As a long time Armored Core fan, I am disappointed with Armored Core VI.
EvaUnit02@kbin.social to 
Man, in 2023, it's really hard to get heard through all of the macho "git gud" guff but as a fan of Armored Core since its inception: this game is not what I was expecting. I am disappointed.
I adored Armored Core as a series because it was steeped in the management of myriad statistics and unimaginably many ways to combine various parts to get to the collection of statistics you wanted. It was about navigating maps that were sometimes open and sometimes long and winding. It was about having a mech that can hit hard for a small open map or has enough ammo and energy for a long, exploratory map. It was about kitting out your AC for each and every mission to accomodate for every detail given in the mission briefing.
With the exception of AC4 and to some extent, AC5 (and Formula Front, I suppose), the piloting was really rather ancillary. Sure, it was fun. Sure, there were things to do. But really, as a pilot, your job was to leverage your AC's strengths while mitigating its weaknesses.
AC6 turns all of that on its head.
AC6 feels very much like a Souls action game akin to Sekiro just with an added dash command. You dash around, trying to fill up an arbitrary bar just so you can deplete another bar all while managing your own bars. You do this while looking for patterns in a boss, avoiding their attacks, and waiting for "your turn". Cool, if you like that sort of thing. But the focus now really is on the action aspect rather than your builds. Of course, you can still build ACs but it feels much more like kitting out a Souls character than it does studying numerous values and piecing them together in ways that are both effective and affordable.
My gripes:
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The game seems to dish out AC parts as a reward rather than giving them to you as the core gameplay itself.
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Why do I not have a radar?
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The image editor is more restricted than it used to be (no more free-form pen tool)
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Why can't I build an AC whose generators offset my energy usage?
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Why is there a stagger gauge? Why isn't staggering instead a function of the kinetic energy behind my weapons and the stability of your AC?
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Why do my weapons do insane damage to normal enemies and virtually no damage to bosses?
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Ammo counts seem insane. I could be misremembering but I'm pretty sure the shoulder-mounted missile pod in the first mission reported having 150 missiles.
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Energy is just a meter limiting your dashing and jumping. It feels very much like a Dark Souls stamina gauge. I suppose if I'm charitable, I could say it feels like AC4.
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Speaking of Dark Souls, you now have magical repair kits akin to Estus Flasks.
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Combat seems very much of the Sekiro/Bloodborne dodge => stagger => damage variety. It seems much less viable to just walk in with a massive tank, soak everything thrown your way, and accomplish your mission. It also seems much less viable to use distance and terrain to your advantage. The smaller scale of the ACs in AC5 really gave me hope that terrain would be coming back as a major feature but it hasn't. Moreover, you can't build an AC that can fly off in to the stratosphere and rain hellfire from the sky.
This game feels very much like Sekiro with robots, to me. It's a game that is 95% action and 5% mech building. Even the action element doesn't try to feel like giant lumbering mechs engaged in combat. It feels like Gundams darting around while pulling both energy and ammo out of the ether in order to keep up the pace of the action. AC4 was very "super robot"-like but at least AC4 retained the core conceit of combat by virtual of stat interactions.
The bosses also feel distinctly Dark Souls-ish. They're big, imposing trials. I long for the days of Nine Ball and White Glint.
Does this game have stats? Sure. Do you build ACs? Yeah. But they are not the focus of the game anymore. This game is about piloting and at that, the piloting has been massively changed to feel much more video game-y and Dark Souls-like. It's about identifying and reacting to patterns. If you can do that, you'll be in very good shape to complete missions despite your build. In fact, I fully expect to see streamers with goofball AC versions of "nothing but my underwear and a torch" runs through the game.
One of the greatest joys I got out of the previous AC games was in finding clever ways to complete missions. If a mission was too hard for me, then I would try to construct an AC that allowed me to win the mission outside of the way the game wanted me to win. It was such a joy. It was facilitated through the fact that parts were numerous right from the get-go and the game mechanics centered around the interaction of dozens of statistics. Few things felt better than pummeling an AC with shots that they couldn't handle and keeping them in stun lock.
Sadly, this game is hell bent on you playing the game as an action game. You will be required to both understand and become proficient in the action mechanics or else you will fail missions. Mech building is a secondary activity.
There are plenty of games that do that already. What I wanted was Armored Core.
Dang, this is a disappointing read. This might be an unpopular take, but I have been steadily losing respect for FromSoft over the years due to them essentially following the same path as Bethesda - they used to make varied games until one of them randomly became very successful, and from that point on they've just been remaking that one game over and over with slightly different coats of paint. I was hoping they'd break out of that pattern with AC6 and do something original for a change, although I was also keenly aware there was a risk that, being the sixth game in the series, it would be just another AC. The fact that it's apparently just another Souls is somehow even worse.
As a massive Dark Souls fan, AC6 is not even a very good Souls game. No deep lore and story, no beautiful scenery, no exploration at all. Even the bosses aren't as good, because DS bosses can be tackled in various ways (melee, ranged, magic, many cheese strats) while AC6 bosses are designed to only let very specific builds succeed, which is incredibly boring. I honestly don't understand the hype.
Hah, you and OP are literally arguing the exact opposite of each other.
"It's a bad Souls game, I can't just use whatever build I want and win with pure skill!"
"It's a bad Armored Core game, I can't just optimize my mech for this exact fight and steamroll it!"
...
I like the game.
There's no contradiction there. You are required specifically optimize your build for the difficult boss fights -and- play with Sekiro-like skill. The game is clearly designed like this. And while I've never played any of the previous AC games I agree with OP that this feels Souls-like, with stamina, poise and everything.
The combat is fine perhaps. The main reason I don't like AC6 is because there's nothing interesting in it except the boss fights. It's the blandest FromSoft game I've ever played. Elden Ring kept me enthralled for a 100 hours until I got all achievements, trying to explore everything. An afternoon of AC6 I started to wonder why I was still playing, when after each mission or boss there's just going to be more of the same.
I've only just finished Chapter 1, but the cloaking mechs were an interesting challenge. That was more than just boss fights.
Mopping up MTs is a stupid waste of time, I agree, at least the ones that don't have high lethality weapons like bazookas. Bazooka MTs and artillery cannons are an interesting challenge, but there's not much variety there. Helis are never interesting foes.
The biggest flaw, imho, is that ACs don't feel different-enough, both to use and to fight. Maybe more will get unlocked further in the game, but I'm not seeing much variety in builds. You've got your homing missiles to cause stagger, your damage-guns to deal damage, and your swords and bazookas to punish people. Some ACs skip the punish-weapon and go all-in on damage. I'm missing the flak-bombs from the early games, the very different fighting styles of tanks and quads, the wider variety of missiles, etc.
Shields create an interesting tweak but I've only seen the riot-shield MTs and the pulse-shielded enemies -- I haven't seen any with the normal AC shield.
Yeah the cloaked enemies mission was also the highlight of chapter 1 for me. The far more interesting visual design of the area, the unique enemies and the mission design*. It was cool. But still disappointed that the ol' invisible enemies stage was the highlight of an entire chapter :P. I expected a lot more from FromSoft.
::: spoiler spoiler Behind you! :::
You misunderstood OP; there should not be one correct build to beat a given boss, there should be many possible viable builds, that all require different strategies and tactics because they have tangible trade-offs and don't all work for different enemies or maps.
"Use a gun and dodge well" or "use the sword and dodge well" is removing that planning and adaptation towards your own AC's requirements.
As a long-time Tenchu fan, I feel this was about Sekiro to be honest. It started life as Tenchu 5, then got turned mid-development into Sekiro. I just wish it had a bigger emphasis on stealth, rather than just swordfighting...
Tenchu has kind of a weird / tangled development history.
I think it's unlikely that we will get a another Tenchu entry with gameplay similar to older ones anymore.
If you want games with similar gameplay to Tenchu, then maybe you should watch Acquire's outputs. They developed games like Kamiwaza and Shinobido that have stealth mechanics.
Edit: updated for readability
This is a great sales pitch to hook me deeper into adding it to my wishlist lol.
I agree 10000%. This is Souls with robots, not Armored Core.
What's even more upsetting is that the reviews I read claim exactly the opposite, but you jump into mission 1 and there's a giant gunship that will 2-shot you, and you have no ability to customize your mech, so you're right from the outset being told that build means nothing about outcome.
I'm not surprised the Souls fans love this game since they don't know any better, but I am very disappointed in FROM.
(never played an AC game before) The lesson I took from the tutorial boss is that you should use the right weapon for the job, i.e. the build matters a lot. I wasn't getting anywhere with anything but the sword.
Yes, and that is not AC. There is not one correct weapon for the job, there should be many different combinations of tactics, weapons, movement styles, etc. The build didn't matter, because "the sword can kill everything" is not a "build", but it's true in AC6.
Want to one-shot the giant mechs at the expense of agility to handle small ones? Turn your AC into a massive lumbering build with a stupid-big cannon. Want to snipe stuff from halfway across the map, in exchange for a 20-second reload? Or make your AC able to fly for minutes on end, at the expense of only having a lightweight shotgun and blade, and barely any armor? No problem.
You could do those and tons more, and they all have trade-offs, and none of them work for every mission. That is AC.
There is no variance here, it's all just Dark Souls-like dodge-fighting. You could keep the same build from mission 1 and beat the game, and that's not "difficulty" in the AC sense.
I had this same experience. The gunship dies in 3 melee hits. I can only conclude that all the people whining about how unreasonably difficult it is are either just not moving around at all, or are trying to stay on the ground and gun it down.
It's funny how you turned, "this is not AC" into "[this is] unreasonably difficult". Despite what the Souls crowd seem to keep responding with, this is not a complaint about difficulty, it's a complaint about where the difficulty lies.
Souls-like games place their difficulty in adapting your movement and timing. That's what this game does.
AC used to place it's difficulty in planning. You had thousands of combinations of weapons, movement styles, distances, etc, so you could find many different ways to beat a boss, not just one. "Just fly up and hit it with the melee weapon while you dodge around" is the dumbed-down version of AC.
I was not referring to you specifically, but rather the significant number of people complaining about the difficulty of that encounter - take a look at the negative Steam reviews, for instance - at least when I was looking at them a day or two ago, about 30-40% of them mentioned that specific fight as being too hard. I've also seen it mentioned in a review, which is just unreal to me.
To respond to you directly, though... You seem to want the PS1 / PS2 era AC, which I don't think this is trying to be. You even note that AC4 and AC5 started to skew away from that; why would you assume that AC6 would be a return to the "old ways", rather than a continuation of the evolution they'd already started?
I'd also note that the 'Fly up and hit it with the melee weapon' boss is the tutorial boss in the first mission, before you get the ability to customize your AC, so your argument is kind of misplaced there.
You can use "fly up and hit it with a sword" for 95% of AC6.
That is not "AC" in the traditional sense, and while obviously FROM can make whatever game they want, it's disappointing to me that they turned it into Sekirobot, but with shorter and less interesting maps, and basically no lore.
As to why I thought it was a return to OG form, as I mentioned in my response to OP, I read multiple reviews which said it did exactly that. That's not FROM's fault, but it does suck.
I don't think FromSoft ever stated that it was a return to OG form. Reviewers say all kinds of things (including that the tutorial boss is too punishing, heh).
You're obviously free to dislike the game, though; I've been having a great time with it, but I also didn't come into the experience expecting (or even hoping for, really) AC1/2/3, so maybe that's got something to do with it. Is it different? Yes, absolutely, but it's still fun.
I think most AC games pretty much dump you into the first missions with a stock mech. AC6 is only distinct in that the first mission is so long and includes a comparatively-difficult boss-fight.
Yes, in most of them the first mission is just a short tutorial, before they turn you loose in the actual game (mech creation).
I'm a fan of both franchises and this seems like a good blend to me, not perfect but not bad.Seems like you're ultimately annoyed that you can't faceroll the game with simply bigger numbers in certain stats. And you also seemingly have a hate boner for Dark Souls.
You really drive that point home with "Few things felt better than pummeling an AC with shots that they couldn't handle and keeping them in stun lock."
I mean, if that's how you have fun then ok; but I don't think the majority of players find fun shooting fish in a barrel.
You're also gonna have a pretty unsuccessful time chasing the gameplay of your childhood too. The entire gaming landscape has changed so simply plucking out the formulas of old and dialing up the graphics isn't really enough. Look at Old School Runescape and see how the players approach the game compared to 2006. Look at Halo 3, one of the best, most influential FPS games to date, imo. If it were released today, it would be eaten alive, calling it "boring" or "simple" etc. ; because people today are playing seizure inducing shit like Valorant or Apex. I firmly think if you got the AC you think you wanted, it wouldn't reach those expectations at all.
That's not it at all. What I want is the freedom to approach the game using the mechanics of the stats, the way the game had worked for decades before. If that means "faceroll[ing] the game", then so be it. I thought the final boss of Verdict Day (among many others across the series) was incredibly difficult but I didn't have a problem with it because the game let me respond to that difficulty with building my mech rather than requiring me to be dexterous and having intimate knowledge of action game mechanics. AC6 just doesn't play like the mech sim I expect the series to be. It plays like an action game and demands I master the action. It feels less MechWarrior, more Titanfall. I know that's a reductive analogy and all three games are fairly different but hopefully my point gets across.
Then you've misread. I adore the Souls series. That doesn't mean I want my From games to be homogenized in to it.
I disagree. For what it's worth, I wasn't a child when Armored Core first released on the PSX; so, I'm not really chasing childhood nostalgia. Regardless, I thought Verdict Day was brilliant. Granted, it was ten years ago but it was nearly fifteen years after the original AC.
Its alright for people to dislike Dark Souls or not want every game to be a Souls-like. Not too mention that there weren't really any actual criticism of Dark Souls in the post. Makes the rest of your comment fine of as defensive more than anything.
Well, you confirmed some of my fears. I'm sure I'll still enjoy it when I play it eventually, but the mech game genre has been in starvation mode for a long time and it doesn't seem like AC6 will be able to really scratch that itch.
As a fan of souls games and mech games, I wouldn't be TOO worried. OP is overstating the problem. I sympathize, because this is indeed a different Armored Core, but it's nothing at all like a souls game. It's still a mech game and a good one, but it's not as technically deep as previous AC games while also being dramatically more difficult.
I would say in older AC games having a terrible build vs a great build meant the mission was either literally impossible or braindead easy. In AC6 a terrible build means the mission will be much harder, but still perfectly doable, and having a great build means the mission will run smoother but may still be quite challenging since threats are generally a lot more deadly than they were in previous titles.
I can totally understand how that can kill the vibe for someone who wants to seek victory in the build screen and enjoy the rewarding power fantasy during the mission, but it's still a great mech game with a lot of meaningful variety.
Proof of this is that while, yes, AC purists are upset that this game is more action-y, there are just as many Souls fans who are mad that the mech building game they bought is - get this - actually a mech game and not just Robo Souls.
Agreed.
That said, the Armored Core games seem to disagree with their own stated goals.
"We want you to reconfigure your mech to properly fit with the mission!"
"Cool, so you're going to give me a thorough briefing on what I can expect so I can tailor my mech to that?"
"No."
"You're going to let me reconfigure my mech mid-mission?"
"No."
"You're going to unify the buy/sell/garage screens so I can easily redesign my loadout without flipping through 3 different screens?"
"No."
"So what am I supposed to do?"
"Die. Then reconfigure. And depending on the game, go deeply in debt."
"Yikes. So at least reloading will be quick?"
"No."
"You'll at least skip the scripted dialogue and startup animation when I'm retrying?"
"No."
"... Okay."
Seriously, the Armored Core game that die-hard fans describe sounds great. I wish those were the games they actually made.
What you described is just old school trial and error lol. Missions in armored core were never long enough for this to be an issue
Having only ever played AC2 (and Chromehounds which as basically a spiritual successor) before AC6: It feels pretty much like the same game. The only thing I'm not liking is that in AC2, all the parts were in the shop from the start and you just had to have money to purchase them. AC6 unlocks parts in the shop over time, by completing missions. So even if I grind out a good paying sortie to buy everything right off the bat, I don't actually have everything.
But the combat and action? I see no difference in 6 from 2. AC2 was also pretty much about playing aggressively, dodging enemy missiles, and retaliating in the same way 6 handles it. The best build was the one that gave you the highest numbers across the board. But the bosses are actually unique and not just another AC who might be a few levels higher than you.
I don't know how 3-5 played (didn't even know they existed until 6 was announced; never saw them in a store, never heard anyone talk about them), but 2 was definitely not what you would say makes Armored Core, Armored Core.
Agree that the mecha feel a bit more samey, but I played the heck out of the first AC games and I don't miss the long and winding maps. I still remember maps I had to play Descent-style constantly switching to the 3D map (like the biological missions with the mouse-monsters in the first game). It was boring and tedious. And I don't miss superlong missions where I had to ammo-ration.
A fundamental problem with AC is they don't give you enough info to make informed decisions about config unless you want to try->die->redesign. Like if they had a preview of the terrain and some rough guesstimates about mission length and ammo needs, you could tailor your mech without the "oops I didn't know this was going to be a marathon I'm out of ammo" which is just the most miserable way to lose. AC6 makes this explicit in that you probably won't run out of ammo if you've 4 weapons and you use all of them. Given the alternative, I'll take it.
And as for the "why isn't stagger a function of knockback" that was terrible gameplay you could stunlock people in the early AC games.
I like the cooldown-based weapons, like the motion model (fighting while doing the flanking boost is hella fun)... But yes, the energy model is weird and imho does a lot to make the ACs feel samey. It used to be picking an energy weapon meant a tradeoff that you were draining your boost power when firing.
But yes I miss the radar. I think the expectation is that players will lock-on and then forget it, but I hate lock-on so I switched to mouse and keyboard and I find I'm often losing fast-moving targets in my periphery.
I miss the limited rotation rate of the early games, where boosting backwards to put a target in front of you was often better than turning to face them. Rotation rates was another way different layouts felt different. This also led to considerations with FCS shapes - short-ranged weapons with wider targeting-boxes that didn't require aiming.
But on the other other hand, the spreadsheet of numbers is always dumb. I can't think of any genre other than turn-based RPGs that are better for including "this weapon does different damage to target X vs target Y". That's always annoying trivia - let the Pokemon players keep that nonsense.
I'm mostly just surprised that I've seen people say AC6 is more accessible than previous ACs when it's probably the hardest AC game since Last Raven. The chapter 1 boss is as hard as the final boss of Verdict Day.
Of course, I said the same thing about Elden Ring; my friend was trying to convince our other friends that it was more approachable than Dark Souls, and I was like "The first story boss has higher moveset complexity than Nameless King phase 2!" I think in the end most people still found it more approachable, which I don't really understand because I think it was way harder than the non-DLC parts of DS3, so maybe I'm just looking at these games wrong/weird.
AC6 is both more and less accessible along the same lines. It's a simpler game. The space given to customize your make is smaller, you can't go into debt by making stupid builds, and in exchange bosses will wombo-combo you from full AP to dead even with a heavy build if you get stunned at the wrong time. There's a person who experiences that wombo-combo, says, "this is bullshit" and puts the game down forever. But there is also a person who tries AC2, fails a mission with an expensive loadout, realizes they can't afford to make the build that failure inspired them to make, and say "no THIS is bullshit" and put the game down forever.
Likewise, Elden Ring is both easy and hard because it gives you a ton of freedom. There are more solutions than just "git gud" which is refreshing for someone who can't tolerate banging their head against Iudex Gundyr for a couple hours. But it's obnoxious to someone who sees Tree Sentinel and doesn't want to "have to explore" to find level appropriate content.
I've never played an Armored Core game before but I'm enjoying this one. What you're describing sounds fun too though.
It's fun and finished. Too bad you don't like it but it's a really enjoyable game for most players including myself.
Can you recommend an older game to play on an emulator instead? Do they still hold up?
Everything after 3 is good. Runs well enough on pcsx2. The set of 3 that are right around nexus holds up really well and can play online with xlink Kai which is awesome. I'm too lazy to post links, I apologize
Ok so I haven't completed the game yet (too busy with work) but so far I am enjoying it. Just finished crossing the wall.
I feel like AC6 feels like a good mid-point between AC4 (too floaty) and AC5 (too on the ground).
Maybe because I usually preferred inverted legs / 4 legs over tanky ACs, I feel like the game pretty much did what I want it to do?
Bosses in older AC entries usually don't have a clear "tell" in their actions. It could be a good thing but could also cause a lot of frustrations.
I still remember Pulverizer from Last Raven, it was definitely more frustration than fun....
The second I saw a focus on bosses with life bars, estus flasks and stagger gauges I was out. Been a fan since the ps2 days and was extremely disappointed