I've been playing Freespace 2 a bit lately and it is good but find the controls a bit too complicated. Are any of the other flight games here more simple in the controls? I don't need easy difficulty just easier controls to remember since I'm more looking for a good flight game to play in short sessions while I hit some of the RPGs in my backlog.

Not at the moment. TBH the only good games that come close to Ace Combat are HAWX and HAWX 2.

FS2 have complicated controls? xD