Shadow 22 is the last wall in Mission 28 of Ace Combat 8. He is also why so many runs end with the timer at zero and one enemy still on the radar. His real name is Colonel Girish Toprak and his callsign is Ares. He leads the most elite Su-57 unit in the Sotoan Air Force.
The Shadow 22 fight gets much easier once you stop trusting your missiles. Gun him whenever he stalls, or bring SASM and let the blast do the work.
Here is the short answer:
- Make the gun your main weapon. Flares do nothing against bullets.
- Fire one missile to pull his flares, then a second when he levels out.
- Bring SASM if you can. A near miss still hurts him.
- Take the head-on pass when he offers it. It works more often than it should.
What You Will Read:
Why Your Missiles Keep Missing Shadow 22
Ares and his three wingmen never run out of flares, and they answer almost every launch with a post-stall maneuver. In the campaign, a PSM breaks missile tracking. So a missile you fire while he is mid-flip is simply gone.
It gets worse. Clean shots from right behind him often drift wide at the last second, with no flare in sight. If that keeps happening to you, your aim is fine. The fight is built to push you onto the gun.
There is good news too. The same rule works for you, so your own PSM shakes his missiles, and our post-stall maneuver guide covers the inputs. The Shadows are also fragile. One solid second of gunfire can finish any of them.
How to Beat Shadow 22 in Ace Combat 8
1. Go After Shadow 22 First
Four Su-57s arrive together, and the natural instinct is to thin out the wingmen. Do the opposite. Target Ares right away and authorize special weapons for your flight, so everyone piles onto him.
He is strangely easy to catch in the opening minute, and the other three tend to fold faster once their leader is down. You do miss part of his big speech this way. I can live with that.
2. Use the Gun During His Kulbit
His signature move is a kulbit. He stalls and flips on the spot, then fires missiles backward at you. It looks terrifying, but for a couple of seconds he is hanging in the air and barely moving. Put the gun on him right there.
Do not wait for a perfect tail position, because you will not get one. Short bursts every time he stalls add up fast.
3. Bait the Flares Before You Fire for Real
Missiles still have a job. Fire a single standard missile to make him dump flares and flip. Wait about a second after the maneuver ends, when he levels out and starts to run. Then send the QAAM or SASM.
Never launch two at once here. You just throw both away.
4. Take the Head-On Pass
If you cannot get an angle, stop turning with him. Open some distance, then swing back around and hold the gun down while he comes straight at you. He usually accepts the joust and does not dodge. Break off before his own guns reach you.
5. Keep an Eye on the Clock
The mission timer does not stop for anybody. It even keeps running during his death speech, so a kill in the last seconds can still end in a failed mission. Leave yourself a margin.
If you run dry, you can land and rearm in the middle of the fight. A landing also repairs your damage and refills your flares.
Best Plane and Loadout for the Shadow 22 Fight
You can win this in almost anything, but some planes make it far less painful.
| Plane | Special weapon | Why it works |
|---|---|---|
| F-15C | SASM | The favorite for this fight, and available on a first playthrough. |
| Gripen | SASM | Agile enough to stay with the kulbits. A good fix if the F-22A or F-35C is not working for you. |
| MiG-21bis | SASM | The cheapest way to carry SASM. It can mount a machine gun pod too. |
| F-22A or Su-57 | QAAM | No SASM here, so the gun does most of the work. QAAM needs guidance parts to land. |
If your hangar is short on options, our MRP farm guide shows the fastest ways to earn enough for one of these.
Why SASM Is So Good Here
SASM explodes near its target, so it does not need a direct hit. That takes most of the sting out of the flares and flips. Stack special weapon parts for speed, guidance, damage and capacity, then add the part that widens the SASM blast. Built like that, each Shadow goes down in three or four hits.
Fire it from close range, right after the flares or straight into his face on a head-on pass.
Gun Setup and Wingmen
For the gun, take the auto-fire part, and add gun range and damage if you have slots left. Auto-fire shoots for you whenever a Shadow crosses your nose, which happens a lot. If the sight feels jumpy, switch the gun sight to Type B in the settings. It is much steadier.
If you lean on missiles, put one wingman in an EA-18G Growler. Its ESM support makes your missiles track better.
Mission 28 S Rank: The Shadows Decide It
A Thousand Points of Light is long, and most of your score is banked before the Shadows show up. The rank still hangs on how fast you kill them. Drag the fight out and an S run turns into an A or a B, even with more kills on the board. Sweep all four in two or three minutes and you are in S rank territory.
Checkpoint restarts cost you score as well, so treat an S attempt as one clean run. This is where the SASM build earns its place.
Who Is Shadow 22?
Shadow 22 is Colonel Girish Toprak, callsign Ares. He is Sotoa’s top ace and the leader of the 22nd Unit of Lux Lunae, the elite squadron whose pilots all fly as Shadows. Like the rest of his unit, he flies a Su-57 Felon.
He is the man who shot down Jan Cope, the original Wings of Theve, which makes this one personal. You first trade shots with him in Mission 18, Moonlight and Shadows, but he pulls out before you can finish it. The rematch in Mission 28 is where he dies.
Shadow 22’s voice actor is Dar Dash in English and Kenyu Horiuchi in Japanese. Once the 22nd Unit is gone, only their commander is left. That is Moon 11, the boss of Mission 29.
Shadow Squadron Assault Records
Every member of the 22nd Unit has an Assault Record, and one of them is easy to lock yourself out of. To fill the full set, shoot down Shadow 24 back in Mission 18. A different pilot then takes his place in Mission 28.
That only carries over inside a single campaign run. Free Mission will not do it. Kills by your wingmen still count toward the records, and named aces also unlock skins for their aircraft type.
