My Thoughts on Armored Core 6 After 40 Hours of Gameplay...

I just completed Armored Core 6. I beat

the final boss and got one of the first

endings, and I just wanted to give my

thoughts on the game after playing it for

over 40 hours. So first of all, I just

wanted to say that I think it's an okay

game. It's not bad, but it's not

spectacular or a masterpiece like Elden

Ring was. It's an okay game, and I feel

like there were plenty of flaws with the

game that kind of held it back from

becoming a masterpiece. When I first

finished the game, I was kind of shocked

at how it was already over so quickly,

and I didn't really feel like I was even

playing the game a lot. I started playing

the game last Friday and now it's Tuesday,

and I was just kind of playing the game

casually, not really trying to beat the

main campaign as quickly as possible. I

was taking my time, I was grinding some of

the older missions, replaying the older

missions to save up money so I could buy

new parts for my mech, and I was

experimenting in the arena, so I wasn't

just kind completely gunning for the

ending and only doing the campaign. But

after only playing the game for like 5

days, I seem to have managed to beat the

entire game already. And I feel kind of

disappointed that number one, the game was

so easy because it's supposed to be like a

FromSoftware game and they're famous for

making really difficult Souls-like games.

And I know this is not a Souls-like, but

it's from FromSoftware, so I was expecting

that this game was going to be really

challenging. But the game just wasn't

really that challenging. I did get stuck

on a few bosses for a couple of hours,

but apart from that, I managed to just

blaze through the majority of the game

without any difficulties, and I actually

beat the very final boss after just

attempting it once. Now I know there's NG+

and NG++, and I've heard that you get

different endings and there's some few

extra new missions after doing NG++, but I

don't really feel motivated to get the

other endings. I don't really want to play

through the entire game all over again

just so I can unlock a different ending

when I didn't really care that much about

the story in the first place. Actually, I

have no idea what was going on in the

story. For some reason, after I beat a

game and I finish the final mission and I

defeat the final boss, I lose all interest

in playing that game anymore. I don't

really care if I could replay the missions

and try and improve my rank or do arenas

and see if I can get a better score or do

PvP. The game is kind of dead to me after

I finish the final mission and I complete

the main story. Same with Diablo 4. When I

finished the campaign and I finished the

final boss, even though you could grind up

to level 100 and do Nightmare Dungeons, I

just kind of lost all all of my motivation

to carry on playing the game. So first of

all, when I initially started the game, I

was really intrigued with the world and

excited to see what kind of story the game

was going to throw at me. But the story

just didn't really seem to go anywhere for

me, and I just felt like I wasn't very

invested in the story. I didn't really

know what was going on most of the time.

It just seemed like, okay, we've got this

mission, we got to defeat these bad guys

because they're bad and they're trying to

do this. And I just didn't really feel

like I cared much about the story or the

characters. I feel like one of the

problems about the storytelling was that

you never really got to see the humans

inside of the mechs, and that really kind

of dehumanized the story for me. Like in

the anime Neon Genesis Evangelion, which

is an extremely emotional story and roller

coaster ride of emotions, I feel like that

is mainly because you get to see the

characters that pilot the mechs. In

Armored Core 6, you never really see a

single human being ever. There's no humans

in this. You wouldn't even know that there

are humans piloting the mechs. You would

think, oh, these are just completely

robotic machines with no one inside. But

I'm pretty sure there's supposed to be a

pilot inside of the mechs, and you never

get to see anyone's face or anyone walking

around, or you don't get to exit the mech

as a human and walk around the

headquarters or the home base or anything.

And I feel like this lack of human

presence really kind of made the story

very dull and boring for me. So

unfortunately, for that reason, I really

couldn't get very emotionally invested in

the world or the characters or the

universe of Armored Core. So I'd have to

give the story a 2 out of 10. Now next, I

was really impressed with the amount of

customization you could do to your mech

and the sheer amount of of weapons and

arms and legs and different parts that you

could unlock. It was just endless. Like,

I'd unlock this new weapon, I thought,

surely this must be it, and then nope,

several levels later I'm just unlocking

another 10 or 15 weapons and

shoulder-mounted bazookas and missile pods

and laser guns and swords and all this

stuff. And it seems really cool at first

because you've got so much choice, but

then after you test out all the different

weapons and missile pods you realize that

most of them kind of suck and there's only

a few that are actually really good, like

the stun needles or the shotguns or the

Gatling guns or the Songbirds. Those were

my main go-to weapons and every time I got

stuck I just switched back to those. And

when I wanted to have some fun, I might

experiment with some of the other weapons,

but they were always kind of lacking in

luster compared to my main go-to weapons.

So even though you have the ability to do

all this customization and there's lots of

different parts. I feel like 90% of the

parts and weapons I just wouldn't touch

because they weren't that great. For

example, the reverse joint super agile

legs which make you jump and boost really

fastly— fast and quickly were cool, but

then it means that you couldn't really

carry much weaponry because you had to

take a light load and you couldn't take

the missile launchers or the big weapons,

and you had to choose just crappy assault

rifles or the Uzi kind of guns. And the

damage output when you've got a light

build is just so bad it makes it

unplayable. So I always ended up going

back towards my normal heavy build, and

the tank tracks just make the game so easy

because you get nearly 20,000 AP and you

can just basically soak up any kind of

damage and you don't really have to worry

about dying. Like I said before, I found

the game to be kind of easy. There was

only a few points in the game where I

found it really difficult, and they were

honestly the most enjoyable parts of the

game where I was just scratching my head

trying to think of a build that could take

down this boss. Most of the boss battles

were fun, but there was only a few that

really got me stuck. Number one, Baltius,

took me hours to figure out a build that

could take him down. And then also, like,

the big spider boss took me quite a few

attempts to take it down, but they were

really fun to fight against. When you're

not doing the boss battles, the missions

are really boring and dull, and I just

feel like you're fighting against all of

these trash mechs which just take a couple

shots to kill, and there's no challenge.

What's the point? They just stand around,

they shoot at you, not really doing any

damage to you, and it takes like one shot

from your guns to kill these little trash

mech mobs, and it just feels like this is

a waste of time. Most of the time, if I

didn't have to take out the trash mobs, I

would just fly straight past them. Some of

the missions are so stupidly short. Like,

there's one mission where you've got 4

minutes and all you have to do is find out

where the wreckages of Armored Cores are

so you could retrieve the data logs. Some

missions start and all you have to do is

fight some boss that appears and then it

ends. And it just feels like these

missions feel so lazy and so short that

there was no point of even having them in

the game. Why didn't they just make proper

missions that take, I don't know, 20 to 30

minutes to finish and there's like a

beginning and an end? And then for some

reason, a few of the missions had no

checkpoints. There's one mission where you

got to protect some building. It's got

like a shield and a tower and there's

enemies coming towards it trying to shoot

at it. You got to take out the enemies

before they take out the shields and

destroy the building. And there's no

checkpoints during that entire mission.

If accidentally you let some of the trash

mobs through and destroy the building,

then you have to start the whole thing

from the beginning. The OS tuning system

seemed pretty cool in the beginning,

unlocking the chips so you can unlock more

powerful upgrades, but then you realize

that it's a very basic and shallow system

where basically you're just putting points

into whatever weapon you're using. So if

you use explosives, you max out the

explosives, and then If you want higher

defensive capabilities, then you just get

the armor stuff or the damage mitigation.

And then there's some skills in the OS

tuning which don't make any sense, like

manual aiming. I don't understand why

you'd want manual aiming when you've got

automatic aim assist. Maybe it's like,

maybe you're really bored of the game and

you want to make it harder, so you use

manual aiming so it just makes the game

harder, so it's more of a challenge. And

then there's like the kick thing, which I

never used because it seemed kind of

pointless. And the quick turn thing also

seemed kind of pointless because I can

just turn the camera around pretty quickly

anyway. I would have liked a proper skill

tree where you could unlock different kind

of abilities or skills that affect your

weapons. Like maybe you have the shotgun,

and then if you specialize into certain

skills, you can then maybe charge up the

shotgun or do like a quick fire, but then

it reloads longer or something like that.

That could help customize your playstyle

through skills, but because the game is

not really an RPG game, doesn't really

have many RPG elements, it's purely an

action game, I guess they didn't want to

go for a skill tree. I finished all of the

arena bosses and they weren't really much

of a challenge either, and I did a bit of

PvP, but it wasn't really my cup of tea.

It was okay for a quick laugh, but I don't

really see myself seriously dedicating a

lot of time to trying to become a PvP

master. So I feel like the replayability

and the value of— value for money you get

out of the game is not that great. I don't

really care about getting S ranks or

trying to perfect my score on all of the

missions because once I've done the

mission, I don't really want to go back

and replay it because they weren't even

that fun anyway. And the game was like

£50. I don't really feel like the game was

good value for money because it didn't

even last me more than a week. It was like

a quick weekend game A couple days, bit of

fun messing around with mechs,

customizing it and painting and stuff.

But for £50, that seems like not a lot of

entertainment in return for that amount of

money. I feel like the game should have

been just £20. I feel like they kind of

got lazy. Like, they made a good core game

with good combat mechanics and fun

gameplay and like a cool idea, but then

they didn't flesh it out properly with

like an open world or actually good

missions with a lot of depth, and the game

just kind of finishes abruptly and it

feels like, oh, that was it? Seriously?

So yeah, all I can say is I was kind of

disappointed when the game finished, and I

don't see myself playing NG+ or NG++

because I am kind of done with the game.

I feel satisfied. So unfortunately, I

would have to give the game a 6.2 out of

10. It's okay, but I don't really feel

like I could highly recommend it.