Did you guys know that mechs are pretty cool?
Date posted
Time to read
Played on
PS5
I am one of the many people who was introduced to FromSoftware by their Souls-likes and never played anything from their Armored Core series. In fact, I haven’t played that many mech games throughout my entire life at all. I think the last one I played was Custom Robo way back on the GameCube.
But I have the same thought as everyone else: mechs are pretty freaking cool. Mechs as a concept are inherently cool. Although I’ve never been one of those people that’s been all in on that genre.
So coming into Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon, my excitement for it was moderately positive, at least from the mech perspective. However, what had me really intrigued was knowing that the director of this game was the lead designer behind Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, which is one my favourite games of all time and easily had the best combat system I’ve ever seen.
While I didn’t expect Fires of Rubicon to live up to that same level of immaculate combat, it still did a very solid job with an awesome build system, and I glad I got to experience some of the coolest moments out of all of 2023 with this game.
Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon is the latest installment in FromSoftware’s mech series, after a prolonged break from the franchise. The game features a simple but satisfying gameplay loop of customizing your mech with a deep arsenal of weapons and parts, pushing its limits in battle against increasingly intimidating foes, and returning back to base with the profits of war to purchase more equipment.
Choose your weapon
I know that Fires of Rubicon is completely different to the Souls-likes that FromSoftware became famous for, but I’m still going to use them as a point of reference throughout this writing, purely because I think it makes for some interesting comparisons anyways. Therefore, I found it interesting how antithetical Fires of Rubicon was from Elden Ring with how it expected the player to approach their builds.
In Elden Ring (and most Souls-likes), the build is a meticulous layering of choices, as the player slowly works towards their ultimate goal for the entirety of the game. While there’s some wiggle room to adapt during their journey, it takes time for any drastic change to occur. And I know there’s respec-ing in those games too, but that’s never been something that’s been that highly encouraged.
But every time I died in Fires of Rubicon, the menu immediately gave me the option to re-customize my mech right from that fail state. I was so fascinated and excited by this feature and how it let me completely flip my mech’s archetype and get right back into the fight. This was so refreshing compared to many other games where I failed an encounter and had to stick with whatever I had built earlier.
I especially liked how the progression was primarily horizontal instead of vertical as well. So rather than being constantly rewarded with boring upgrades that clearly outclassed my current weapons, I was given increasingly interesting tools of destruction. This allowed for a huge amount of player expression, which made me feel like my mech was truly one-of-a-kind unique. Plus, it felt very Sekiro where it was mainly my knowledge and experience that was pushing me forward instead of my upgrades.
The only nitpick I had with the build system was that I wished there was a transmog feature for at least some of the mech parts. I understand that wouldn’t have worked for the leg types, but I would’ve really loved to be able to have chosen the head, torso, and arms that I thought were the coolest instead of what optimized my build.
Combat mode engaged
It took a while for combat to click for me, and even now after finishing, I’m not sure if I fully clicked with it 100%. While I had fun flying around and felt decently competent at it, I didn’t think I was that skilled at fighting. It’s possible that I needed New Game+ to really push me to thoroughly understand the combat, but I’m currently not that hot on playing the game again right now.
The best part of the combat was weirdly whenever I was stuck on a fight. I loved tinkering away on my build when I felt like I hit a wall. I systematically tried a bunch of ideas and slowly figured out what worked and didn’t work, inching my way to my correct solution. Sometimes I miscalculated and went the wrong direction, and sometimes I overhauled my entire strategy, but that tinkering was always so satisfying.
I also thought this game would’ve punished me more into using certain builds, and while I did adjust them very often, I never felt like I had to use a specific set of pieces. Although I almost wished the game would’ve forced me to use parts that I never would’ve considered. I’m sure there were weapons out there that I actually would’ve loved but never tried out.
Another fun puzzle-solving aspect to combat was how I had to figure out the distance and speed of engagements for how I wanted to take fights. The variety of enemies and bosses were very welcome and really stretched the wide range of playstyles. This was best demonstrated in the arena fights which were some of the most enjoyable parts of the whole game.
In a lot of ways, the combat system as a whole specifically reminded me of Lies of P with how I felt like I was figuring out my own solution to each new combat problem. It was never a one-size-fits-all, and that dynamically changing solution kept the game always feeling fresh.
Cool factor at 100%… Disabling limiters…
Last, but definitely not least, was the highlight of the entire game for me, and that was the cool factor.
This game doesn’t know how to not be cool. Every moment, every thing this game does is cool. It lives and breathes cool. I kept thinking back to my Final Fantasy XVI playthrough last year, but instead of thinking “Oh my God, this is so hype!”, I was getting “Oh my God, this is so cool!”.
The voice acting absolutely carried this tone. There was no other word to describe it other than effortlessly cool. Not only the radio scenes, but also the brief moments during levels where Walter, Carla, or Rusty were casually delivering the most badass lines possible.
Spoilers for boss fights
My God, the first boss fight with Balteus was a spectacular set piece that put a giant exclamation point on the first chapter of the game. It was this wild dance of machinery that was emblazed with the coolest hellfire of attacks I’ve ever seen.
And that Ice Worm fight. Holy shit. Uniting the factions to take it down was so anime. And when Rusty said “I won’t miss”… My guy thought he was Master Chief, but I’ll give it to him cause goddamn that was cool.
The vibes throughout the entire game were just relentlessly cool. Even though I didn’t really follow the story that closely, I loved soaking in the atmosphere through the dialogue and the environment. And it was punctuated with the coolest of characters and climatic moments that I won’t forget for a long time.
Mission over, time for debrief
Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon ended up being an interesting surprise for me. Given the legacy of the lead designer behind Sekiro, I thought the combat would’ve been my main hook. And while I liked the combat and thought it was good (maybe not as amazing as I’d hoped), it was everything else in the game that really kept me coming back.
The builds and being able to tune my mech however and whenever I wanted pulled me in way more than I thought it would. And the amount of variety in unique weapons was awesome, and it never felt like any one was the singular best solution to every scenario. It was this constant tinkering of my mech that helped me create a fantastic journey with it.
But what I was stupidly blown away by was how goddamn cool the game was in its existence. There were countless lines, set pieces, wallpaper worthy vistas, and epic moments that kept outdoing each other from beginning to the end of the game.
Fires of Rubicon is a spectacularly cool game that I’m glad I played. While I didn’t have quite the drive to go through the multiple New Game+’s, I think one day I’ll come back to finish the game again for the True Ending. But for now I’ll absolutely be on the lookout when FromSoftware announces their next entry in the Armored Core series.
I recommend this game to
- Anyone looking to try a mech game with tons of fun build customization with solid all around combat
- Cool people who want to do cool things and see some of the coolest shit ever
| Date started | Feb 8, 2024 |
| Date finished | Feb 25, 2024 |
| Completion time | 21 hours |
| Ending | Fires of Raven |
| Trophy completion | 16/30 |
Across the Galexzzz 
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