Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon

[The Decline]

Did you play AC 4 or 4 Answer? Because this plays like an updated version of those. They also predate Demon Souls by 3 years.

 

[TedNugent]

They simply hoped to ride on the Elden Ring success train

....huh?

 

[jaekl]

I can't really see anyone who really enjoys fast japanesey robot games not enjoying this one. It's safe to buy if you like that stuff.

 

[Jacob]

Never played the old games but I read this review of AC6 and I get where gabel is coming from.

https://steamcommunity.com/id/praisingthesun/recommended/1888160/

Which makes me wanna try AC3, maybe later this year.

 

[Lyric Suite]

It controls more like Souls than it does Armored Core.
From Software was once a very talented dev studio which made thematically and mechanically very diverse games. Kuon, Otogi, Armored Core, King's Field, Tenchu etc...
Now they're becoming the Ubisoft of Dark Souls...

Yeah but it's like the Ubisoft of actual good combat (also, doesn't the fact they just released a new Armored Core game point out they are trying to diversify again?).

I know, i know, Codex contrarianism compels people to even shit on Souls combat but the truth is that it's still miles, and i mean, MILES ahead of the shit out there. Even Elden Ring. Even Armored Core 6.

Maybe it's faint praise since the competition is so lacking but it's still a fact. Also for me who hates animu and a lot of other crap that comes out of Japan FromSoft stands as a unique source of the kind of game style the Japanese appear to have mastered (arcadish, twitchy but not braindead combat) without any of the shit that bogs those games down to me (like the aformentioned animu and similar assorted faggotry).

Whenever i feel like playing an action game that's addicting and impossible to put down, i have to either turn to FromSoft or fish out something from 20+ years ago. The last AAA western action game i was able to finish was Doom Eternal, just to point out the kind of alteratives we have.

 

[Lyric Suite]

BTW, one thing i need to point out here, and that is i actrually do not believe FromSoft has grown "stale" since breaking through mainstream success with Dark Souls.

Yes, they have been putting out Souls-likes ever since and abandoned all the various series they had before, but it's not actually true they have been doing nothing but the same thing over and over. Bloodborne isn't the same as Dark Souls and neither is Sekiro. As for Dark Souls 2 and 3, those were likely something the publishers requested more than something FromSoft themselves wanted to do (only explanation for why Dark Souls 2 was handed over a different team and why Dark Souls 3 shares so much blood with Bloodborne), but even there one can see some atempt at diversifying the formula, at least with Dark Souls 2 (however misguided some of its ideas or the execution thereof may have been). Even Elden Ring tried to add something new, so you can't really say they turned into a Souls-farm house in a vein similar to the Ubishit conveyor belt slop.

 

[Dedicated_Dark]

The Ibis battle was overrated, dudes were like you can't dodge 'cause it's bullet hell and shit. This was my first time, the dude was a cakewalk. Only got hit by the Vergil dives.
Well, might have been the nerfing they did with the recent patches as well.

Game needs a harder difficulty.

 

[Multidirectional]

Yeah but it's like the Ubisoft of actual good combat (also, doesn't the fact they just released a new Armored Core game point out they are trying to diversify again?).

I know, i know, Codex contrarianism compels people to even shit on Souls combat but the truth is that it's still miles, and i mean, MILES ahead of the shit out there. Even Elden Ring. Even Armored Core 6.

Maybe it's faint praise since the competition is so lacking but it's still a fact. Also for me who hates animu and a lot of other crap that comes out of Japan FromSoft stands as a unique source of the kind of game style the Japanese appear to have mastered (arcadish, twitchy but not braindead combat) without any of the shit that bogs those games down to me (like the aformentioned animu and similar assorted faggotry).

I doubt you would have much trouble enjoying something like Nioh 2 if you actually tried it. And its combat design is a significant step above anything I've played from FS, in my opinion. I didn't want to play it myself at first because from videos it looked way too visually busy but it turned out most of it's just a stupid "effects" setting that shits up visuals if you put it on "high" and is also the biggest hit on performance.

 

[TedNugent]

The Ibis battle was overrated, dudes were like you can't dodge 'cause it's bullet hell and shit. This was my first time, the dude was a cakewalk. Only got hit by the Vergil dives.
Well, might have been the nerfing they did with the recent patches as well.

Game needs a harder difficulty.

Yeah, I've been trying to go back and unlock the Karasawa (one log away now), so I was trying to clear the area under the bridge with the wheels and the two MTs (since it gives like literally 10 logs), and I was having a bit of trouble clearing out both the pinwheels and the heavy MTs (got down to the last MT with my Ransetsu/bullet orbit build).

By the way, I cleared the really shitty NG+ mission where you have to fight three ACs with some overlap (so it's usually 2vs1) with the Ransetsu RF and laser turrets, so it's actually not a complete dogshit weapon after the buffs, and is my favorite kinetic weapon after the patch.

So then I decided out of frustration to throw on the paraplegic legs and the needle guns.

Holy shit. You actually zoom around on the ground faster on the paraplegic legs, plus you just swivel your whole torso around on the turret and keep booming away. Oneshot all the combat log trash, then went to Ibis and oneshot her without even trying to dodge and with extremely sloppy aim.

I still don't fully understand what the downsides of the wheelchair legs actually are, these things are a joke, lol. If you can zoom around the map with no recoil, being able to boost the same as bipeds, and your verticality isn't exactly dogshit, plus you have the durability of monster biped legs - lmfao. By contrast, using those needle guns with bipeds against the pinwheels was damn near impossible due to the frames wasted from recoil, hence why I almost never equip recoil shit on my biped builds. Even with the heaviest legs, even the "hover" ones, you still have recoil that forces you to stand still, so it only works in boss/AC fights. Wheelchair legs just zoom around blasting shit with the biggest boom-booms you care to throw on. My guess is that people thought Ibis was hard because unlike Balteus and the Sea Spider, she didn't actually present a giant static target for the biggest booms in the game, so you have to kind of move your analog sticks around a little bit to stunlock her with them.

I see why I was refusing to use the track legs, lol. Literal training wheels.

Side note, this is part of why I was worried about jumping in to PvP.

 

[Lyric Suite]

Alright, got this down as well. Honestly, i'm starting to think the AI nerf is overstated. I did half a dozen practice runs on the boss before committing on the mission (no way i was going to restart the mission with that obnoxious elevator sequence) but in all of them the AI was exactly as i remember it being when i first encountered this thing pre-patch:



Unless somebody can whip out tangible proof this idea the AI was nerfed may just be something people are imagining in their heads. The AI definitely had a tendency to just get confused even pre-patch. It didn't happen all the time but it was definitely there.

 

[TedNugent]

Okay, made it into chapter 2 of NG++ and I am shocked at the number of new missions. It's already been like 5 or 6 new missions that I haven't played before.

This game is fun as hell.

Ayre was the hardest boss to date for me, had to bust out the wheelchair legs and stun launchers again. She has a really

I finally gave in and tried doubling up on the laser guns with the weapon rack, and it's fun as hell (swap once they're on cooldown), and allows you to continuously shoot without the annoying downtime. Also tried out the Spring Chicken legs, with a booster swap it cut the QB delay in half and my fuel economy is on point with boingo jumps.

Controls on Playstation 5 leave a lot to be desired IMO. Was playing at maximum turn speed and tracking Ayre was still a nightmare. It turns slow. Another thing that annoys me is that the analog stick button press will turn on constantly when I don't intend for it to. So I had to remap the roadie run boost to one of the d-pad buttons. The triggers are also really spongy and awful, so I remapped the bumpers to be the main hand weapons. Really thinking I should've just bought this on PC.

 

[Lyre Mors]

Really thinking I should've just bought this on PC.

Keyboard and mouse with this is a total game changer. If you play with a controller in PVP on PC, your odds of winning are very slim. I did my first playthrough with a controller just for the added challenge, but switched to keyboard and mouse for NG+.

Why on earth didn't you buy this on PC? Not just for the additional options, but potential modding down the road.

 

[mediocrepoet]

Really thinking I should've just bought this on PC.

Keyboard and mouse with this is a total game changer. If you play with a controller in PVP on PC, your odds of winning are very slim. I did my first playthrough with a controller just for the added challenge, but switched to keyboard and mouse for NG+.

Why on earth didn't you buy this on PC? Not just for the additional options, but potential modding down the road.

How hard would you say it is to adjust? I had been playing with controller but part of that's because I didn't understand how the game worked. Now that I do, I can grok the M+K a bit better I think.

 

[Lyre Mors]

How hard would you say it is to adjust? I had been playing with controller but part of that's because I didn't understand how the game worked. Now that I do, I can grok the M+K a bit better I think.

It's a little tricky to retrain yourself, but as long as you ease in with the first few missions, you should adjust pretty quickly. Also, note the manual aiming enhancement in OS Tuning.

 

[TedNugent]

Why on earth didn't you buy this on PC? Not just for the additional options, but potential modding down the road.

Nostalgia factor, I originally played AC2 three times through on the Playstation 2.

Honestly, I would work around it if they would just increase the max turn speed by a few ticks. As is, 10/10 is still really slow turn speed.

Ironically, I think the controls were actually way better on PS2.

How hard would you say it is to adjust? I had been playing with controller but part of that's because I didn't understand how the game worked. Now that I do, I can grok the M+K a bit better I think.

It's a little tricky to retrain yourself, but as long as you ease in with the first few missions, you should adjust pretty quickly. Also, note the manual aiming enhancement in OS Tuning.

I feel like several weapons would really benefit from you being able to lead the target. The auto aim bubble is actually extremely inefficient for weapons with slow projectile speed because you're utterly at the mercy of your opponent standing still.

I keep most slow projectile speed weapons on the shelf for this reason.

Side note, I just found an interesting breakdown channel with no-bullshit analysis that demystified some of the (lacking) tooltips in-game:



Here's the spreadsheets:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...RDOXp2D6ubmLicuTsp8/edit?pli=1#gid=1552084533

Also, classy troll build:

 

[mediocrepoet]

How hard would you say it is to adjust? I had been playing with controller but part of that's because I didn't understand how the game worked. Now that I do, I can grok the M+K a bit better I think.

It's a little tricky to retrain yourself, but as long as you ease in with the first few missions, you should adjust pretty quickly. Also, note the manual aiming enhancement in OS Tuning.

I'm thinking I might start over with a M+K run and just shelf my midway controller run for now then... something to think about anyway.

 

[WhiskeyWolf]

Was playing at maximum turn speed and tracking Ayre was still a nightmare. It turns slow.

The tracking in this game is interesting. If your tracking specs are good enough, you don't want to engage a fast enemy with the 'hard' lock (middle MB), because you yourself will be unable to physically keep track of it... but your system will. I on multiple occasions had a situation when the boss was right in front of me, only for me to start firing the needles, then the boss would make a rapid dodge and end behind me, at which point the entire body would swing 180 degrees and still fire directly at the boss while I was still facing forward.

 

[AlwaysBrotoMen]

One of the most fun games i have played this year.

 

[Crayll]

I'd be interested to know how many used the hard lock. I never bothered, even playing on controller it felt like I got better results trying to manually keep the camera on target.

 

[Latro]

Never played the old games but I read this review of AC6 and I get where gabel is coming from.

https://steamcommunity.com/id/praisingthesun/recommended/1888160/

Which makes me wanna try AC3, maybe later this year.

AC3 controls like ass, the missions are humorously short, and the weapon balance makes you admire vanilla AC6

 

[Latro]

The Ibis battle was overrated, dudes were like you can't dodge 'cause it's bullet hell and shit. This was my first time, the dude was a cakewalk. Only got hit by the Vergil dives.
Well, might have been the nerfing they did with the recent patches as well.

Game needs a harder difficulty.

Yeah, I've been trying to go back and unlock the Karasawa (one log away now), so I was trying to clear the area under the bridge with the wheels and the two MTs (since it gives like literally 10 logs), and I was having a bit of trouble clearing out both the pinwheels and the heavy MTs (got down to the last MT with my Ransetsu/bullet orbit build).

By the way, I cleared the really shitty NG+ mission where you have to fight three ACs with some overlap (so it's usually 2vs1) with the Ransetsu RF and laser turrets, so it's actually not a complete dogshit weapon after the buffs, and is my favorite kinetic weapon after the patch.

So then I decided out of frustration to throw on the paraplegic legs and the needle guns.

Holy shit. You actually zoom around on the ground faster on the paraplegic legs, plus you just swivel your whole torso around on the turret and keep booming away. Oneshot all the combat log trash, then went to Ibis and oneshot her without even trying to dodge and with extremely sloppy aim.

I still don't fully understand what the downsides of the wheelchair legs actually are, these things are a joke, lol. If you can zoom around the map with no recoil, being able to boost the same as bipeds, and your verticality isn't exactly dogshit, plus you have the durability of monster biped legs - lmfao. By contrast, using those needle guns with bipeds against the pinwheels was damn near impossible due to the frames wasted from recoil, hence why I almost never equip recoil shit on my biped builds. Even with the heaviest legs, even the "hover" ones, you still have recoil that forces you to stand still, so it only works in boss/AC fights. Wheelchair legs just zoom around blasting shit with the biggest boom-booms you care to throw on. My guess is that people thought Ibis was hard because unlike Balteus and the Sea Spider, she didn't actually present a giant static target for the biggest booms in the game, so you have to kind of move your analog sticks around a little bit to stunlock her with them.

I see why I was refusing to use the track legs, lol. Literal training wheels.

Side note, this is part of why I was worried about jumping in to PvP.

Wheelchair is just broken, anyone who plays pvp knows this. I’m giving it a rest until the first major balance patch

 

[Lyre Mors]

I'd be interested to know how many used the hard lock. I never bothered, even playing on controller it felt like I got better results trying to manually keep the camera on target

You benefit more from using lock on with pretty much every one of the agile bosses in the game. You know, those guys who like to teleport behind you and say "nothing personel kid." Manual reticle for everything else for sure.

 

[Lyric Suite]

I'd be interested to know how many used the hard lock. I never bothered, even playing on controller it felt like I got better results trying to manually keep the camera on target.

Likewise. It's also a source of pride for me when i'm able to keep track of where an enemy is going to land so i can move in with a sword swipe. I feel so frikking bad ass lmao. Hey, it's the simple things in life that count.

 

[Dedicated_Dark]

I'd be interested to know how many used the hard lock. I never bothered, even playing on controller it felt like I got better results trying to manually keep the camera on target

You benefit more from using lock on with pretty much every one of the agile bosses in the game. You know, those guys who like to teleport behind you and say "nothing personel kid." Manual reticle for everything else for sure.

Agreed. I think they made the hard lock-on a thing cause they wanted to keep these retarded hyper flashy bosses.

 

[TedNugent]

Hrm, one thing that warrants a comparison to Dark Souls for me.

The boost bar feels much more like a stamina bar this time around, complete with the literal "dodge" button. The fact that it fast recharges as soon as you touch the ground.

In AC2 my fixation was making a build that would have enough energy efficiency to stay airborne and allow figure 8 aerials without bottoming out, and organically evading missiles by using conventional controls. In this game, the energy bar is about timing quick boosts to evade strikes. I dislike this mechanic and how it inorganically affects the automatic tracking system.

For example, my method of dodging in a previous game would be to halt and then reverse direction before a projectile lands by using the strafe keys, essentially weaving. You would also regenerate energy in the descent. It would also take more energy to climb, so staying aerial was a delicate balancing act, and there was a purpose to remaining on the ground.

It is aesthetically a lot more attractive than the rolls in Dark Souls, though, and it does fit better with the idea of having multiple verniers that can engage quickly to disengage. The passive vernier thruster effects are actually really nice. Turning or changing direction is always accompanied by a little puff from the thrusters in the opposite direction, which is well thought out. This game presents itself very nicely.