Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon Offers Up Bite-Sized Mecha Combat

TUCSON, Ariz. (KGUN) — It’s been over a decade since FromSoft, developers behind Dark Souls and Elden Ring, put us in the pilot seat of a giant robot in their long-standing Armored Core series. In fact, the franchise skipped the PS4 generation entirely. The mech genre, once more prevalent in gaming and anime, has been supplanted by other interests, making this sixth title in the Armored Core series a delightful blast from the past.

Fires of Rubicon has you playing a mercenary named Raven, taking up odd jobs from various competing organizations trying to take the natural resources from the planet Rubicon 3. Think a less environmentally friendly Avatar, where the forests have been completely overrun by massive factories and hulking metal structures from a post-apocalyptic liminal space. Completing missions forces you to battle artillery, mobile mechs with swords and shields, and drones among other enemy types…including giant foes who will push your giant robot to the limits.

The game is played in small missions that can take anywhere from five to ten minutes allowing you to pick-up-and-play at your leisure without too much commitment. As you progress through the story you’ll earn money which can be used to buy weapons and improvements for your mech. But everything comes with a tradeoff. You can improve mobility at the cost of defense. And stronger weapons may have fewer rounds of ammo that can be deployed each sortie. All of this is shown with very overwhelming data that is probably more sensical to gamers who play games like Baldur’s Gate. To me…it wasn’t as important as making my mech look as ridiculous as possible.

Fires of Rubicon has so many customization options it will live on solely for the memes. Someone has already built a murderous Thomas the Tank Engine for instance. And while I like to think of myself as creative…I was only able to make a vaguely bird-like robot that had a cool color schematic.

The massive set-pieces are really where the game shines. Climbing up a titanic mining ship/ground transport with a near-instakill laser tracking your movements…taking on robots five times your size strapped with enough firepower to destroy a small country…there’s a sense of the epic in nearly every aspect of Armored Core.

Graphically the game looks fantastic but it does suffer from some goofy physics, like your robot barely touching signs or trees and causing them to spontaneously explode like they are full of nitroglycerin.

Another minor gripe is that some of the story, told in visual novel style focused more on text than offering any sort of visual flair makes it a little hard to really invest in anything happening. Which is fine because you’re likely more invested in blowing things up.

Armored Core VI is one of the more unique gaming experiences of the year. While I can’t wholeheartedly recommend it to everyone, for those who like the nitty gritty of character creation and enjoy a challenging demolition derby, Armored Core will sate that thirst.