On the surface, there's something rather off-putting to me about 'Armored Core 2: Another Age' as a cultural artefact. The 'bigger is better' philosophy is garish in all periods of course, but the quaking ground the industry now stands on because of it makes it all the more foul to the taste. I confess this is the central reason I avoided 'Another Age' at first, my resentment of overly long games which pitch themselves as such almost purely for the sake of itself as a novelty deterred me and invoked my shameful reactionary purely because of the timely context I myself as a player and critic exist in. What I would not have anticipated is one of the more fascinating and, now in my view, important entries in FromSoftware's catalogue.

It's easy to perceive 'Another Age' as merely more 'Armored Core 2', so say we humour this perspective for a little while. On this platform, one will discover 'Another Age' a simultaneously invigoratingly inventive and suffocatingly boring experiment of a project, with equal ability to dazzle and push the technology and conceptualisation abilities of its predecessor as well as risk surprise top surgery with its insipid monotony threatening to really bore one's tits off. It's a bizarre experience to watch this game violently vacillate between the series' very best moments and very worst in its bountiful mission variety. On this easy perspective, one might also be aware of the mechanical succession to 'Armored Core 2', a game I held qualms with on the basis of difficulty and mechanical onboarding. 'Another Age' amends my previous notes here by being both significantly harder and, hilariously enough, longer. Unlike '2' I felt actively prodded by the structure of 'Another Age' to create a variety of ACs and engage with all aspects of the construction process in a way I found far more engaging and well rounded, it helped to notice the good manner to which the game introduces it's layers as this is the only expansion game other than 'Project Phantasma' where I did not load a save.

So concludes this little written experiment of 'Armored Core 2: Another Age' as simply more 'Armored Core 2', a far more inconsistent experience that is bolder in mission design as well as being, in completeness, more systemically and mechanically rich and satisfying, held down primarily by the fact that it is fucking hopelessly absent on a cohesive or conventionally compelling narrative context. 3/5, not enough fish, will hang myself in my cute dress later.

But this is reductive, so it's time for me to commit to my tradition in reviews and embarrass myself properly.

'Armored Core 2: Another Age' from an actual cohesive perspective is, without contest, the most experiential of FromSoftware's mecha titles. This doesn't mean it's the best, not even close, but it does mean it's dramatically more important than its exterior would suggest, and I can now fully understand where folks are coming from in their love of the title. There is, in critical space, some well earned admiration for the world building in previous titles achieved through cold dialogue and a practically inhuman structure. 'Armored Core 2: Another Age', because of it's excellent mechanics and demand for player engagement with its most important systems in AC building, because of it's borderline abrasive mission variety and broad curation of it's 100 mission catalog, because of it's completely barren, detached and decisively not cohesive narrative, this is the purest distillation of the 'Armored Core' experience that has presently been conceived. The emptiness, the boredom that was felt in this game's lows stopped being flaws for me to harp on in my annoying review and instead became an integral part of the experience that, in retrospect, I wouldn't have any other way. Never before have I felt so drearily detached from myself, from my behaviour in one of these games. The progression of the world building is limited only to the changing landscapes of metallic murder you travel to as the map expands, painting the world itself in physicality as nothing more than stages for violence, total background noise. This technique of environmental storytelling is, of course, very important to what would evolve stylistically in the city of Layered in 'Armored Core 3', but thematically, this absent separation of Raven from Place is deeply important to what is explored in that third generation. A legion of metal and smoke charging forward across the Earth in systemic automation, ignorant and disconnected from the environment itself they impose upon, doomed to face its retort beyond the rebooted setting's Silent Line. This all starts in 'Another Age', truly marking it as a deeply important play in my eyes. There's no 'plot', there's nothing real in 'characters', this is truly immersive experiential storytelling, there is nothing but a dissociative conflict of corporate interests which you numb yourself into accepting, a furious blend of steel and fire signifying only the greatest, grossest industrial heights of our systemic failure. This is a very unique kind of compelling, one that the series feels born for given the notes of it sprinkled in all entries, but 'Another Age' is the only title to truly slice it down to the bare nub of it's meaning, and for that, I passionately applaud it. Given how much FromSoftware's later work is championed for this kind of storytelling, I'm surprised to hear the sentiment of 'Another Age' having no story to be one so common, because with a small change in perspective one may realise that this bloated experiment is hollowingly rich with it.

Alright, let's get this out of the way, this game isn't amazing. Definitely the weakest FromSoftware game I've played but there are some things I like. For one, it's the mechanics of 'Armored Core' and gen 3.5 too, so obviously the game is fun. However, this is basically an Arena or AC on AC focused title, and to it's credit it is very good at this so long as you are loading a 'Nexus' save.
///
EDIT: THIS IS WRONG, apparently you'll be locked out of getting certain parts for doing this so I may have really messed up, lol.
///
This is by far the most 'expansion' one of these 'expansion games' has ever been as it's basically a great Arena mode with tons of fun opponents and matchmaking preferences that is to be added onto 'Nexus', due to having no shop and leaving new saves to slowly gain new parts by progressing in it and the totally vapid tutorials 'Armored Core: Nine Breaker' which eventually roll the credits on the game. This is really what brings in down, in the sense that this just feels like 'Armored Core: Nexus' disc 3 and is weird as a standalone release. Because doing tutorials for hours to actually beat it? It's as suffocatingly boring as it sounds, but the Arena itself is good fun with the new balancing if you have a nice AC to load with you.

So yeah, I can't recommend it as essential playing, but it wasn't the worst thing I've played.

Tempering expectations for 'Armored Core: Nexus' did not come easy for me. My adoration for how well served I had been by its predecessor 'Silent Line: Armored Core' left me in a position both wanting and not wanting more at the same time. That sounds fucking stupid I know so, please, indulge me.

I didn't get on great with 'Nexus' off the bat. As much as I now understand them to be so obviously superior, I wasn't a fan of the controls and found myself slipping up a lot because of how long it took for me to rewire my muscle memory. I found the missions to be samey and done-before, the UI totally balmy, the heat mechanic overly oppressive—as despite the game having otherwise some of the best customisation and quantity of parts in the whole series, heat can really straddle the selection of certain parts—and the story lacking much in way of a hook. It took me a while to appreciate the detached and unceremonious nature of which the humans had penetrated the Silent Line, the nonchalant emptiness as a feeling is excellently congruent with the aimless ascension-ism they have been characterised with previously. With how much generation 3 built up the location, 3.5 knocking it all down without a flinch is almost nauseating as you are quickly shuttled into the same grove we were just in a game ago. Same systems, same mechanics, same destruction sans ethics and reason, wasn't something supposed to change? Something other than the mission select screen into something for a PC game? There's an understated and yet all consuming nihilism that underpins so much of the first half of 'Armored Core: Nexus', it's not just that the tone is noticeably bleaker, it's the connotation of everything you're doing feeling so similar. I'd whinge about the mission design being hackneyed but that almost feels like the point, culminating in an utterly hopeless ending which some could see from a mile away, because IBIS' remark so clearly means practically nothing now in the face of the systemic issues driving humanity. Of course the corporations dig too far, of course it means an apocalypse, that's not a spoiler, that's me doing your pattern recognition for you.
I respect this bleakness, it's powerful, and I appreciate how the obviousness of the missions aided this feeling in a truly immersive way, but that does not mean some of these missions aren't rushed or just flat out confusing on why they're even in the game. 'Nexus' was made very quickly and you can feel it in a lot of places, like when the same desert mission where you destroy tanks is split into two for some reason? It feels like this is where a normal 'Armored Core' level would just have you resupply, or not even that if we're talking 'Silent Line', and you do them so quickly after the other that it feels the most glaring. Also, on this note, FromSoftware has—for lack of better phrasing—totally fucked up the Arena here. There are maybe 10 encounters with it you have across the story and about four of those fights are memorable, genuinely not sure what they were doing here, it's like the worst interpretation of what 'Master of Arena' was doing in 1999. This sounds harsh, so I'm hasten to remind that 'Nexus' does have its strong sorties that are very much worth playing, particularly its final one which uses the apprehension felt for the impending doom very well alongside a really excellent final encounter with a... potentially familiar face. Top the game off with an excellent final gameplay section which embodies the moment and you have an all time classic here.

The game is helped a fair bit by the fact that certain presentational elements have clearly been mastered by this point. The game looks and sounds great, cutscene animation in particular is much more well done and the music is fantastic. Kota Hoshino is absolutely deserving of his legend status in the fanbase with these thrilling techno and rock tracks. The qualities from the third generation of great sampling and catchy groves are still here but with much richer instrumentation and more impassioned compositions, simply excellent work.

'Nexus' also has a bonus disc which might be worth mentioning, basically containing a selection of remade developer favourite levels from older 'Armored Core' games. It's a fun novelty with some neat B-Sides, but can be a little annoying or bland at points. I would only recommend it if you're a fan but, as that's what I am, I enjoyed it. A sentiment which may be applicable to all of this, but this is still a very strong title which has left the story in a powerful position.