns.

The game had no board, no pieces, just one book for each player representing their aircraft, with the player choices and the pictures in the book taking you through the resulting battle. The mixture of immediacy and hidden simultaneous movement helped make Ace of Aces a popular design, and as with any popular design that meant expansions and spinoffs.

Nova followed the original Handy Rotary set with Powerhouse, then Flying Machines in 1983 abnd Balloon Buster in 1985. A boxed Handy Rotary Deluxe Edition appeared in 1986, and then brought World War II into the mix with the release of Wingleader in 1988, while 1990’s Jet Eagles tackled modern jet combat.

From biplanes to barbarians

Perhaps even better known, and more popular, than the historical Ace of Aces was Leonardi’s Lost Worlds, a fantasy combat series using the same system which was first published by Nova in 1983.

Rather than flying airplanes players chose fighters, monsters, and other fantasy characters to fight one-on-one battles using illustrated combat books. Lost Worlds wasn’t simply a carbon copy replacing biplanes with Lizardmen and Knights, Leonardi played with the mechanics, keeping the combat-picture-book design but tinkering with some of the rules. This wasn’t the first time the rules had been tinkered with either, as Nova had experimented with the concept in the western gunfight game Bounty Hunter.

Each player chose a character and then handed their character to the other player, so you would be hlding your oponents book but see the fight from your characters perspective. The first batch of titles from 1983 included quite generic titles such as Man in Chainmail with Sword and Shield, Skeleton with Scimitar and Shield, Hill Troll with Club and Dwarf in Chainmail with Two-handed Ax. Yearly releases from Nova followed, including Unicorn (1985), Woman with Quarterstaff (1985), and Manticore (1987). Nova Game Designs publised a total of 24 Lost Worlds books between 1983 and 1991.

Lost Worlds has subsequently been picked up by a number of publishers over the years. Chessex published four titles in 1995, whilst Flying Buffalo used the system for seven Tunnels & Trolls branded books over 1995-96, and returned to the system in 2003 and 2003 for four licensed books using characters from the Knights of the Dinner Table comic. Flying Buffalo also produced a range of five titles between 2003 and 2008 which used photographs instead of the conventional illustrated character represetations. They also offer a custome made service, called Be Your Own Lost Worlds Character, which offered fans the opportunity to turn themselves in to a gamebook character by supplying the photgraphs which Flying Buffalo would then use to create a one-of-a-kind Lost Worlds title.

Shadis Magazine #28 actually included two complete Lost Worlds characters in their gaming magazine, while in 2004 1% Inspiration Games published four new titles, including Gunslinger with Whip and Pistol and Bitra, the Man-Spider.

But, the single biggest publisher of English-language Lost Worlds titles was a company called Greysea who produced 23 new titles in 1997, which included Zombies and Dinosaurs alongside more traditional fantasy characters, as well as a Design Your Own Character book which allowed you to create and draw your own personalised character.

In total there were 73 English language books, not counting who knows how many titles from Flying Buffalo’s Be Your Own Lost Worlds Character promotion.

Meanwhile in Japan…

While Lost Worlds then faded from English-language store shelves in the 2000’s, a licensed version of the game was beginning to take off in a big way elsewhere.

The game, as Alphaville sang back in the 80’s, was becoming Big in Japan.

Hobby Japan officially licensed the Lost Worlds system and used it, initially, for their Queen’s Blade range which consisted of 19 titles between 2005-2009. The game was so successful that a sequel, Queen’s Gate followed wth another 19 books between 2007-2012, and then Queen’s Blade Rebellion (13 titles, 2008-2014), and Queen’s Blade Grimoire (10 titles, 2012-2016), aking a total of 61 new books in the series, which have never been seen in English.

Battletech, Pern, and Star Wars

Back in the English language, the concept wasn’t only confined to Lost Worlds but was reaching out to New Worlds. Back in 1987 Nova published the six-book licensed series BattleTech Science Fiction Combat Book Game, which allowed players to fight one-on-one battles between BattleMechs. Other variations also appeared, such as an Ace of Aces style Dragonriders of Pern game involving aerial battles, while West End Games took the concept to a galaxy far, far away with the 1989 game Starfighter Battle Book: X-wing vs TIE Interceptor in addition to their Lightsaber Dueling game featuring Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader books.

Ace of Aces flies again

In 2024 Ace of Aces returned through a successful Kickstarter campaign by Mr. B. Games. 3,247 backers pledged $189,374, far exceeding the original $15,000 target, for the Ace of Aces: Powerhouse Series Deluxe Edition. The new edition retained the original games book-based system but replaed the old presentation with larger books and new full-colour artwork.

Now Mr. B. Games have returned to Kickstarter with Ace of Aces: Handy Rotary & Flying Machines Deluxe Editions, continuing the reprint programme with the next two classic sets. The campaign brings back both the books in the new Deluxe format, with them being fully compatible with the recently released Powerhouse edition.

Appetite for the game has clearly not disappeared. At the time of writing this, on 17th September, the new campaign has already passed it’s $50,000 target, attracting more then 850 backers and $100,000 in its opening days. The campaign is scheduled to run until Thursday 8th October 2026.

More than four decades after its debut the old air-combat game is receiving a prettier reprint, and as a game the two little books still do the job remarkably well.