[ARMORED CORE: VI FIRES OF RUBICON] Tourist
0So I'm guessing the choice mission put me on some path to get some specific ending. In fact I looked it up. Got to get ng++ to get third ending. Interesting...
Finally got the hang of the game. After the initial shield ring boss, everything after that seems fine. I wonder if the Coral storyline existed in the other AC games? I bet the enhancing soldier thing was old news.
A little bit of malding also:
Difficulty is a little bit of a joke. There was Baltheus the god of filtering. And then a bunch of super easy missions. Some were trivial, some gave a little challenge. I'm sure there will be other "Malenia blade of Miquella" level enemies, but for the most part, it's so easy that it's trivialized. I get it that I try to find the best combo of weapons, which seem to be shotguns/Gatling guns and Granada shoulders or some sniper shoulders, and that might be the reason the enemies don't pose much of a threat. But if you're going to give such a meatgrinder of a boss at the end of chapter 1, then it sends a precedence. Either don't have him as a boss that soon, or ramp up the other bosses. Might also be the case of that's the boss where I learned how to use my arsenals well, and if I were to encounter him again, I'd manage well(though I doubt it, still got no idea what to do for the flame blades, I just basically out damaged him, cuz got no idea how to dodge that shit). The weird wonky difficulty going between counting sheep and nuking the planet, is kind of the same problem I had with Elden Ring. I'd like to say poor design, but I'm not a game dev so got no idea. Just balance the game better, make the boring parts more interesting. If the majority of the game is me going on auto pilot and I only have to wake up for a couple of boss fights, then something is wrong. I've got a feeling it's a mixture between inability to balance player arsenal and inability to create good bosses. There are a lot of trash level weapons and there are a lot of samey bosses, that don't really add anything new(though in some part I get it, they all have the same loadout that you could build, so there's no avoiding sameyness with the ACs, but the bosses themselves still could be better). There used to be a time when games had relatively predictable difficulty curve(starts easier, ramps up as you play). But with the Soul's games(Elden ring the biggest nominator) and with this, I've got a feeling like they just have never tried to ease the players in. Like it's more entertaining for them if there are actual skyscraper curve bosses in the middle of otherwise nothingness. And that's why enemies are bullet sponges and only take damage during brief windows. Shit's weird man. It's all just kind of boring.
A thing that really bothers me is stagger. Sometimes the enemy is really quick in recovering stagger, other times it increases super slowly. When you get hit by stagger, can't do shit, when enemy gets hit by stagger, sometimes he can do anything he wants, sometimes the stagger is canceled and sometimes he is stunned. I don't know if it's a case of bugs with how action interacts with stagger, or enemies just have different rules. It really bothers me, as it doesn't seem to be consistent. You want to stagger as much as possible, cuz more damage and safe for you to unload your "stop to fire" weapons. But it's an unreliable mechanic. Also cooldown indicator for Gatling guns is too tiny, can't see nothing, when it's surrounded by effects and fast moving target. Also why the fuck don't enemies drop down when staggered mid air? Hell's up with that?
Animations seem to be an issue all together. There are so many times when I can't do anything because I'm stuck in an animation. It might be a case of me being unlucky, but I swear sometimes it seems like the enemy doesn't have the same issue of being stuck when using certain weapons. It's such a major pain in the ass. And the slower weapons often stop you from dashing away. And of course cuz no iframes, then dashing often doesn't mitigate damage. You've got to dash quite a bit before the attack would hit you. And sometimes the enemy's attack indicator doesn't even show or it's instantaneous(with some the shotgun attacks especially). Though when it comes to the enemy, they can magically dodge all my shotgun shells. It's weird man.
Energy shields were a problem with the first shield boss, but after unlocking weapons that are good against it, it's not that much of a problem anymore. Just a little annoying, that you've got to basically lose and then you get the chance to rearm yourself to fit the enemy.
If you ain't rocking melee, shields are a massive pain also. They seem so strong. Block everything imaginable.
Lastly of course the invulnerable zones on some enemies(shields included). Annoying cuz getting around those zoomy-zoom enemies is time consuming.
Game's still fine, though it would've been cool to get more interesting missions, it's all quite bland. Raven fight was awesome though.