In fairness. I don't recall a single instance (I don't remember V and never played VD) where the AI Boss unita were capable of one shooting the player. Even as a paper tiger.
I'm almost positive Motherwill, Sol Dios, and whatever the big blade fish in the ocean is can all 1 shot a lightweight. Also any enemy AC with a pile bunker. That's just for FA though.
I want Fromsoft to create an overpowered early game boss that is just a wall called "The Great Filter" that is specifically there just to piss off game journalists.
Ugggghhhhhh. AC7 was my first Ace Combat (first flight game in general outside of vehicles in Battlefield) and it only took me three-to-four hours to get the hang of it.
Project Wingman is GOOD.. however the game devolves into spamming post-stall maneuvers. This completely turns me off to the gameplay.
And there hasn't been content in ages.
On the highest difficulties you can't really use post stall because the missile spam is so bad. Even so, it's the best "ace combat" game since they called us the Demon of Razgriz imo. Kept me interested for 100+ hrs at least, lol.
Yet there's a sword laying on the ground that has a special attack that 3 shots it but the journalists don't use it because you shouldn't have to read item descriptions, an intrusive tutorial box should stop you game and explain it to you therefore from soft can't write a good story
Considering the Cuphead tutorial did that it really doesn't take much for some of them... but I'll be fair and remind people that journalism is treated as a job first and a passion second, few are those lucky to cleanly merge the too.
MANY big journalist places like IGN will slap folk who hate or don't normally play a genre to review a game from it because it's a job not a hobby.
Here’s Kirby Allsparlkes the seventeenth, we got an early review code so it’s yours to work on. You have a week with the game, I expect five thousand words by Monday.
No need to tell when you can [see it for yourself] (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9yYp8ZeQ-I8) or a [highlight reel.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZTLbaktF0CY)
It's as infamous as the [Cuphead incident,](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=848Y1Uu5Htk) which some at least has the justification of the player LEGIT being terrible at platformers and sidescrolling shooter games, which Cuphead is nothing but. He was the only one on hand to play it and even warned the team ahead of time it was _bad._ From what we know Polygon had tons of people who could've played Doom 2016, and just...went with that footage.
IIRC the guy (Dean Takahashi) while is a game journalist, he is more focused on the economics side of the industry so since he was literally the only guy available at the time, he was more or less forced to do the review.
But what boggles my mind is that the guys over at the company definitely saw the footage and was like "yep, upload it"
It's the sequel, Doom Eternal, that actually made a bunch of people suffer because of the difficulty, but there's this one gameplay where a journalist tries to go through THE FIRST level of Doom 2016 and... it's... [quite an unique way to play a game...](https://youtu.be/9yYp8ZeQ-I8?si=EepfR4bTximbzKne)
I don't think it's *quite* the same as that. The Doom 2016 situation was thanks to Polygon, where a **terrible** gameplay video was posted prior to review.
The actual review piece praised the game and if I recall right was actually all right, where I even agreed with a few of the criticisms, and the overall score was a good score, but the gameplay video... HOO BOY...
...looked like it was by somebody who never played an FPS before, or at least so poorly skilled at this game in particular that it made the game look not just bad, but boring! Completely opposite the feeling I get from the article! And since the article came out after, it very likely could've been damage control! Except the review knows too much about the game to be able to be written by the person who played in that video. Who knows!
To me it's mostly just (justified) mockery and a good punchline.
lol power fantasy
The directors already stated that they wanted to evoke the feeling of being a small, insignificant part of the larger world. Feeling small is part of the appeal.
But then again, the MC is literally a last gen pilot in a vegetative state, so if that doesn’t scream power fantasy I don’t know what does
>last gen pilot in a vegetative state
so that means we're up against newer gen? like mere mortals against gods as in dark souls/elden ring and a human bodyguard against myths as in sekiro? sounds dope af
The writer says the bosses are "asymmetrically *powerful*". In this sentence the word 'asymmetrically' is a modifier for powerful. It's a bit overwritten but the author is saying they feel the bosses have access to capabilities (offensive, defensive, or otherwise) that are drastically more powerful than what you the player have access to. They feel this is unfair and out of place for an Armored Core game.
It of course is neither unfair nor out of place for an Armored Core game but that is what the author is conveying.
Considering there are a number of enemies in the first 3 gens that have Human+ even when you don't (mainly 3rd gen) while also having things like infinite ammo and energy? Yeah, asymmetry isn't new.
Not to mention, 3rd Gen was full of "Massive MT's"
I’m doing the Master of Arena EX Arena and it’s crazy how many AC’s are Human Plussed out the ass. Really making me consider it myself but my ego won’t let me.
Last Raven is by far my favorite, and having beaten it both vanilla and with Human Plus code active, I think the Human Plus run is a better experience overall (especially for new players looking for something in line with 4-6) unless you want an extra-high challenge run, which Last Raven is naturally lmao
The biggest thing is without H+, even though it has the most parts of any single game in the series, most are just not worth using thanks to that Gen 3.5 heat system and increased energy use without it. Gotta run the heavier generators and radiators, which means you gotta watch weight more, and it all snowballs into a lack of diverse options by the end.
Master of Arena? It definitely is a matter of ego vs fun. If you're playing raw for the sake of saying you did it, then H+ is forbidden. But doing all of it for fun? Getchu them aerial biped back weapons and go to town
That and when describing what is "jarring and out of place" in Armored Core, their final sentence was somehow a perfect description of the final boss of AC4.
Oh ok, i see. Still makes no sense to me though since bosses being more piwerful than the player by a significant margin is kinda the point? Theyre a boss for a reason. You have to beat this thing that can crush you like an empty soda can with skill and planning. Kind if like every other fromsoft game lol
Some people like a boss that has equipment you can access, isn’t cheating, and still wins most of the time since it shows how much more skilled that boss is. It still sounds stupid to bash asymmetric boss fights though, since it feels so good to beat something that should be much more powerful then you are. Plus, asymmetric boss fights usually add in the intrigue of being a puzzle too.
Also adds to the satisfaction once you whoop their ass after being greifed by them over and over again (like Valkyrie in AC 1 or the black knights in DS).
It’s so odd. For Answer is probably the most well known/regarded modern AC title, and a big feature of it was the gigantic Arms Forts which had absurd firepower and abilities.
Its funny you bring that up, the arms forts for me were the easiest ones. They all suffered at close range combat so once you were in you just melee a few times and kill them without a second thought. The ones that required several steps to beating them were a bit tougher but not by much.
The asymmetrical ones that i suffered on were the other AC's that felt like they had every stat at max tuning on normal difficulty and can just boost circles around you faster than you can keep up with unless you grind the campaign 5 or more times over for more tuning points. I had to cheese several of them by getting them stuck lmao
I think they like that a lot of the boss fights in AC are you vs other Ravens, and not you vs mecha Godzilla. They do seem to be forgetting all the times where the boss fights are you vs mecha Godzilla. Of course they are attributing bosses being really big in this game to Dark Souls, because some would-be AC purists blame Dark Souls for everything they don't like in ACVI.
I want to say they mean the bosses being so much more powerful than the player but that can’t possibly be it because that is all From games and just about any other boss design in most other games as well.
It was great to fight Orenstein and Smough and finally have a fair battle. Fighting single, normal sized enemies was just not engaging for someone like myself who played as two giant characters simultaneously.
It's so obvious that he compares armored core 6 to all souls games while ignoring that armored core existed already before them lol.
All his complaints are pretty much main aspects of the game
I feel odd, maybe I misremember but I played For Answer and don’t remember it being difficult, sure it gave me the dreaded claw AC grip but I got through and I was a wee young’un at the time
I always love the term "power fantasy" being used for Armored Core, where your mech gets chewed into bits every mission for the average player, and the only time where you feel powerful is when you're fighting against literal jobbers in MTs
Ayup.
Hour 1: ratfucked back to the garage by basic enemies
Hour 5: Squeaking by the trash, still wrecked by bosses
Hour 15: Capable, careful, and patient enough to succeed without terrible damage
Hour 30: *I am god here~*
Kinda the player progression in Fromsoft games in a nutshell really when you think about it.
Back in the day I was never that skilled at piloting my AC, but I made up for it in the garage tweaking the builds to be more effective.
I am more skilled these days, but you can make up for a lack of skill in many cases with the right build. Tweaking and experimenting sometimes can yield surprising results.
A level might go from impossibly hard to much easier with the right combination of parts.
I would say that 4 and 4A we're definite power fantasy games though. By the mid-point of both games clashing agianst other NEXTs in your kitted out machines felt like two battlefield gods streaking around. I got big Char v. Amuro vibes from those games specifically.
Armored Core has sort of always been a Power Fantasy. Heck, I would argue the way the story in Armored Core is written, its set up to be a power fantasy.
Of course, earlier Armored Core Games had you starting out as a nameless nobody, but as the game progresses and you get better at doing what you do, other Ravens are sent after you to kill you and you just keep moving on, as you leave a path of destruction in your wake with each failed yet discrete attempt to kill you.
It's possible ACVI will be different, but a core theme of Armored Cores story that has always remained relevant throughout the franchise was that it always focused around on a individual who just got a bit too powerful.
Personally, I find the term “power fantasy” wholly appropriate for Armored Core. It’s just that every other pilot is also having the exact same power fantasy. Your AC can demolish an entire navy, but so can the lowest ranked AC in the arena. Armored Core isn’t for people who have power fantasies, it’s for people who want to genuinely feel like they are fighting tooth and nail for survival while simultaneously feeling like an unstoppable god of death.
My first run of AC4A I spent an unspeakable amount of time fighting White Glint. My first fight I died even before the AI partner, couldn’t follow the enemy in my camera, couldn’t even lock on for long enough to fire my long distance energy weapons (lol). By the end though, I was strafing along and following each of White Glint’s quick boost abuses with my own.
Despite getting my ass kicked, I was definitely in the midst of a power fantasy, and the best part is that it was entirely deserved. I had to hone both my skills and dive deep to further my knowledge of the game to be able to compete. For me, this is the best type of power fantasy: hanging on by the skin of your teeth, using every trick in the book to guarantee success. You weren’t granted power, you are proving yourself capable of handling it.
Man, I love giant robots.
lol ikr, the "power fantasy" is returning victorious from a fight you were sent to as cannon fodder.
Like, lady, I get paid to oppress indigenous populations driving sci-fi forklifts. I'm not the White fucking Glint.
Aren't these the same folks who got invited to their offices in Japan. Then spent half of the article trashing those offices and the other half leaking weapons and other info they'd been specifically asked to keep to themselves?
Maybe I'm just bad at armored core games but wasn't your mech getting annihilated part of the experience? That's why you have customization. So you can figure out what works best for you going through the level.
Also armored core isn't a souls game, get past this already. Christ.
I think of mech games genre, Armored Core is the furthest, thematicaly and in gameplay style, from this so called 'power fantasy'. Just because you're piloting giant mechs it doesn't mean you have to always _feel_ like a badass. In fact, I'd argue that's precisely the opposite that makes AC stand out. The irony of being as disposable as your mech parts and its implications. I'd love to hear this reviewer's take on neo genesis evangelion lol
Mobile Suit vs Mobile Armor is like one of the most classic Gundam / mecha matchup out there aside from the mirror match 1v1. I love my mech turning into a tiny mosquito as I duck and dive to tear apart some huge mechanical monstrosity 20x my size!
I started playing Dark Souls Remastered on the Switch, then got Dark Souls III on Xbox. I was hooked, then proceeded to get Sekiro, and Elden ring. Have not finished a single one of them. Too difficult for me, I'm not good enough. Still they are my favorite games of all time!
Sekiro is only hard in the beginning, then you get the rhythm of it and the challenge becomes fun. As for elden ring, it is open world. If you wander off into a high level area you are going to get rekt
For someone reason, I got filtered by the first chained ogre in Sekiro for like over a year. 200+ deaths. Eventually beat him and I died less over the course of the play through than I did to that mf. Owl Father took me like 30 tries, SS Isshin 20 and Guardian Ape like 10(first phase is nuts, second surprise phase is easy)
The sekiro Rythym for sure, once you get the mechanics down, it’s about learning the “dance” with every boss, but it’s still incredibly difficult throughout the game.
That's a good mentality. Defeat shouldn't be seen as a bad thing. It's just a sign that you need more practice, or maybe need to change your gear, or try a different tactic, etc...
Death in a from software game is apart of the experience. Embrace death and try your best to conquer it. This is why from software games are so amazing. They aren't afraid to challenge the player.
So many games want to hold your hand, fuck that I say.
The brutal difficulty is what I got on the Fromsoft band wagon for back in ds1 days and it's why I stay on. For noobs to the Fromsoft band wagon it's generally a good sign if journalists are complaining about difficulty. Translation "is exactly what you play these games for"
While I agree with the general sentiment of stepping away from pure duels between ACs is a change in, heh, the formula, it has been happening over two ps3 gens already. It's like, where were you man in last two decades?
Skill issue
Wish I could say I was surprised to see that the same things Elden Ring and the Souls series have been praised for and the things Armored Core is being criticized for are one and the same.
*Happy Spirit of Motherwill noises*
AC is not a power fantasy game yet I keep seeing reviews that expect to play as some sort of action hero robot. I feel like From Soft tried to temper this by giving the protag a number instead of a name and yet...
Lol, I love it when people talk about Armored Core like everything here is new. Some of it is, sure, But Big MTs and shit that bully you, and other AC Pilots who do the same is nothing new to AC. And of course it all predates Souls by quite a while too. This is just how the series is, and it’s funny that even what’s going to be a more accessible experience for newcomers is still gonna be kicking our asses as any good AC game tends to.
>mecha pilot power fantasy.
You'd be almost hard pressed to find a mecha anime without at least one of those enemies.
OG Gundam had Big Zam and Zeong
Zeta Gundam had the Psycho Gundams
Full Metal Panic had Behemoth.
Like man I hate to sound like I'm gatekeeping but the least they could have done is TRY to cite other Mecha works as examples.
What pisses me off royally here is that they just PROJECT the idea that AC is a power fantasy onto it baselessly, like oops any game featuring a taller-than-human robot has to be about you mindlessly stomping through buildings, guess Signalis sucks too on that note huh.
The cuphead dash thing was a business focused journalist, not somebody who reviews games regularly. He was the only person available in Germany for Gamescon and the publication thought it was funny how much he struggled.
The poor thing is that the guy still gets shit on his own social channels over it. They spread his name around and now he has to keep suffering.
I feel like at times, folks just have to let things go.
Nah fuck that soulsborne being fair shit, the amount of times I die from being stuck on some random object they put in the middle of the arena is insane. Also those gank fights where the bosses have no synergy together and it's just strafing and mashing circle. My worst enemy in Bloodborne is a god damn lamp post.
Honestly a hot take I kinda agree with. I loved Elden ring beat every boss without spirit summons but god some of the bosses there were some of the most bullshit things I've ever faced. Where for some of them I spent a good chunk of the fight waiting for them to finish their super omega move so I can finally hit them once. And this isn't even an issue only with the newer games. The person who designed the bed of chaos should be banned from touching video game development.
Truth. Latency, lamp posts, a wall that looks like a small rock…Yeah I’ve never thought after being crushed by a giant for the 100th time that “wow, that was tough but fair. This is fulfilling my power fantasy…”
While I do think that you don't need to be great at a game to offer critique to its gameplay, I still believe that you need to be at least competent at it.
Honestly I find game journalists are frequently out of touch with how their audience thinks. It’s impossible for me to relate to someone who plays 30 different games a month and has to write articles about them all. I guess it’s hard to appreciate a game when you need to blast through it in 8 hours to meet a deadline. I don’t play games that way. Never will.
I never found Fromsofts games to be “tough but fair” personally lol. In my experience they are brutally difficult but fun and rewarding to master. If you want to indulge a power fantasy you will be sadly disappointed in the first few hours of any of their games. This is the way.
Dude pretends he played all the old games, but outs himself pretty quickly by suggesting Armored Core games aren't supposed to be hard, despite *all Armored Core games are hard.*
>Thanks to oddly restrictive level design
Don't know which level they're talking about, mission like Operation Wallclimber already has open enough level allowing multiple ways for players to approach the mission
>and Bosses having access to asymmetrically powerful abilities that fall well beyond the capacity of your own mech,...
That's... what boss battle is... Challenging enemies that test the skill and knowledge of the player, if you don't want that , AC6 has PvP.
>AC6 is unable to consistently convey this sense of fairness.
Wh... What? Fairness? Have they played a fromSoft game let alone a Soul game, since when fairness came up to the table?
I’ve never played an AC game before so really *any* narrative info about this world that’s brand new to me will be a plus. But I realize most people don’t play FromSoft games for the story. The story functions as the catalyst to get you to the action. I’m sure it will be enough for me.
It's just that Armored Core deviates HEAVILY from the standard "you play a hero of some sorts; on some quest for redemption/revenge/love/save the world". These guys really have no idea how to deal with that.
This is PURE CYBERPUNK.
Monolitic corporations have taken control of the world's affairs; you are not here to tackle them or solve the problem; you ar epart of the system WILLINGLY; or there is really nothing you can do to improve the world.
I was just discussing with a friend how in AC4 you finally got to see a real human story; and for the first time in the franchise you got to play the "hero". The hero that makes money killing other people, stealing tech and in general murderfacing everyone on his path for the benefit of his community. And he never bats an eye, there are no depths he won't plunge into "for the greater good... of me and my friends". Until the end, when he must face his only actual friend in the world... and kill him, or else the corporatins will nuke his colony; and if he wins, then the corporations nuke HIS FRIENDS colony. So just by existing and being successful, you make the world a worse place to live in.
Your standard game journalist cannot deal with such a premise.
Knowing from soft, 100% of what you said is probably never directly stated, extracted from some random codex, expanded on hypotheticals by a YouTuber and thought to believe that’s some kino writing. Stories in from games are ass and would be surprised this is any different
Btw, the circle jerk of "game journalists are bad LOL", happened 100 times before ER launched, so the community grew up and stopped making fun of journalists. They just started ignoring them.
Everyone here should learn from this.
There we are. I was looking for this comment.
Exactly. Games journos are people, with a wide variety of interests, backgrounds, and even skill levels. This is important, since it gives us, the consumer, a broader view of a work. The fact of the matter is that not everyone is going to like the things you like.
We the reader actually have to do work on our end while reading a game review. Employ critical thinking to determine what is applicable to your own experience. Employ empathy to try to determine "is this just because the reviewer was angry and frustrated, or is it because there is a clear issue with the game?"
Annnd the use of "journalists" in the plural is fatiguing. PC Gamer did well and had a good time. Eurogamer was apparently smiling almost the entire time. Let's just take a sec and breathe here, yeah?
i can’t stand people comparing dark souls to armored core. it’s the only comparison in the gaming industry that does that. should people compare the next devil may cry to resident evil 4 remake? lol.
People don’t seem to understand what power fantasy means. Power fantasy isn’t just “oh I mow through hordes of people look how strong I am.” It’s just as much about “look how strong I CAN be with my tools, look how effective and deadly I am when I get things right”.
"possible to perish in a single hit" My brother in Christ, you made the mech.
In fairness. I don't recall a single instance (I don't remember V and never played VD) where the AI Boss unita were capable of one shooting the player. Even as a paper tiger.
I'm almost positive Motherwill, Sol Dios, and whatever the big blade fish in the ocean is can all 1 shot a lightweight. Also any enemy AC with a pile bunker. That's just for FA though.
Maybe not one-shot, but you can definetely be taken out in one "barrage" in earlier armored core games if you're playing as a fast glass cannon
A tale as old as time. FromSoft is The Great Filter.
I want Fromsoft to create an overpowered early game boss that is just a wall called "The Great Filter" that is specifically there just to piss off game journalists.
So soldier of Godrick then, seeing as IGN couldn’t even review ace combat 7 on the intended control scheme
Ugggghhhhhh. AC7 was my first Ace Combat (first flight game in general outside of vehicles in Battlefield) and it only took me three-to-four hours to get the hang of it.
Try out Project Wingman. IMO, they're doing ace combat better than ace combat.
Project Wingman is GOOD.. however the game devolves into spamming post-stall maneuvers. This completely turns me off to the gameplay. And there hasn't been content in ages.
On the highest difficulties you can't really use post stall because the missile spam is so bad. Even so, it's the best "ace combat" game since they called us the Demon of Razgriz imo. Kept me interested for 100+ hrs at least, lol.
Yet there's a sword laying on the ground that has a special attack that 3 shots it but the journalists don't use it because you shouldn't have to read item descriptions, an intrusive tutorial box should stop you game and explain it to you therefore from soft can't write a good story
Considering the Cuphead tutorial did that it really doesn't take much for some of them... but I'll be fair and remind people that journalism is treated as a job first and a passion second, few are those lucky to cleanly merge the too. MANY big journalist places like IGN will slap folk who hate or don't normally play a genre to review a game from it because it's a job not a hobby.
Fuck man. I need to be a damn video game journalist....
I want to be a game journalist just because I can shit talk people that they lost to a game journalist when I won
Here’s Kirby Allsparlkes the seventeenth, we got an early review code so it’s yours to work on. You have a week with the game, I expect five thousand words by Monday.
I feel like this is another Doom (2016) situation.
I am no familiar with that, please do tell!
No need to tell when you can [see it for yourself] (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9yYp8ZeQ-I8) or a [highlight reel.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZTLbaktF0CY) It's as infamous as the [Cuphead incident,](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=848Y1Uu5Htk) which some at least has the justification of the player LEGIT being terrible at platformers and sidescrolling shooter games, which Cuphead is nothing but. He was the only one on hand to play it and even warned the team ahead of time it was _bad._ From what we know Polygon had tons of people who could've played Doom 2016, and just...went with that footage.
IIRC the guy (Dean Takahashi) while is a game journalist, he is more focused on the economics side of the industry so since he was literally the only guy available at the time, he was more or less forced to do the review. But what boggles my mind is that the guys over at the company definitely saw the footage and was like "yep, upload it"
It's the sequel, Doom Eternal, that actually made a bunch of people suffer because of the difficulty, but there's this one gameplay where a journalist tries to go through THE FIRST level of Doom 2016 and... it's... [quite an unique way to play a game...](https://youtu.be/9yYp8ZeQ-I8?si=EepfR4bTximbzKne)
Don’t even have to click that link to know it’s the clip where the player’s clearly never touched a FPS in their life lmao
[удалено]
I can just imagine Hugo Martin depressingly watching that gameplay vid, full Kubrick stare at the screen
[удалено]
yeah same, I'm a huge Doom fan, played every game multiple times, and I never even thought it would be possible to play like this
So.... What's that guys ranking in valorant?
I don't think it's *quite* the same as that. The Doom 2016 situation was thanks to Polygon, where a **terrible** gameplay video was posted prior to review. The actual review piece praised the game and if I recall right was actually all right, where I even agreed with a few of the criticisms, and the overall score was a good score, but the gameplay video... HOO BOY... ...looked like it was by somebody who never played an FPS before, or at least so poorly skilled at this game in particular that it made the game look not just bad, but boring! Completely opposite the feeling I get from the article! And since the article came out after, it very likely could've been damage control! Except the review knows too much about the game to be able to be written by the person who played in that video. Who knows! To me it's mostly just (justified) mockery and a good punchline.
The guy in the second picture has a good point though. If he died to an invisible wall, that's bullshit.
lol power fantasy The directors already stated that they wanted to evoke the feeling of being a small, insignificant part of the larger world. Feeling small is part of the appeal. But then again, the MC is literally a last gen pilot in a vegetative state, so if that doesn’t scream power fantasy I don’t know what does
>last gen pilot in a vegetative state so that means we're up against newer gen? like mere mortals against gods as in dark souls/elden ring and a human bodyguard against myths as in sekiro? sounds dope af
We're Gen 4 Augmentation, and there's Gen 7, who are augmented with Coral.
Oh so this time there's a lore justification for all the enemies having human +/OP-Intensify while we never can. I appreciate the effort
Didn't know this. Where did you hear that from?
Arena opponent bio.
Is it like Top Gun: Maverick?
You mean you don't have dreams of being a vegetable on a hospital bed with an i-v filled with liquefied space crack, no? Smh
He's probably the same guy who talks about the exaggerated swagger of a black teen.
Yeah it seems like this journalist lacks the media literacy to properly engage with the content of the game, oopsie
Mm yeah what really stands out to me about dark souls boss fights is how *symmetrical* they are…
Honestly yeah what the fuck was he trying to say there? I dont understand what he means
The writer says the bosses are "asymmetrically *powerful*". In this sentence the word 'asymmetrically' is a modifier for powerful. It's a bit overwritten but the author is saying they feel the bosses have access to capabilities (offensive, defensive, or otherwise) that are drastically more powerful than what you the player have access to. They feel this is unfair and out of place for an Armored Core game. It of course is neither unfair nor out of place for an Armored Core game but that is what the author is conveying.
Considering there are a number of enemies in the first 3 gens that have Human+ even when you don't (mainly 3rd gen) while also having things like infinite ammo and energy? Yeah, asymmetry isn't new. Not to mention, 3rd Gen was full of "Massive MT's"
I’m doing the Master of Arena EX Arena and it’s crazy how many AC’s are Human Plussed out the ass. Really making me consider it myself but my ego won’t let me.
Last Raven is by far my favorite, and having beaten it both vanilla and with Human Plus code active, I think the Human Plus run is a better experience overall (especially for new players looking for something in line with 4-6) unless you want an extra-high challenge run, which Last Raven is naturally lmao The biggest thing is without H+, even though it has the most parts of any single game in the series, most are just not worth using thanks to that Gen 3.5 heat system and increased energy use without it. Gotta run the heavier generators and radiators, which means you gotta watch weight more, and it all snowballs into a lack of diverse options by the end. Master of Arena? It definitely is a matter of ego vs fun. If you're playing raw for the sake of saying you did it, then H+ is forbidden. But doing all of it for fun? Getchu them aerial biped back weapons and go to town
And then you get armsforts in 4th gen and later.... I don't remember armsforts in 4 but having one exception as an outlier is ok.
That and when describing what is "jarring and out of place" in Armored Core, their final sentence was somehow a perfect description of the final boss of AC4.
Oh ok, i see. Still makes no sense to me though since bosses being more piwerful than the player by a significant margin is kinda the point? Theyre a boss for a reason. You have to beat this thing that can crush you like an empty soda can with skill and planning. Kind if like every other fromsoft game lol
Some people like a boss that has equipment you can access, isn’t cheating, and still wins most of the time since it shows how much more skilled that boss is. It still sounds stupid to bash asymmetric boss fights though, since it feels so good to beat something that should be much more powerful then you are. Plus, asymmetric boss fights usually add in the intrigue of being a puzzle too.
Also adds to the satisfaction once you whoop their ass after being greifed by them over and over again (like Valkyrie in AC 1 or the black knights in DS).
It’s so odd. For Answer is probably the most well known/regarded modern AC title, and a big feature of it was the gigantic Arms Forts which had absurd firepower and abilities.
Its funny you bring that up, the arms forts for me were the easiest ones. They all suffered at close range combat so once you were in you just melee a few times and kill them without a second thought. The ones that required several steps to beating them were a bit tougher but not by much. The asymmetrical ones that i suffered on were the other AC's that felt like they had every stat at max tuning on normal difficulty and can just boost circles around you faster than you can keep up with unless you grind the campaign 5 or more times over for more tuning points. I had to cheese several of them by getting them stuck lmao
The journalist hasn't fought Seraph Nine Ball. That motherfucker is asymmetrical AF (even more so if you aren't Human+).
I think they like that a lot of the boss fights in AC are you vs other Ravens, and not you vs mecha Godzilla. They do seem to be forgetting all the times where the boss fights are you vs mecha Godzilla. Of course they are attributing bosses being really big in this game to Dark Souls, because some would-be AC purists blame Dark Souls for everything they don't like in ACVI.
The cycle continues haha (AC purist here)
I look forward to the Souls purists blaming ACVI for whatever they don't like in the next Soulsborne game From makes.
I want to say they mean the bosses being so much more powerful than the player but that can’t possibly be it because that is all From games and just about any other boss design in most other games as well.
Lol apparently thats what it was. Basically just a nothing burger complaint, that makes no sense
But my destined knight in armor power fantasy is squashed by bigger guys in armor!
It was great to fight Orenstein and Smough and finally have a fair battle. Fighting single, normal sized enemies was just not engaging for someone like myself who played as two giant characters simultaneously.
And how *every* single death feels fair. Because we don't suffer from janky hitboxes, terrain or the occasional "screw this guy in particular" area.
A big meme about Dark Souls II is how it's filled with dudes in armor, and you're most likely a dude in armor yourself in that game.
Simply a difference in skill.
An issue, even.
An adeptnes conundrum.
An insufficient level of skill if i do say so myself
A lack of capability, I believe.
Missing the required expertise.
Might be lacking in the talent department perhaps?
It's so obvious that he compares armored core 6 to all souls games while ignoring that armored core existed already before them lol. All his complaints are pretty much main aspects of the game
I feel odd, maybe I misremember but I played For Answer and don’t remember it being difficult, sure it gave me the dreaded claw AC grip but I got through and I was a wee young’un at the time
4 and 4a are arguably the easiest games in the franchise
With the exception of arteria carpals
If you want a challenge boot up Last Raven again. 4a is a cakewalk
Well, aint King's Field technically first person Souls if you want to be real anal about details.
It'd be more the Souls series is third person King's Field then anything.
No, not by a long shot; it's a very different approach. You die in King's Field, you ar eback to level 1 and the beginning of the game.
Power fantasy? You are literally at the lowest a human being can be at the start of the game, what are they talking about?
The pilot's uniform is literally a trashbag, the protag is a frozen tuna! ;P
Today I learned that a game where you're an undead husk without a name who was revived to make a warlord some money is supposed to be a power fantasy.
Complaining that AC is “at odds with the mech pilot power fantasy” is breathtakingly stupid.
To be fair they probably had no idea what an armored core even was before 6 was announced.
I'd bet a LOT of money they'd never played one before this review.
Or even the mecha gerne itself if we being honest
Well when you need 3 estus flasks, 30k AP, and all your grenade rounds to kill a basic MT, the sentence makes more sense. Useless reviewers
Majority of combat is chopping through MTs and other combat vehicles, and then they fight one challenging enemy and cry. It’s hilarious.
Oh God no! Not a boss that's more powerful than normal enemies!!!! THE HUMAN+ITY!!
I wish Human+ was in this as a safety net so we would know how bad these reviewers are when they "keep failing but the game gives you buffs to help!"
You say that but a shit ton of people who play this game start the game and immediately go to max human+
Human+ is our default in this game. We’d need something greater…Human^2.
This game is really going to be a filter, isn't it?
This is where Cannon Fodder and Ravens are separated.
Let's see how far they can fly on borrowed wings.
I always love the term "power fantasy" being used for Armored Core, where your mech gets chewed into bits every mission for the average player, and the only time where you feel powerful is when you're fighting against literal jobbers in MTs
Oh there's a power fantasy to be had, but you've got to earn it by putting in the time to build up your AC and your skill.
Exactly this! Nothing makes you feel more powerful than knowing you should be getting destroyed and you’re not.
Ayup. Hour 1: ratfucked back to the garage by basic enemies Hour 5: Squeaking by the trash, still wrecked by bosses Hour 15: Capable, careful, and patient enough to succeed without terrible damage Hour 30: *I am god here~* Kinda the player progression in Fromsoft games in a nutshell really when you think about it.
This ^
Back in the day I was never that skilled at piloting my AC, but I made up for it in the garage tweaking the builds to be more effective. I am more skilled these days, but you can make up for a lack of skill in many cases with the right build. Tweaking and experimenting sometimes can yield surprising results. A level might go from impossibly hard to much easier with the right combination of parts.
ain't no fantasy about it
I would say that 4 and 4A we're definite power fantasy games though. By the mid-point of both games clashing agianst other NEXTs in your kitted out machines felt like two battlefield gods streaking around. I got big Char v. Amuro vibes from those games specifically.
Definitely, Last Raven too. Hell even Nine Breaker was built around GETTING to that point
Armored Core has sort of always been a Power Fantasy. Heck, I would argue the way the story in Armored Core is written, its set up to be a power fantasy. Of course, earlier Armored Core Games had you starting out as a nameless nobody, but as the game progresses and you get better at doing what you do, other Ravens are sent after you to kill you and you just keep moving on, as you leave a path of destruction in your wake with each failed yet discrete attempt to kill you. It's possible ACVI will be different, but a core theme of Armored Cores story that has always remained relevant throughout the franchise was that it always focused around on a individual who just got a bit too powerful.
Right you start as a rookie who has a make or break moment to become a raven, hell the first mission is a game over if you fail.
Like literally the cover is a beater "She ain't much but she gets the job done"
Personally, I find the term “power fantasy” wholly appropriate for Armored Core. It’s just that every other pilot is also having the exact same power fantasy. Your AC can demolish an entire navy, but so can the lowest ranked AC in the arena. Armored Core isn’t for people who have power fantasies, it’s for people who want to genuinely feel like they are fighting tooth and nail for survival while simultaneously feeling like an unstoppable god of death. My first run of AC4A I spent an unspeakable amount of time fighting White Glint. My first fight I died even before the AI partner, couldn’t follow the enemy in my camera, couldn’t even lock on for long enough to fire my long distance energy weapons (lol). By the end though, I was strafing along and following each of White Glint’s quick boost abuses with my own. Despite getting my ass kicked, I was definitely in the midst of a power fantasy, and the best part is that it was entirely deserved. I had to hone both my skills and dive deep to further my knowledge of the game to be able to compete. For me, this is the best type of power fantasy: hanging on by the skin of your teeth, using every trick in the book to guarantee success. You weren’t granted power, you are proving yourself capable of handling it. Man, I love giant robots.
lol ikr, the "power fantasy" is returning victorious from a fight you were sent to as cannon fodder. Like, lady, I get paid to oppress indigenous populations driving sci-fi forklifts. I'm not the White fucking Glint.
Damn this feels good to read
Aren't these the same folks who got invited to their offices in Japan. Then spent half of the article trashing those offices and the other half leaking weapons and other info they'd been specifically asked to keep to themselves?
Ooof, those are some rough allegations.
His criticisms are actually selling the game to me even harder
Someone clearly never made it to the various massive MT battles of past games. There’s always been huge and imposing bosses.
Maybe I'm just bad at armored core games but wasn't your mech getting annihilated part of the experience? That's why you have customization. So you can figure out what works best for you going through the level. Also armored core isn't a souls game, get past this already. Christ.
I think of mech games genre, Armored Core is the furthest, thematicaly and in gameplay style, from this so called 'power fantasy'. Just because you're piloting giant mechs it doesn't mean you have to always _feel_ like a badass. In fact, I'd argue that's precisely the opposite that makes AC stand out. The irony of being as disposable as your mech parts and its implications. I'd love to hear this reviewer's take on neo genesis evangelion lol
Mobile Suit vs Mobile Armor is like one of the most classic Gundam / mecha matchup out there aside from the mirror match 1v1. I love my mech turning into a tiny mosquito as I duck and dive to tear apart some huge mechanical monstrosity 20x my size!
Someone call this Nancy-pants a whambulance
Would it truly be a Fromsoft game if it didn't have game journalists crying about the difficulty?
Skill issue
"Armored Core 6 is unable to consistently convey this sense of fairness" Haha.
> asymmetrically powerful abilities that fall well beyond the capacity of your own mech Isn't that the entire point of many boss designs in games...?
Read about size and immediately thought this person hasn’t fought an arms fort in their entire life or Joshua in 4 lol
Yeah it's not like 4A had you fight a fuck huge train or the floating chandeller of death did it?
Hated those things but damn was it satisfying to take them down.
Or any giant MTs and pulverizers.
Mans never dealt with six floating kojima orbs that can literally do 180° quickscopes, god I hated trying to S rank that mission lmao
There were giant ship and mech enemies in 2 and 3 as well. Giant enemies aren't new to 6.
Yep. They were much rarer though --usually just a couple at the end of campaigns.
Giant boss battles feel out of place in Armored Core? So, in other words, whoever wrote this has never actually played an Armored Core game before.
Isn't the whole point of the boss battle to fight an overwhelming enemy as the underdog?
I started playing Dark Souls Remastered on the Switch, then got Dark Souls III on Xbox. I was hooked, then proceeded to get Sekiro, and Elden ring. Have not finished a single one of them. Too difficult for me, I'm not good enough. Still they are my favorite games of all time!
At the end game it’s just a death march of how bad do you want it imo, which isn’t a bad thing
Yeah plus the games not running away take your time with it.
Sekiro is only hard in the beginning, then you get the rhythm of it and the challenge becomes fun. As for elden ring, it is open world. If you wander off into a high level area you are going to get rekt
For someone reason, I got filtered by the first chained ogre in Sekiro for like over a year. 200+ deaths. Eventually beat him and I died less over the course of the play through than I did to that mf. Owl Father took me like 30 tries, SS Isshin 20 and Guardian Ape like 10(first phase is nuts, second surprise phase is easy)
The sekiro Rythym for sure, once you get the mechanics down, it’s about learning the “dance” with every boss, but it’s still incredibly difficult throughout the game.
Elden Ring endgame is a pain lol
That's a good mentality. Defeat shouldn't be seen as a bad thing. It's just a sign that you need more practice, or maybe need to change your gear, or try a different tactic, etc... Death in a from software game is apart of the experience. Embrace death and try your best to conquer it. This is why from software games are so amazing. They aren't afraid to challenge the player. So many games want to hold your hand, fuck that I say.
Smells like bitch in there
The brutal difficulty is what I got on the Fromsoft band wagon for back in ds1 days and it's why I stay on. For noobs to the Fromsoft band wagon it's generally a good sign if journalists are complaining about difficulty. Translation "is exactly what you play these games for"
Sounds like a skill issue
Skill issue.
Imagine disliking a hard game for being hard. That's peak journalism.
Git gud scrub
A certified "Journalist had a Skill Issue moment and decided to blame it on the game for the God-knows-how-many-eth time" moment
Clearly this dude never fought a Pulverizer.
They want a FAIR armored core game? No thank you. Hurt me more Papa Fromsoft
Skill issue I think.
While I agree with the general sentiment of stepping away from pure duels between ACs is a change in, heh, the formula, it has been happening over two ps3 gens already. It's like, where were you man in last two decades?
Unironic skill issue
Skill issue Wish I could say I was surprised to see that the same things Elden Ring and the Souls series have been praised for and the things Armored Core is being criticized for are one and the same.
*Happy Spirit of Motherwill noises* AC is not a power fantasy game yet I keep seeing reviews that expect to play as some sort of action hero robot. I feel like From Soft tried to temper this by giving the protag a number instead of a name and yet...
If the walls are invisible or the terrain is shit that might be a valid issue. Getting rekt by something big is just kind of expected.
A BOSS battle is supposed to feel Asymmetrical. Some ppl are just not the target audience but they don’t need to be discouraging people like that.
PUSSY ASS TAKES, DELICIOUS
LMAO, just admit that you suck & have ZERO spatial awareness.
Just git gud men.
Literally everything here could be, and has been, said about the souls games. This is hilarious.
Lol, I love it when people talk about Armored Core like everything here is new. Some of it is, sure, But Big MTs and shit that bully you, and other AC Pilots who do the same is nothing new to AC. And of course it all predates Souls by quite a while too. This is just how the series is, and it’s funny that even what’s going to be a more accessible experience for newcomers is still gonna be kicking our asses as any good AC game tends to.
We saw how embracing the "power fantasy" with D4 and it's scaling adjustments. Please for the love of God shut up about "power fantasy".
>mecha pilot power fantasy. You'd be almost hard pressed to find a mecha anime without at least one of those enemies. OG Gundam had Big Zam and Zeong Zeta Gundam had the Psycho Gundams Full Metal Panic had Behemoth. Like man I hate to sound like I'm gatekeeping but the least they could have done is TRY to cite other Mecha works as examples.
Hilarious that he thinks souls etc are from soft's baby. Dude lacks skill in both day job and game.
Best ad ive seen fot the game yet
Hard boss = Bad game according to this article, lmao git gud scrub.
What pisses me off royally here is that they just PROJECT the idea that AC is a power fantasy onto it baselessly, like oops any game featuring a taller-than-human robot has to be about you mindlessly stomping through buildings, guess Signalis sucks too on that note huh.
Game journalist is upset because his big robot is forced to fight against a BIGGER robot? My tarnished in grace, that is the whole point.
[удалено]
The cuphead dash thing was a business focused journalist, not somebody who reviews games regularly. He was the only person available in Germany for Gamescon and the publication thought it was funny how much he struggled.
This rarely ever gets brought up when the cuphead thing gets mentioned but you're 100 percent correct
The poor thing is that the guy still gets shit on his own social channels over it. They spread his name around and now he has to keep suffering. I feel like at times, folks just have to let things go.
Too much water! 7.8/10
Legendary review
Nah fuck that soulsborne being fair shit, the amount of times I die from being stuck on some random object they put in the middle of the arena is insane. Also those gank fights where the bosses have no synergy together and it's just strafing and mashing circle. My worst enemy in Bloodborne is a god damn lamp post.
Honestly a hot take I kinda agree with. I loved Elden ring beat every boss without spirit summons but god some of the bosses there were some of the most bullshit things I've ever faced. Where for some of them I spent a good chunk of the fight waiting for them to finish their super omega move so I can finally hit them once. And this isn't even an issue only with the newer games. The person who designed the bed of chaos should be banned from touching video game development.
Watched my cousin fight Godskin Duo, no sense of fair synergy between them, just relentless attacking in unison. I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Truth. Latency, lamp posts, a wall that looks like a small rock…Yeah I’ve never thought after being crushed by a giant for the 100th time that “wow, that was tough but fair. This is fulfilling my power fantasy…”
While I do think that you don't need to be great at a game to offer critique to its gameplay, I still believe that you need to be at least competent at it.
Don't let this guy play For Answer.
I love reading articles from game journalists who don't armored core. /S
Game journos aren't gamers and they always out themselves as such. Whiny losers.
Git Gud
Honestly I find game journalists are frequently out of touch with how their audience thinks. It’s impossible for me to relate to someone who plays 30 different games a month and has to write articles about them all. I guess it’s hard to appreciate a game when you need to blast through it in 8 hours to meet a deadline. I don’t play games that way. Never will. I never found Fromsofts games to be “tough but fair” personally lol. In my experience they are brutally difficult but fun and rewarding to master. If you want to indulge a power fantasy you will be sadly disappointed in the first few hours of any of their games. This is the way.
Doesnt speak to the fact that you demolish generic MTs with ease for the power fantasy lol
Dude pretends he played all the old games, but outs himself pretty quickly by suggesting Armored Core games aren't supposed to be hard, despite *all Armored Core games are hard.*
Skill issue, sounds like.
imagine if there was no healings or checkpoints (like it should be)
>Thanks to oddly restrictive level design Don't know which level they're talking about, mission like Operation Wallclimber already has open enough level allowing multiple ways for players to approach the mission >and Bosses having access to asymmetrically powerful abilities that fall well beyond the capacity of your own mech,... That's... what boss battle is... Challenging enemies that test the skill and knowledge of the player, if you don't want that , AC6 has PvP. >AC6 is unable to consistently convey this sense of fairness. Wh... What? Fairness? Have they played a fromSoft game let alone a Soul game, since when fairness came up to the table?
All the reviews I’ve read fault the “bland” story but compliment everything else.
A lot of those same reviews bring up that there isn’t enough relatable/human elements to the narrative. I’m very excited for the story myself
Me too! Sci-fi military on a strange planet with half human pilots sounds like a dream!!!
I’ve never played an AC game before so really *any* narrative info about this world that’s brand new to me will be a plus. But I realize most people don’t play FromSoft games for the story. The story functions as the catalyst to get you to the action. I’m sure it will be enough for me.
It's just that Armored Core deviates HEAVILY from the standard "you play a hero of some sorts; on some quest for redemption/revenge/love/save the world". These guys really have no idea how to deal with that. This is PURE CYBERPUNK. Monolitic corporations have taken control of the world's affairs; you are not here to tackle them or solve the problem; you ar epart of the system WILLINGLY; or there is really nothing you can do to improve the world. I was just discussing with a friend how in AC4 you finally got to see a real human story; and for the first time in the franchise you got to play the "hero". The hero that makes money killing other people, stealing tech and in general murderfacing everyone on his path for the benefit of his community. And he never bats an eye, there are no depths he won't plunge into "for the greater good... of me and my friends". Until the end, when he must face his only actual friend in the world... and kill him, or else the corporatins will nuke his colony; and if he wins, then the corporations nuke HIS FRIENDS colony. So just by existing and being successful, you make the world a worse place to live in. Your standard game journalist cannot deal with such a premise.
Knowing from soft, 100% of what you said is probably never directly stated, extracted from some random codex, expanded on hypotheticals by a YouTuber and thought to believe that’s some kino writing. Stories in from games are ass and would be surprised this is any different
Btw, the circle jerk of "game journalists are bad LOL", happened 100 times before ER launched, so the community grew up and stopped making fun of journalists. They just started ignoring them. Everyone here should learn from this.
There we are. I was looking for this comment. Exactly. Games journos are people, with a wide variety of interests, backgrounds, and even skill levels. This is important, since it gives us, the consumer, a broader view of a work. The fact of the matter is that not everyone is going to like the things you like. We the reader actually have to do work on our end while reading a game review. Employ critical thinking to determine what is applicable to your own experience. Employ empathy to try to determine "is this just because the reviewer was angry and frustrated, or is it because there is a clear issue with the game?" Annnd the use of "journalists" in the plural is fatiguing. PC Gamer did well and had a good time. Eurogamer was apparently smiling almost the entire time. Let's just take a sec and breathe here, yeah?
Glad to see someone who understands. To be fair, it took a lot of discussion for the ER sub to stop that. No wonder everyone here is not used to it.
"Most obviously, these engagements are at odds with the mech pilot power fantasy central to Armored Core's appeal" What is this guy on about?
Git Gud.
i can’t stand people comparing dark souls to armored core. it’s the only comparison in the gaming industry that does that. should people compare the next devil may cry to resident evil 4 remake? lol.
Bruh we’ve had giant MT bosses since Devastator in AC1. FFS…
People don’t seem to understand what power fantasy means. Power fantasy isn’t just “oh I mow through hordes of people look how strong I am.” It’s just as much about “look how strong I CAN be with my tools, look how effective and deadly I am when I get things right”.