In my review of Armored Core 2: Another Age, I lamented that the series was becoming stagnant and worried that the release rate was hurting the games. Armored Core 3 came out just short of a year after Another Age and is in many ways a remake of the first and a reboot of the series. I was unsure whether a reboot/remake was really a good idea at this point, but this game ended up being one of the best in the series.

It's still the same old Armored Core. There are a few additions, but if you played Armored Core 2 you have a good idea of what’s gonna be here. Same kinds of weapons for the most part, the arena’s here, you still can’t use the right stick to move the camera (Or anything else. This game was released in 2002). Even the same kind of story, although I’d still say it’s an improvement over the narrative of the original Armored Core. However, it’s great in pretty much every way that you’d hope. The controls and movement are a little smoother but are still weighty. In general, the game just feels more polished than earlier entries. Quad legs actually walk now. It’s more fun to play in a way that’s hard to explain.

What's a little easier to explain the greatness of is the mission design though. This was such a breath of fresh air after Another Age. Not every mission is super unique, but there are a ton of memorable ones. Retrieving a package from a sinking ship, saving floating cargo on the water, Traveling through air ducts to disable EMPs, and way more missions were really interesting. Missions now take much more advantage of parts like hover legs and radiators too, which is nice. Funnily enough, despite being a soft remake of the first game, this game has fewer overt remake levels than Armored Core 2 from what I remember. The first missions are clear callbacks, but that’s mostly it.

There are definitely improvements in other fields though. Menuing is a big part of this series, and it’s been made much more convenient. Transitions are faster, the garage and shop have been combined into one section, and you can sell parts in the equip area. However, for some reason stat comparisons in the shop have been removed, meaning you can’t easily see how your part is better or worse than a prospective purchase.

While there are no new part types, there are iterations on pre-existing parts. In Armored Core 2, Overboost was a new addition that I really enjoyed. In Armored Core 3 your core may have Overboost, but it could also come equipped with Orbital Cores. These are auto firing energy weapons with infinite ammo that can be really useful on longer missions or if you really need max firepower and no mobility. There’s also a few more options for left arm parts. Now you can equip howitzers and flamethrowers instead of swords and shields. It seems FromSoft is slowly realizing that there’s really no need to differentiate between left arm weapons and right arm weapons. Slowly.

You can also drop weapons mid-mission. This can lighten your AC, and you don’t actually have to pay for the dropped ammo. Unfortunately, you have to enter a Street Fighter Combo to drop a weapon. Hmm, if only there was a stick that could free up some other buttons for alternative use…

You know what’s back though? The Arena! It’s still good, but it’s a little worse than that of Armored Core 2. That game’s arena was more difficult and had me really considering my parts and tactics. In this game, fights are much easier. However, they did limit the amount of fights you can do by making you complete more missions. That was probably a good idea, because these matches are still the best way to earn money. I was a little in debt once, but after playing enough arena matches, I was a millionaire.

Now, we must talk about the story. It’s good enough. It uses the main structure of the first game’s story, but it’s a little different. The Controller’s existence is well known and supported by the trio of corporations. Even when the Controller begins to seemingly glitch and start randomly sending robots to destroy stuff, the corporations trust it. You could definitely pull some sociopolitical commentary from this, but we never learn really why the Controller is doing what it does. It just happens. Why did the Controller open the surface up at the end? Was it a test to see if humanity was strong enough or something? Maybe I’ll find out in the next game, but still. We’re also missing Nineball here, which I guess means the Controller isn’t in charge of the Raven’s nest this time. I’m not sure why they changed that. Overall, I think this game’s story could’ve been a little better.

I don't usually bring up the audiovisuals in my reviews of these games, but Armored Core 3 is an exception. The visuals are good. Everything looks fine. But for some reason, the soundtrack here blows every previous soundtrack out of the water. It’s really good. They went for a mix of techno and orchestra, and the songs are really good without feeling intrusive.

This is a great game. In fact, it’s the best game in this marathon I’ve been doing. If you want a taste of old gen Armored Core, this might be the best game to start with. Just make sure you rebind the controls after the first mission. I was really considering giving this a 9/10, but I think I’ll leave it at an 8/10 for now. Next I’ll be playing Silent Line.