Armored Core is defined by an industrial coldness, and such inhumanity is central to the dramatic questions of its newest entry. There isn't a single human being to be seen in the entire game, their presence indicated only by voice over and the hulking mechs they inhabit. Rubicon itself is a planet dotted with colossal megastructures and sprawling metropolises with a bevy of institutions and organizations fighting for control of them as well as the hybrid power source and data conduit substance known as Coral that enticed them there. There’s the derelict scientific institute that established the initial research into the substance and caused the cosmic disaster that hangs over the planet, the governing authority that administers over the remaining Coral reserves, the two corporate powers occupying the planet in order to extract wealth from its veins, and the beleaguered locals struggling to liberate their home. (Editors note: there are actually even more factions in this game!) However, regardless of the faction in question, there’s nary a whiff of culture to be seen, beyond corporate logos and military decals. It’s a vision of humanity's future set on a planet of war where all of our efforts as a people have gone solely into creating the most fucked up mechs, the most overwhelming missile barrages, and the most devastating laser volleys possible. It is within this bleakness that From Software asks the player to answer the question of whether humanity can be trusted to evolve past its current form. It makes for the most interesting moral choice in From Soft’s modern catalog, however not all elements of the game support it as well as it could have.

In order to bring themselves into such a position where they can make such a call, players build and customize their mechs from an arsenal of parts and fight for the highest bidder. There are dozens of stats on display affecting your mech's performances, and figuring out how to balance the tradeoffs of each component to build a cohesive machine is half the fun. This customization is one of the more successful thematic aspects of Armored Core VI, being the vessel in which players express themselves and form an identity. Aside from their name (separate from their callsign, Raven), no aspect of the player character is customizable, or even viewable. Raven is, in essence, their mech, and as such, constantly in flux.

The combat that this customization is in service of is balletic and bombastic, with hefty assault charges and nimble boost dodges, and has a engaging learning curve as the player gradually comes accustomed to managing the considerable mental stack regarding the range and ammunition of four different weapons at once, alongside the mech’s own engine and cooldown capacities. As is typical of From Soft games, spikes in difficulty are often just as much knowledge checks as they are tests of skill and dexterity, and those who love tinkering will be ecstatic over the range of options to try out when they encounter a progress barrier. However, the balancing of the game is too lopsided in order to fully facilitate this intended approach; the stagger system, disconnected from the parries of Sekiro that defined it in that game, heavily rewards burst damage, and if you have powerful ammunition on hand when an enemy is staggered, even Armored Core VI’s fiercest enemies will swiftly crumble. For the most part, my first playthrough was based around upgrading and tinkering with parts for a central mech design I created early on, and the design I took into the final battle shredded every threat it faced in NG+ and NG+2 (on patch 1.02). This undermined the structure that New Game+ is meant to facilitate in this game, which is utilizing the repetition of replaying the game’s various missions as an opportunity to try out new mech designs, and unfortunately I found that NG+2 disappointing in the story department as well.

The story in Armored Core VI the first two routes are quite compelling. It has far more dialogue than any of From Soft’s Soulslikes, including Sekiro, which helps to bring personality to the sheer complexity and density of its proper nouns and headier ideas. There are occasional blemishes, of course. Front of mind is Handler Walter’s dramatically inert off-screen ‘death’, which is, confusingly, only vaguely alluded to. Then there’s the matter of Gen IV augmentation, one of a plethora of established experiments in modifying physiology in order to better pilot Armored Core mechs, which leaves it unclear what Raven’s psychological capabilities are in regards to free will, which muddies the messaging around player choice and the will to choose. However, most of the twists and turns land impactfully, and the decisions to be made are hefty enough that either route of the base story shines through as a memorable and meaningful experience. NG+2, titled ‘Alea lacta Est’ has a lot going for it by focusing around the mercenary support group ALLMIND and their hidden agenda of implementing the Human Instrumentality Project from Neon Genesis Evangelion. It may not be original, but it’s a good thematic fit for the game. This is undermined however by the fact that Alea lacta Est replaces the dramatic gravitas found in the finales of prior playthroughs, with what is essentially a joke. Low rank mercenary G5 Igauza’s petty resentment of the player character takes center stage over a hypothetical antagonist that could have more directly and cleanly represented opposition to the player character’s goals. Sure, G5 Igauza as a foil is meant to represent how one could squander the will to choose, but it doesn’t register when Armored Core VI’s depiction of humanity is already so consumed with war and profit. It doesn't help that the game’s final image is a straight up goofy way of expressing its status quo shift, becoming an instance where the game’s commitment to never showing human faces goes a bit too far, and hardly feeling like a worthy reward to the considerable grind required to reach the ending. It adds up to one of those cases where the masterpiece version of a game is so clearly visible in its released form, but it falls short in a few key places, even if it doesn't stop it from being great overall.

Taking aim at the carceral state and boldly declaring that all Lobster Cops Are Bastards, Frog Tec 3 emerges as a masterwork of an anarchist polemic. Well, not quite; anybody who thinks that anarchism is naive and idealistic will not be swayed by any evidence presented in this game, because it's smart enough to not stray far from the silly sensibilities of the series to deliver its message. It's simply a way to interrogate some of the ingrained assumptions of the genre that were seemingly taken for granted in the first entry and more gently mocked in the second. It also helps justify the Wild West setting, which at first seemed to be a tad too specific of a genre for the grand finale, but it works because such a setting is known in the popular imagination for exploring the intersection of the law and lawlessness. It's also a perfect fit for one of the series’ running gags, which is the Detective’s insecurity over his oddly shaped head that cannot host a hat. Of course, the fact that I had to spoiler tag this review thanks to the plot twists attached to its politics is a big indication of how much more ambitious these games have gotten, which is quite welcome. In addition to a new scooter (and accompanying sweeping music track) to traverse the larger space, the game pulls off a gag I'd have previously assumed to be outside the scope of these microgames, and then does another just a few minutes later. What a delight that Frog Tec went out on such a high note!

It’s rather impressive how the strengths and weaknesses of Breath of the Wild were flipped for Tears of the Kingdom. Where the former game was a refreshing open world dragged down by its underbaked immersive sim elements, the latter is a brilliant immersive sim parred with a disappointing open world. Put another way, with the re-use of Breath’s Hyrule, the joy of discovery that defines the best entries in the open world has been shifted to the mechanics and the new maps that Tears provides. One of these emotive redistributions works quite well (for the most part) and the other does not (for the most part), leading to a final product that sings quite well but sag in a few important places.

The core problem that needs to be solved when designing an immersive sim is that all of the wacky creative choices that the player needs to be more appealing than just taking the path of least resistance. Tools like magnetism and time freeze in Breath had limited applications in combat, and simply slapping enemies with your sword was just more efficient, even with the weapon degradation system attempting to force the player into more spontaneous play. In a single fell swoop, the new ability Fuse, which allows the player to attach any item to any weapon, provides a host of useful and whacky combat and exploration utility, while also giving purpose to the hoard of items and weapons that the player accrues of the course of playing these two games. Being able to enhance any weapon I find with whatever I choose makes the temporality of my weapons far less bothersome because I’ll always have something on hand to suit my needs, while still having the possibility open for creativity and experimentation. While the powers Ascend and Rewind allow for unique navigation options, the real showstopper of Tears is, of course, Ultrahand, which allows the assemblage of standard items and special Zonai tools into nearly whatever form the player desires. The building blocks of the system are easy and intuitive, allowing for both complex engineering and satisfying simple solution crafting. However, the game is far better at incentivizing using Ultrahand to solve simple problems in closed areas, such as the sky islands, the shrines, and the dungeons than it is at incentivizing that complex engineering. Tearsrequires the player to have intrinsic motivation to access its wilder possibilities outside of funny videos on twitter, which is mostly fine, but makes all the time I spent to get my Zonai batteries to max capacity feel like a waste, which brings us to the reason why the new open world ofTears falls so flat.

Of course, there’s a good degree of value in the opportunity to see how the people of Hyrule have progressed since the events of Breath, but the accompanying busy work of unlocking regions I’ve already explored is hardly appreciated. This wouldn’t be a large problem whatsoever weren’t for the lacking nature of the new open world zone in the form of The Depths. My initial discovery of the massive underground cavern lying below Hyrule was a rush of horror and awe (albeit a pale shadow of the experience of entering Elden Ring’s Caelid for the first time) but once you’ve seen one area of The Depths you’ve seen them all, with rare exception. However, this area has the materials that are needed to build Zonai devices from scratch and to mean upgraded battery, which means if you don’t want your time with the toys you build to be painfully short, you have to spend a painfully long time down under. I wanted to make use of the more open ended nature of the Ultrahand system, so after my time in The Depths I built a war machine that I’m decently proud of to fight Ganon, but could only be used for twenty seconds on a max level battery. Turns out, in the actual fight I didn’t have enough time for auto-build to assemble it and for it to take off, so I simply resorted to slapping him with a sword again. It was a sharp reminder of how the freedom of the mechanics conflicts with the freedom of the open world, making me wish that this was a more focused and condensed experience, that asked the player to use ultrahand and fuse to solve more specific problems.

Before I go, I will expend a few words on the narrative of Tears, which has some strikingly bold decisions but is ultimately let down by typical Nintendo cowardice, where status quo triumphs over progression everytime. I must ask, is there anyone on the planet who doesn't want Link to keep his awesome new arm, and if so, who is letting them near Nintendo’s development offices? A similar aversion to consequences manifests in Zelda’s arc, which sees her unfortunately sidelined once more but this time in a way that’s actually kind of interesting, until it’s reverted in tidy fashion in time for the credits. Even in a series with threadbare continuity, things must go back to the way things were. Now, thanks to my dopamine starved brain, this review is being published several months after I actually finished the game, but when I think about Tears of the Kingdom these days, two things come to mind; the all timer final boss fight and all the time I spent gathering apples at the same damn apple orchard from Breath of the Wild.