Acecraft Beginner Guide: First-Week Tips and Checklist

Almost every new Acecraft pilot goes down the same way: sitting still, taking a pink projectile they could have absorbed, and wondering what happened. The good news is that the game gives you everything you need to avoid that in your first twenty minutes. Take it at your own pace: here are the habits and the first-week checklist that get you from rookie to pilot who clears content, while the Nightmare Legion does its best to stop you.

What Acecraft Is

Acecraft is a two player co-op shoot ’em up from Vizta Games, a MOONTON studio, that launched globally on August 28, 2025. Under the 1930s rubber hose art sits a vertical bullet hell with roguelike upgrades: you fly a stage, pick upgrades between waves, beat the boss, then spend your rewards on permanent upgrades. The setting is Cloudia, a world of islands floating above the clouds.

Learn the Stunt Before Anything Else

Acecraft’s combat is built around one mechanic: pink projectiles are ammunition, not just danger. Let go of the screen and your aircraft absorbs incoming pink shots, and your pilot’s Stunt fires back at enemies automatically. Every pilot has their own Stunt built on this loop, starting with Ekko’s Spitfire in the tutorial.

Hold your finger on the screen and drag to move; your plane fires on its own while you hold. Lift your finger and the plane stops, stops firing and absorbs pink shots. Every pilot’s kit has four parts:

• Main Cannon: your constant auto-fire.
• Stunt: triggered by absorbing pink projectiles.
• Passive: a background bonus unique to each pilot.
• Ultimate: your big move, and many Ultimates also clear enemy projectiles.

Two things trip up new players. First, treating absorbing as optional: a pink shot you don’t absorb still hurts, so letting go is defense and offense in one move. Second, overthinking it. You want the absorb rhythm to become a reflex, so your attention stays on the bullet patterns. Our game mechanics guide explains the full loop, and the pink absorption guide covers the timing.

Movement Rules That Keep You Alive

• Balance dodging and absorbing. Weave through gaps in normal bullets, and let go to absorb the pink ones.
• Watch your sides and the bottom of the screen. Some enemies come in from behind or from the edges, so keep an eye on the whole screen, not just the top.
• Survival beats damage. Chasing kills into a wall of bullets is the classic early mistake. A pilot who stays alive doing average damage clears the wave. A downed pilot clears nothing.

If the controls still feel awkward, our controls guide walks through every input and setting.

Your First-Week Checklist

Here’s what opens up in your first days and what to do with it. Tick them off as you go:

Upgrade Priorities for Your First Week

The skills you pick during a run are called Attachments (Super Tech is something else: a track on your aircraft’s Modify screen). How you pick them decides your power curve:

• Go deep, not wide. Upgrade your main weapon and one core attachment instead of grabbing a little of everything.
• Take healing when it shows up. Healing picks, like the SOS Beacon plug-in that heals you after each wave, are a lifesaver early on.
• Plan your EVO. Level an attachment up and grab its matching plug-in, and it evolves into a much stronger version. Our Attachments guide lists every pairing.
• Save heavy weapons for bosses. They’re built for high-health targets, so don’t burn them on regular waves.

Match Your Wingmen to Your Element

Every pilot belongs to one of four elements: Solaris, Sandstorm, Cyclone or Nimbus. Epic wingmen give a 25 percent boost to their Base Attributes when you equip them on a pilot of the same element, and they’re strongest with their exclusive pilot. It’s an easy habit that adds up over time. Our wingman guide and element matching guide have the details.

Pilot Rarity, Shot Types and Elements

Pilots come in four rarity tiers: A (Excellent), S (Epic), SS and SP. There’s no B rarity in the current game. Each pilot also has one of three shot types (Sharpshot, Crusher or Vanguard) and one of four elements: Solaris, Sandstorm, Cyclone and Nimbus.

• SP pilots: the newest top tier, with Blazewing Ekko and Drakuku.
• SS pilots: Vincent and Silvanna.
• S pilots: a big group that includes Elsa, Pris, Sylas, Vivienne, Leo, Nepheria and the Looney Tunes pair Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck.
• A pilots: the early backbone, like Ekko, Scott and Ryan.

Rarity isn’t everything. A well built A pilot often outperforms a neglected S pilot, so check the Acecraft tier list before you pour resources into anyone. When recruiting opens, the gacha guide explains how to stretch your Diamonds.

Progression Systems You Can Leave for Later

You don’t need most of these in week one. Levels, Attachments and Wingmen carry the early chapters, and the rest come online when the content asks for them.

• Pilot levels: Gold and EXP raise your pilot’s stats, up to a level cap of 60.
• Amplification: long-term power-ups for individual pilots. See our pilot amplification guide.
• Wingmen: up to two per pilot. An Epic Wingman that matches your pilot’s element gives +25% Base Attributes.
• Gear: equippable stat pieces you fuse into higher rarities.
• Emblems: equipped onto Gear for extra combat attributes.
• Modify: permanent upgrades through Base Tune-Up and Super Tech.
• Pappos: helper companions you set as Main or Assist Pappos, added in February 2026.
• Bonds and Support Pilots: bonded pilots at 3 Stars lend each other Support Skills.

Free Resources You Shouldn’t Skip

• Codes: recruit pulls cost 300 Diamonds each, and new pilot releases often come with codes worth Recruit Tickets and up to 500 Diamonds. Check our Acecraft codes page first.
• Joey: a free pilot just for logging in two days in a row.
• Daily routine: the Flight Log, Balloon Party and the daily Store ads are small, but they add up to a lot over a week. Our free-to-play guide shows how to stretch every Diamond.

Five Beginner Mistakes to Avoid

1. Spending Diamonds before redeeming the current codes.
2. Leveling every pilot a little instead of three or four properly.
3. Letting pink projectiles hit you instead of absorbing them.
4. Using your Ultimate and heavy weapon on mob waves instead of the boss.
5. Skipping the daily Flight Log, the easiest free rewards in the game.

Acecraft Beginner FAQ

Take Your Time: absorb pink shots on reflex, dodge everything else, build deep instead of wide, and match your elements. Cloudia gets loud fast, but once these basics click you’ll stop noticing. When you’re ready for the next step, our advanced tips pick up right where this guide ends.

SoulSurfer

Vincenzo Antoniani has spent more hours exploring hostile alien biomes than most people spend commuting to work. Whether he's diving for Managed Democracy in Helldivers 2, scavenging the dunes of Arrakis in Dune: Awakening, or getting chased by something with too many teeth in Subnautica 2, Vincenzo brings a survivor's eye for detail to everything he writes. He's also a longtime World of Warcraft raider who somehow still finds time to explore every new planet, ocean, and desert gaming throws at him. When he's not narrowly escaping death in a procedurally generated nightmare, Vincenzo is digging through patch notes, testing builds, and figuring out the fastest way to not die so you don't have to learn the hard way. Expect guides that are equal parts practical and slightly haunted by whatever killed him last.

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