After a long disappearance of more than ten years in which From Software put all its focus on making Souls games, the Armored Core series returns, and we cannot ask for a better return than that. Armored Core VI Fires of Rubicon has preserved the brilliance of the series and its basics, while introducing many new ideas and using many elements from the Souls games to become an experience that old fans of the series will love, and that fans of From Software who are trying Armored Core for the first time will fall in love with!
Be the most skilled mercenary on Planet Rubicon!
The story of Armored Core VI centers on the planet Rubicon, which contains a giant energy source called Coral. Years after a devastating natural phenomenon called The Fires of Ibis occurred in which the fires of Coral consumed the surface of the planet, companies and organizations struggle to control the energy of the Coral and in turn control the planet Rubicon. in full.
You play as mercenaries, and your main goal at the beginning of the game will be to carry out many corporate tasks at the expense of other companies, all in the end in order to make money for the company under whose name you operate. But after a short while you will discover that this is not the only reason behind your presence on Planet Rubicon, and things begin to become clear and the story becomes more and more complex as you delve deeper into it, until we are eventually surprised by the presence of a larger conspiracy of mercenaries and companies trying to control the energy of the choir.
One of the things that we liked about the story of Armored Core VI is the extent to which we connected with many of the characters that were presented, even though we did not see them in the form of real people, but only in the form of Armored Cores, and this shows the extent of the From Software studio’s ability to present a strong plot with wonderful characters that you can relate to just by… Hearing the sound of their conversation, this is also evidence of the prowess of the voice cast chosen by the studio. Like the studio’s recent games, there is more than one ending here that you can reach depending on your choices in the game, and each ending is radically different from the other ending with a completely different final leader, which motivates us to complete the game more than once to get the full experience!
The story of Armored Core VI is not long, as we were able to complete the game within 20 hours of play, and this also included doing some side quests that we will talk about in detail later. In general, the game will not take you long, and personally we think that 20 hours is a very appropriate time for this experience, especially since you will want to replay the game again to make different decisions and see other endings.
Exciting and fast-paced gameplay with giant boss battles!
Controlling your armored machine is a lot of fun
Although the game’s story is interesting with many wonderful characters, the main focus here is on the gameplay, and this is one of From Software’s best games in that regard. The gameplay reminded us a lot of Sekiro where you need to focus on every move with the enemies and study the different ideas that each new boss arena offers you. The gameplay features multi-directional action and very fast movement that will require some attempts for you to get used to at first, especially since many enemy strikes require quick wits and quick dodge using your armored machine to fly upwards quickly!
The armored machine, although it is huge and heavy, is very fast and allows you to do a lot of acrobatic movements in the air, which is what you need in a fast action game like this with no ability to block enemy blows. Personally, we think that the game maintained the old style of the series, while mixing many of the ideas presented in Sekiro and Bloodborne, which were the fastest games from From Software before Armored Core VI.
Your armored machine has 4 places where you can customize weapons and equipment. You can carry two weapons in each hand and place two weapons on your shoulders, so you have 4 giant weapons capable of destroying most enemies in just a few seconds. The fun thing about Armored Core matches is that they are literally destruction in every direction with massive explosions, and the game makes you feel like a super machine that nothing can withstand.
As for the enemies, almost every stage tries to introduce a new type of enemy, but changing the appearance or movements of the enemies does not affect the gameplay in any way. Much of the time you will find that all you have to do is aim your weapons and missiles at the enemies and start shooting relentlessly. Until you eliminate them, which makes the experience of confronting enemies relatively repetitive, especially in the initial stages and missions of the story.
How do the main quests go in Armored Core 6?
The idea of Armored Core 6 missions is simple. Through the main menu, you will be asked to perform a specific mission. Before you enter the mission, you will prepare the equipment you want to use. The game will then take you directly to the location of the mission. This is the style of old games that is still fun to this day, but unfortunately, the game ran into a problem during its first chapters.
In the first two chapters of Armored Core 6’s story, most of the missions consisted of getting from point A to point B, fighting some enemies, facing a mini-boss or a relatively strong enemy, and then the mission was over. From a story perspective, this makes sense, as you are a mercenary carrying out corporate demands by eliminating specific enemies, but from a gameplay perspective it was relatively boring at first. Of course, the game had fairy quests in the first two chapters, but their percentage was very simple compared to the repetition in other regular quests!
Fortunately, this repetition ends completely in the following chapters, as each mission from the third, fourth, and fifth chapters is legendary, and has a significant impact on the story, events, characters, and planet Rubicon in general, with many options that completely change the ending of the game because Armored Core 6 contains Three different endings, and like the From Software games, these endings depend on your personal choices as the player.
What about side content?
The side content in Armored Core 6 is simple but fun at the same time. It revolves around the Arena, and its idea in short is that it is an arena where you will go to confront other mechanized armored vehicles in order to obtain a higher level and stronger equipment. We were able to confront and defeat the 30 Armored Core that the game puts in place. In front of you in that arena, there are 30 levels, and each one of them is different in difficulty until you reach the most difficult levels S, and if you manage to defeat him, you will obtain wonderful equipment and weapons.
Side content will increase with the launch of the game, as the servers will be opened, so you will be able to engage with your friends in 1-on-1 or 3-on-3 confrontations. Unfortunately, we could not try the online experience in the review version because the servers were closed at the time, but if you are like the arena, but this time against two players Real people, not artificial intelligence, so be sure that you will have the maximum enjoyment from it!
Legendary boss encounters
Like all From Software games, boss encounters take first place in greatness in Armored Core VI. During each chapter you will face many distinctive bosses, but the game really shines in the basic boss encounters at the end of each chapter (5 giant bosses), and each boss will make you want to… Breaking your controller is difficult, and this is what we are used to from the studio’s games.
A huge number of new movements and ideas are presented in these confrontations, which increase the difficulty and fun, and in turn make you increase your concentration and quickness of mind because you will literally die in one second if you cannot avoid a particular strike or if you lose your focus during a difficult fight.
One of the distinctive things about Armored Core VI is that if you die while confronting a boss, you will not lose the mission and the game will restart you from the beginning again. Rather, your progress is saved until you confront the boss, and the game allows you to make the required changes to the equipment you own in order to develop the appropriate weapons that can get rid of them. This particular leader is fast.
Customization capabilities of the Armored Core bring the innovator in you to life
This is one of the most amazing games that offers you awesome customization possibilities for everything in your armored machine, from customizing the equipment and weapons that you use, or even customizing everything in the machine such as the hands, feet, head, and body, and you will need to do that periodically until you get the best and best weapons. Armored Core body pieces for the best protection or the best speed and heaviness of movement. You have complete freedom to customize, and no one Armored Core will be made like another!
It’s not just about customizing the features of the Armored Core itself, but you can also modify and customize the shape and colors and build the Armored Core in your favorite colors. We preferred to build our machine in all black, with some simple touches of red, and it turned out to be legendary in the end.
As we explained in our talk about the gameplay, if you die in the middle of a battle against a specific leader, the game allows you the ability to modify, customize, and change your Armored Core equipment before you complete the confrontation and try to defeat him again, and here you can exploit the leaders’ weaknesses according to the various equipment you have acquired. Buy it before entering the mission.
Technical experience at the highest level
In terms of technical aspects, the game Armored Core VI is wonderful. For example, the sound design of the weapons, enemies, and environments is fantastic, and you feel the extent of the weapons’ power and the massiveness of the armored machines when you hear the sounds of their footsteps on the ground. This also applies to the creative soundtrack, which adds beauty to the experience as a whole, especially the boss encounters in the second half of the game when it comes to the development of the story and events, and you see the impact of your decisions taking its course in the death or life of certain characters.
In terms of graphics, Armored Core VI stands alongside ELDEN RING as the best graphic design that From Software has worked on so far. In the game, we visit a huge number of regions on the planet Rubicon, and each region has its own character, and the studio used the idea of creating a specific shape of the sky (Skybox) for each region, which completely changes the lighting and reflection of colors on the environments around you. There is great attention to detail here, whether in the design of the environments or the armored machines themselves and the weapons, with the textures being meticulous and of high quality that elevate the beauty of the graphics. You can see a wonderful collection of photos that we took with the Photo Mode feature, which is available for the first time in a game from From Software!
Our experience with the game was on an average computer with the following specifications:
- Intel Core i5-10400F processor
- 32 GB DDR4 RAM, 3200 MHz
- Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 8 GB graphics card
- Storage on NVMe M.2 SSD
We were able to enjoy the game on high settings with a resolution of 1080p, and most of the time we got frames ranging between 90-110 frames per second, but at times when the screen was crowded and the level of action and excitement increased, the frames were reduced to 60-70 frames per second. It was great to enjoy a game from From Software at higher than 60 frames per second, especially since all of the studio’s previous games did not support more than 60 frames per second, even on the PC platform!
As usual from From Software, this game also had no technical problems, and we did not encounter any technical error, bug, or glitch throughout the 20 hours that we spent in the game world, and this is further evidence of the studio’s interest in refining its games before releasing them without any haste.
in the end
Armored Core VI Fires of Rubicon is a welcome return to the series after an absence of 10 years, providing us with an exciting action experience with an addictive gameplay style at the highest level of fun and excitement. It has managed to preserve the splendor and greatness of the old series, while introducing many wonderful changes and improvements that bring it closer to… Souls games will appeal to all fans of From Software, and they are a good start for the new generation of Armored Core games.
Gamer Zone Club evaluation: 9
- Gameplay and boss confrontation: 10
- Design of regular enemies and basic quests: 8
- Visual and audio technical experience: 9
Advantages
- A great story with a great connection to the characters
- Addictive and unique action gameplay
- Legendary boss encounters
- Customization capabilities at the highest level
- Great visual and audio design
- Thrilling soundtrack, especially against bosses
- Excellent technical experience with support for up to 120 frames per second with no errors
Disadvantages
- Some noticeable repetition in the design of the usual missions and enemies
