Armored Core 6 vs elden ring In the Armored Core video games, you take control of a large, bulky mech and fight on the front lines of a conflict between opposing corporations in a distant dystopian future. You are fighting as a guns-for-hire mercenary, not a card-carrying corpo recruit. Therefore, your antagonist in one operation may become your paymaster in another. After years of Fromsoftware’s fantasy games, I’m delighted they’re going back to sci-fi with Armored Core 6. It will continue where the prior games left off.
You shouldn’t think of the Armored Core series as Dark Souls with robots if you are unfamiliar with it. They aren’t open-world games, for starters; you complete distinct objectives that occur on their own levels. In that you don’t level up a character and spend skill points, Armored Core games aren’t RPGs either. By mounting more powerful gear on the chassis of your mech, you can upgrade it.
However, even though they are very different from one another in many ways, the Armored Core series and the Soulsborne games are two sides of the same story. All of FromSoftware’s games have high-concept narratives and punishing, granular combat that appeals to your “risk-reward” mindset. This shared DNA not only explains where the Soulsborne franchises originated but also aids in our speculation regarding Armored Core’s potential future.
Feelable worlds
This contrast between moments of safety and periods of peril not only unites the Soulsborne and armoured core games but also reveals how Armored Core 6 will likely be influenced by the success of Elden Ring and the Dark Souls titles.
Since releasing Demon’s Souls back in 2009, FromSoftware has been honing its light-touch approach to storytelling and improving its narrative tools with each successive game. The times that happen in between boss fights in Elden Ring are just as important. Rich narratives ooze from the gloomy settings. In The Lands Between, wandering amid the ruins allows one to imagine what these locations could have looked like in the past and what might have caused them to change. However, this kind of environmental storytelling works best when there is a sense of refuge.
Armored Core 6 and Elden Ring Use Fire in Differing Ways
Recently, Armored Core 6: Fires of Rubicon made a stunning comeback with a release date that had the fans prepared for the upcoming game. According to the new trailer and interviews that go along with it, Armored Core 6 is both the FromSoftware throwback that many have been hoping for. Armoured Core has a long history with the company; in fact, the original version was nearly its debut title instead of King’s Field. Since then, these two franchises have influenced a large portion of FromSoftware’s portfolio, particularly in terms of themes, tones, and difficulties.
However, Armored Core 6 is not currently alone. The DLC for Elden Ring, a recent big hit, is now being prepared. For the first time in ten years, FromSoftware’s fantasy and mecha game lines are operating simultaneously once more, and fans of all kinds couldn’t be happier. Although players will quickly realize that Armored Core 6 is considerably different from FromSoftware’s Soulslikes, the cross-pollination of the Souls community that it should receive will aid its sales. Even so, they have some common thematic elements, some of which are obvious in the games’ mutual concern with fire.
Elden Ring and Armored Core 6 have the exact opposite appearances.
There has been a lot of discussion about what Armored Core 6 isn’t, specifically that it’s not the next Elden Ring or even a Souls-like game. Setting expectations and pleading with fans in advance of a series revival that has been in the works for ten years, FromSoftware has been busy swimming against the current of its own reputation. The studio seems to be saying, “We know we made Elden Ring, but we also make other things.” And what exactly is Armored Core 6? It’s a mech-focused third-person action game. Yes, that does work. However, after watching a hands-off Armored Core 6 preview including gameplay, I believe FromSoftware fell short in its statement. As far as I can tell, Armored Core 6 is not just nothing like Elden Ring, but also the complete opposite.
Instead of being open-ended, Armored Core 6 is linear and mission-based. Combat appears to be much faster-paced than it is intended, yet it is still tactical and not spammy. It tends to favour vertical depth over a wide-open landscape and favours the industrial to the fanciful. Instead of boasting about being an absurdly vast game, it openly displays itself as a small one. Although there is depth and challenge to be found, the game has an arcade, almost bullet-hell appeal that makes it seem simple to grasp. These three phrases wouldn’t even come close to describing most FromSoftware games. At the same time, it’s obvious that pieces of various Souls games were grafted on here, just like players can utilize thousands of parts to create their own mech.