Oh.

Armored Core fans are like "Omg X-7 Asher was so cool and hot during the mission Blow Up The Orphanage"

For those who don't know this is what my brain looks like :33 3

As someone who's played AC since my childhood, I wanted to like AC6 so much. When it was announced, I was right there with the rest of the community hyping it up, all the way up until its release. I went through all 3 endings in about 4 days (i.e. before the balance patch).

The game did a lot right. The story was great, and the characters were a lot more developed than previous entries (even the one-offs had a lot of personality put into their brief appearances). I also rather like what was done with the generators—lots of different stats to consider in regards to how your energy bar handles and refills, as opposed to "pick the one with the highest output" (the strategy in previous titles).

But looking back on my playthrough, I can't think of a single moment where the gameplay felt satisfying. Basic missions against MTs were all but trivial, leading into boss fights that were depressingly frustrating. I never got enjoyment from beating a boss (maybe the Smart Cleaner? that one only took 2 attempts), only a general feeling of "fucking finally". The stagger mechanic and weapon design came together to really limit playstyle options—I landed on dual Zimmermans about halfway through my first playthrough (without having heard the community's opinion, mind), which carried me all the way until NG+, where I switched to a different build that ended up using the stun-needle cannon (also without having heard the community opinion—looking at numbers alone showed it to be the clear winner). Realizing in hindsight that I had essentially cheesed my way through the entire game (and still found myself incredibly frustrated) didn't do much to improve my feelings about the playthrough.

After the balance patch, I expressed this opinion in the Armored Core Discord—if nothing else, the tracking on Balteus' flame-sword was ridiculous and needed to be nerfed. The response I got essentially boiled down to telling me, directly, that I wasn't good enough to be allowed to enjoy the game. After that, I left the AC community, and I have very little desire to play AC6 again.

(As an aside, I am disappointed in the nerf to Balteus' missiles, but not for reasons of difficulty. As you point out, the missiles weren't what made the fight exceedingly difficult. The nerf was unnecessary, cutting perhaps one of the most dramatic and iconic boss attacks in the entire game. Nerf the tracking or damage if you must, but removing missiles from the pattern entirely?)

Firstly, this post isn't aimed at people who don't rly have an opinion about BALTEUS nerf, or is disappointed that it isn't as hard but it won't affect their opinion of the game in general. If you are these people, it's not aimed at you I promise

Possibly petty and unpopular but I'm mid annoyed by people (mostly in social media and comments so maybe I shouldn't pay attention to them anyway 😅) who claim Balteus is super easy now and how Fromsoft "ruined a good game because gaming journalists, now *casuals* wouldn't get filtered out like it was intended, I want immediate rollback, gonna uninstall" and base their claim at them defeating it easily with chapter1 gears and OS tunes off

1. Yeah, you downgraded your AC, but your game knowledge didn't. You played multiple playthrough of ac6, your gameplay knowledge is miles above than at the point where you faced it first, if you want to claim you as a player learnt nothing while playing ~NG++ of ac6 and your muscle memory didn't adapt at all, congrats, your gamer learning ability is abysmal

2. I am pretty sure fromsoft didn't do this because of a few gaming journalists who complain that it's too hard lmao, if they actually give into whatever western fringe reviewers say we'd had easy mode in ER (easy mode is another discourse in video gaming that's its own can of worms esp. in Fromsoft games, I don't want to deride the convo so I won't go into it) Hardcore gamers may be a bit too absorbed in their clique of fellow aficionados, they don't realize that there are a lot of casuals who got stuck at Balteus, or, more importantly, didn't even try to purchase the game because they saw a streamer struggling or heard the general gamer gossips that Balteus is some Great Filter, maybe the gamedevs want more people to try their games?

Because I assure you, for people who didn't play any FS games at all, or maybe just played ER, it'd not be easy. If you think only high skilled players are allowed to enjoy this game...well, I disagree.

Maybe WE want more people to play this game because this game offers a lot more experience than that mindset? This is a mecha genre game that doesn't get such outputs as actions of other fantastical settings.

3. The perceived difficulty level suddenly dropping after Balteus and not really escalating into the realm of filter-like until you reach CEL (because let's face it Sea Spider wasn't as much bemoaned as BALTEUS) suggests that maybe release patch BALTEUS was a bit harder than their intention. Fromsoft producer's tweet about the patch specifically says they intended to modulate the difficulty level in early to mid game.

4. This is a specific gripe to people who act dramatically that less missile barrage means the boss is giganerfed: if you're so ignorant of the boss mechanics to think missiles make Baltie hard how did u even got past it

It was similar when Radahn in ER was nerfed too, lol, Fromsoft in recent years gave us pretty enjoyable games, but the maturity level of some people in the fandom is disappointing even for a video game fandom

My collection of armored core 6 memes. Pls add more ty

And yes one of these was screenshotted from a tumblr post I just realized. Thank my discord server for that one x.x

Oneshot is such a good game

i love oneshot

play oneshot

The reason I like history so much is the way you can see how unchanging human nature is. People have always been doing the same things, with different tools. Ancient Sumerians writing "I am not warning you now in hopes that you'll actually do anything, I am writing this to later prove that I warned you and you did nothing" messages in clay tablets like you'd write an office e-mail. Ancient philosophers talking about shepherds and archers, explaining the exact same problem you had this morning, like they're personally calling you out.

200 years ago, somebody was complaining about Kids These Days burying their faces in books in order to avoid socialising just the same as someone else is now ranting how their children would rather browse their phones than listen to them rant. People were arguing anonymously in the posting boards and newspaper sections just the same as they do on the internet. Someone in the bronze age woke up at 5 am to the sound of toddlers fighting over complete nonsense just the same as someone woke up to the same noises today.

For as long as there have been people, there have been people doing the same kind of things as you. From some dude in a cave with berries for paint, some Roman planning a mosaic on a wall, ancient Chinese noblewoman illustrating her calligraphed poem and some medieval monk decorating the borders of a manuscript and me on my laptop with my stylus pen, we're all just sitting here in our different times and places, wondering why the FUCK are horses so hard to draw.

I’m glad AC6 has a memorable cast.

Handler “on my mother’s name, this is about a FRIEND not me” Walter, Cinder “names her custom made AC parts after food” Carla (who can get her bitcoin keys stolen in a mission if you take too long), Snail the single most hateable man in the world, Pater who yells “YAY PROMOTION FOR ME!” if you kill his caring superior in front of him, Iguazu the malding Yamcha, Rusty Your Buddy, Michigan who somehow manages to be incredibly military and yet likable by virtue of being a funny G.I. Joe ass dude (who knows EVERYONE under him by name), and the menagerie of usual Armored Core crooks and freaks that inhabit the Arena, and let’s not forget the utterly suspect ALL MIND who keeps saying very concerning shit and sort of acknowledges you’re in ng+ and wants your help in creating an ethically* sourced, community built Nineball. Even the playable character is an identity thief and the world’s okayest lobotomite, who gets attacked specifically for stealing an identity AND for being an okay lobotomite, separately and in different situations.

And here’s where I make a special mention to Ayre, the girl living in your head, who is… A normal ass person for the most part and just sort of hangs out with you and wants to spend time together. There’s also the voices of the legion, but otherwise, she’s just A Person, and even feels bad asking you to do things if she can’t pay you. In the middle of the big corpo war, Ayre is like “Raven, did you know? There’s lore :) I hope that was interesting”. When the voice possessing your hollow bloodless head is the most normal and well adjusted person in the setting, you know you have something good going on.

hiiiiii :)