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Tin Tim
Jun 4, 2012

Live by the pun - Die by the pun

Never thought I'd see the day, but here we are. A robit game with a plot that's weaker than in Front Mission Evolved :downs:

I mean, Chief is a pretty good villain, but that's about it. And it's kind of a shame, because the world of AC probably offers some actual plot things to go by. Like, I never looked into it, but that stuff in the wasteland, and the wasteland itself, seem like mighty interesting things to base your plot around.

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GhostofJohnMuir
Aug 14, 2014

anime is not good
I'm kind of on the fence about this game, but Rosary making GBS threads on RD while his corpse quietly smolders was loving hilarious.

T1g4h
Aug 6, 2008

I AM THE SCALES OF JUSTICE, CONDUCTOR OF THE CHOIR OF DEATH!

Please tell me you end up getting the giant fuckoff laser cannon at some point.

Atlatl
Jan 2, 2008

Art thou doubting
your best bro?
Yes, we unlock all the ultimate weapons you see from the story missions after Story 09.

GhostofJohnMuir posted:

I'm kind of on the fence about this game, but Rosary making GBS threads on RD while his corpse quietly smolders was loving hilarious.

rd died as he lived

a chump

yeah rip

MaterialConceptual
Jan 18, 2011

"It is rather that precisely in that which is newest the face of the world never alters, that this newest remains, in every aspect, the same. - This constitutes the eternity of hell."

-Walter Benjamin, "The Arcades Project"

Atlatl posted:

rd died as he lived

a chump

yeah rip

I can only imagine what RD and Rosary's sex life must have been like. Kind of reminds me of Allen from Xenosaga, except even more so.

Deceitful Penguin
Feb 16, 2011
Jesus is there a single part that isn't lame in this story? The main character doesn't even have a name and this 'Resistance' then just goes: "Welp, we are such utter useless fucks that we will blindly put our faith in a single dude pretty much making up for our complete lack of solid tactics, strategy, leadership, materiel or even a clue at all because we are less competent than the Dashcon organizers". I mean, lol at not even realizing whiny bitch was dead.


What special thing did the main character do other than murder her dad anyway? drat, that must have been a hell of an interview.

Fran: So what are your credentials?
Silent Protagonist: I murdered ur dad lol he was really poo poo at this whole robit fightan
Fran: You are now super hired, gun of the Corporation who works for us now for some reason

edit: I take it back the Chief is p-baller

editedit: also lol at them calling a guy in a robot suit 'strong', yea, u sure are a big strong robot man Mr Main Character!

Deceitful Penguin fucked around with this message at 17:25 on Oct 27, 2014

Atlatl
Jan 2, 2008

Art thou doubting
your best bro?
Would it worry you to know that this game is probably the most sensible out of the entire series?

Update 8: Dynasty Warriors Enemy Density

BEEP BOOP BENEVOLENCE
pre:
Order 55-58: Oldschool is Dead
Order 59-61: The Quality of Quantity
Story 06:    Low Effort Coup

AtomikKrab
Jul 17, 2010

Keep on GOP rolling rolling rolling rolling.

Sometimes the plot just kills me, and not in the with laughter way but the, why would you do that? way.

GhostofJohnMuir
Aug 14, 2014

anime is not good

Deceitful Penguin posted:

Jesus is there a single part that isn't lame in this story? The main character doesn't even have a name and this 'Resistance' then just goes: "Welp, we are such utter useless fucks that we will blindly put our faith in a single dude pretty much making up for our complete lack of solid tactics, strategy, leadership, materiel or even a clue at all because we are less competent than the Dashcon organizers". I mean, lol at not even realizing whiny bitch was dead.


What special thing did the main character do other than murder her dad anyway? drat, that must have been a hell of an interview.

Fran: So what are your credentials?
Silent Protagonist: I murdered ur dad lol he was really poo poo at this whole robit fightan
Fran: You are now super hired, gun of the Corporation who works for us now for some reason

edit: I take it back the Chief is p-baller

editedit: also lol at them calling a guy in a robot suit 'strong', yea, u sure are a big strong robot man Mr Main Character!

Honestly I kind of like the story if you take it on the assumption that they're not leaving anything out. The world is a Mad Max hellscape full of marauding bands and feudal city states. You play a psychopathic mercenary who will kill for one side as easily as for the other, working for people who are so desperate for power and resources that they'll hirer anyone, even someone who's killed their family members. Bonds of friendship and family mean little to nothing, with even the closest bonds among comrades causing no sorrow when someone is killed on the battlefield. There's no thought to tactics or strategy, they're relics of a more civilized time. You simply travel the land killing anyone you meet and taking their stuff, in an endless slog of faceless enemies and death to ensure your day to day survival.

Crazy Achmed
Mar 13, 2001

Jesus. So giving machine guns awful scatter and punitively small clip sizes in nexus/LR wasn't enough? I guess it's all about dual-wielding rifles now.

Forget RD, RIP the MG/1000. You shall be fondly remembered, my old friend. :smith:

ACES CURE PLANES
Oct 21, 2010



Crazy Achmed posted:

Jesus. So giving machine guns awful scatter and punitively small clip sizes in nexus/LR wasn't enough? I guess it's all about dual-wielding rifles now.

Forget RD, RIP the MG/1000. You shall be fondly remembered, my old friend. :smith:

Eh, machine guns were on the way out around the time AC3 hit anyways. It started with the RF-160, and though they haven't been quite as hilariously broken as that was, FROM definitely started preferring rifles ever since. MGs definitely needed to be kneecapped after AC1/2 though.

ACES CURE PLANES fucked around with this message at 12:45 on Oct 28, 2014

Tin Tim
Jun 4, 2012

Live by the pun - Die by the pun

Lets just all take a moment and appreciate that RD is dead



Because he was the worst character ever

JohnOfOrdo3
Nov 7, 2011

My other car is an asteroid
:black101:

Tin Tim posted:

Lets just all take a moment and appreciate that RD is dead



Because he was the worst character ever

If you can even call him a character. Which is being very charitable. Actually it would be very charitable to call any of these people characters. The only ones who stands out are Rosie and the Chief. Because they seem to have an emotion in their voice besides "serious"

dis astranagant
Dec 14, 2006

ACES CURE PLANES posted:

Eh, machine guns were on the way out around the time AC3 hit anyways. It started with the RF-160, and though they haven't been quite as hilariously broken as that was, FROM definitely started preferring rifles ever since. MGs definitely needed to be kneecapped after AC1/2 though.

AC3 and SL had some brutally powerful machine guns, especially the MG/800. People only went rifle crazy with part breaking turned on, since they tend to let you luck into crippling your opponent. Let's not forget quads mowing things down with a CNG-300.

dis astranagant fucked around with this message at 16:49 on Oct 28, 2014

ACES CURE PLANES
Oct 21, 2010



The AC3/SL MGs were incredibly powerful, but the RF-160 (and RF-220 if your name happens to be Imori) in particular was so broken that it became the tournament standard on any build, from lightweights to tanks, alongside hi-act missiles. Definitely not something to be written off.

dis astranagant
Dec 14, 2006

And then everyone builds against them so someone overboosts in their face with a LIC-10 :smug:

Agean90
Jun 28, 2008


I 4/4A machine guns were useful thanks to the primal armor mechanic. Plus they were well rounded in general.

Also, I played this game and VDay and im still amazed that they managed to make a game where you can literally kick other robots in the face and make the gameplay kinda dull.

Agean90 fucked around with this message at 17:33 on Oct 28, 2014

ACES CURE PLANES
Oct 21, 2010



dis astranagant posted:

And then everyone builds against them so someone overboosts in their face with a LIC-10 :smug:

Nah, everything was way too mobile. Goddamn though, this conversation makes me wish Naitoh was still around, he had the best match footage. Maybe Nico has something from the last resurgence floating around.

Atlatl
Jan 2, 2008

Art thou doubting
your best bro?
I think they did a good job of adding variety to the high tier weapons list in this one. Part of that is probably just due to the ability to add balance patches, as 4/4A was dominated by high PA penetration laser rifles and VTF missiles up until they got nerfed. In older games there was almost no incentive to not use the MG/1000 or FINGER or whatever they forgot to playtest, and it was too late to do anything about balance once the game was out.

In ACVD medium missiles got hit hard by balance patches so my old staple mech is complete trash now :negative:

Update 9: ffffuucckkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk

pre:
Order 62-65: Downhill From Here
Order 66-68: Ask Jeeves
Order 69-71: Mad at Videogames
Order 72:    Somebody Kill Me (and Regan)

dis astranagant
Dec 14, 2006

ACES CURE PLANES posted:

Nah, everything was way too mobile. Goddamn though, this conversation makes me wish Naitoh was still around, he had the best match footage. Maybe Nico has something from the last resurgence floating around.

Nah, that's actually a thing that happened. Admittedly it was in an FT so the guys actually playing didn't have a lot of time to get used to the ACs.

AtomikKrab
Jul 17, 2010

Keep on GOP rolling rolling rolling rolling.

:allears: Oh man that order mission 72, I knew it was gonna be great from the fact that it was only 1 and the video timer, what exactly happened in run 1? did you like walk into an attack AND get kicked?

Burnsaber
Jan 16, 2011

I'm a wizard and
I don't pee.
I'm a videogame
Perhaps you should channel your frustration in a constructive manner through art and give your eventual tank build one kickin' rad paint job and/or a new emblem that encompasses your emotions.

I just bought this game and I had massive trouble with the order mission 71. I just couldn't get it in the time limit. Once I almost had it but there was one turret remaining with like 500 health :negative:. I just got blinded with all that blue poo poo on the screen and lost direction. Sometimes the scavenger would just get lost somewhere off the field or avoid engagement until the time ran out. I got really salty at that point. Having you beat it in one go reminds me how bad I am at video games.

The hidden easy mode in this game helped me a bunch. Tank leg with dual autocannons is the poo poo bro. You just kind glide to scene, get a lock on and hit R2 and L2 until things stop moving and then just roll over their burning corpses giving no fucks. Man there really should be a customization option to get sunglasses on your mech.

The last story mission was also ordeal for me. Can't wait to see you get it at one go and destroy my self-esteem.

Atlatl
Jan 2, 2008

Art thou doubting
your best bro?
Spoiler alert: I break down in the next update and go with dual autocannons, partly out of giving up, partly to showcase how tanks are actually good now. I should definitely change up the paint though. I'll likely just do the remainder of the story missions with the tank because of all the tunnelfighting, then go to a speedrun build to finish the Zodiac missions.

As for order 72, that was a one-shot kick. Those legs actually do that much charge damage.

wiegieman
Apr 22, 2010

Royalty is a continuous cutting motion


Why do they all talk up the helicopter pilots when they do literally nothing? Is it a Japan thing?

Deceitful Penguin
Feb 16, 2011

Atlatl posted:

Would it worry you to know that this game is probably the most sensible out of the entire series?
Things I know about Armoured Core:

1) If you gently caress up enough in some games they turn you into a cyborg or something.
2) There's AIs and they're got at Robot Fightan also sometimes called 8 Ball or something
3) In one of them you get to play Genocidal War Criminal and everyone hates you for it
4) You gotta pay for repairs and ammo and it's Japanese as gently caress

Honestly, with that I don't know what I expected but not, uh, that.

Also please try out your glorious blade from the last story mission to show how a true Robot Samurai battles his foes. And if you need a new paint scheme, why not go with knife-pony, to keep with the theme?

GhostofJohnMuir posted:

Honestly I kind of like the story if you take it on the assumption that they're not leaving anything out. The world is a Mad Max hellscape full of marauding bands and feudal city states. You play a psychopathic mercenary who will kill for one side as easily as for the other, working for people who are so desperate for power and resources that they'll hirer anyone, even someone who's killed their family members. Bonds of friendship and family mean little to nothing, with even the closest bonds among comrades causing no sorrow when someone is killed on the battlefield. There's no thought to tactics or strategy, they're relics of a more civilized time. You simply travel the land killing anyone you meet and taking their stuff, in an endless slog of faceless enemies and death to ensure your day to day survival.
So, malnutrition and radiation has left them all with sub-human intellects and stunted physical growth, hence we never see a living human being.

That's not a bad idea and would explain why everyone involved except the AIs seem phenomenally retarded.

Crazy Achmed
Mar 13, 2001

dis astranagant posted:

AC3 and SL had some brutally powerful machine guns, especially the MG/800. People only went rifle crazy with part breaking turned on, since they tend to let you luck into crippling your opponent. Let's not forget quads mowing things down with a CNG-300.
Come to think of it, the chainguns also mysteriously became crazy inaccurate in nexus/LR... My non-MG build in SL was quad rifles - one in each hand and two in EOs. Stunlocked the hell out of anything lighter than a tank. :madmax:

So Atlatl, thanks for demonstrating those substandard parts for us. Were those spread missiles you tried out the closest to worthwhile that exist in ACV? If so then that's a sad state of affairs. Launching a shitload of missiles was always one of the fun parts of AC games for me, whether it was the 6-lock-max small missile unit that's been in like every game up to LR, or the 5-shot-burst micro launcher (off a single lock, no less!) from Nexus onwards.

I can also see why laserblades aren't worth a drat anymore. It looks like they don't stun on hit like the used to, is that correct? So unless you sneak up on someone from behind with one, you're guaranteed to get counter-kicked in the face every single time. :rip: oldschool, indeed.

I am now frightened to ask - has the deployable grenade launcher survived? Although I guess it was nigh useless in all the other games (hilariously slow to deploy and lock on, tiny lock box), but it's one of the series' signature weapons...

Atlatl
Jan 2, 2008

Art thou doubting
your best bro?
Two or three more updates after this. After Order 83 I just have to fight Gemini I/II, Scorpius, and Cancer. Those might take some time.

There aren't really the deployable GLs of old in this game. There are deployable CE cannons but they don't have the gigantic AoE associated with them. Howitzers do, but they don't lock on and you need to lob them in to a target, making them useless for everything but a few singleplayer fights. GLs in 4/4A were very good, but that was mostly just because they actually locked fast (everything had the same lock-box based on FCS) and they could stun you for years on end.

Deceitful Penguin posted:

Also please try out your glorious blade from the last story mission to show how a true Robot Samurai battles his foes. And if you need a new paint scheme, why not go with knife-pony, to keep with the theme?

That's not a bad idea and would explain why everyone involved except the AIs seem phenomenally retarded.

I had already recorded up to the last story mission before you posted this so we're going with what we've got so I don't have to waste more of my life in the emblem editor. Or this game.

the AI are just as dumb as everyone else

Update 9: Slow Ride

gently caress strategy
pre:
Order 73-76: The Arena
Order 77-80: Mailing it In
Paintshop 3: My Love For You Is Like A Truck

Seraphic Neoman
Jul 19, 2011


Tin Tim posted:

Never thought I'd see the day, but here we are. A robit game with a plot that's weaker than in Front Mission Evolved :downs:

When you get past the grimark atmosphere, most AC games are like this. You are a mercenary pawn taking missions from faceless megacorps. Your actions have little consequence and in the end the status quo remains intact. The gameplay, the insane attention to details and the small plot snippets is what keeps people interested in this series.

AC4A arguably has the best story, and it's honestly fairly blah. And the endings are as follows:
1) Status quo remains intact
2) You kill an absolute shitton of people resulting in humanity's extinction
3) You kill only most people on the planet and escape into space.

Seraphic Neoman fucked around with this message at 03:24 on Oct 30, 2014

ACES CURE PLANES
Oct 21, 2010



Honestly, I still enjoy the grand unified theory of AC plotlines, being that the games are all just circular, with civilizations blowing themselves up with lost technology, going underground/to Mars to recover, rebuilding enough to discover/create powerful weapons, and blowing themselves up again. It's obviously not intended, but it's fun to think about to add a little something to the otherwise sparse plot.

ACES CURE PLANES fucked around with this message at 20:19 on Oct 29, 2014

Atlatl
Jan 2, 2008

Art thou doubting
your best bro?
The 4A murder ending is wonderful and has the hypest final mission out of any AC game, especially on hard mode.

Old King = best king

Update 10: The Non-End

The extra bit is from when I was replaying this game for the first time in awhile on stream. My condolences to those who (for some reason) thought they'd get an ending.

Sindai
Jan 24, 2007
i want to achieve immortality through not dying
These games look like something I'd play the poo poo out of if the story missions were better and the weapons not so unbalanced. How unfortunate.

7c Nickel
Apr 27, 2008
I had thought they were telegraphing RD's betrayal pretty heavily, but I guess low expectations fooled me into accepting his death.

Positronic Spleen
May 5, 2010

7c Nickel posted:

I had thought they were telegraphing RD's betrayal pretty heavily, but I guess low expectations fooled me into accepting his death.
The game wasn't just foreshadowing, it literally tells you via subtitles at the beginning of the game, remember?

I can't believe that was it, the story had less substance than Project Phantasma. Everyone dies, no moral (plenty of platitudes, though).

AtomikKrab
Jul 17, 2010

Keep on GOP rolling rolling rolling rolling.

Obligate one shot kills weapons are dumb as all gently caress. Oh welp, you die no matter what your build/starting armor.

dis astranagant
Dec 14, 2006

Yeah, but they just had to give it some super blades since it's mission 9.

dis astranagant fucked around with this message at 02:54 on Oct 30, 2014

MaterialConceptual
Jan 18, 2011

"It is rather that precisely in that which is newest the face of the world never alters, that this newest remains, in every aspect, the same. - This constitutes the eternity of hell."

-Walter Benjamin, "The Arcades Project"
Well that was a low effort plot indeed. Is Verdict Day's just as bad?

SIGSEGV
Nov 4, 2010


ACVD is mostly about putting a few things that'll remind the player of AC4 and AC4A, also known as when AC was really good but it is also about not being there yet.

AtomikKrab
Jul 17, 2010

Keep on GOP rolling rolling rolling rolling.

Yeah honestly, these are the most incompetent ai ever. They really failed on the single player part. I mean there are not even any doors with fun stuff/hordes of enemies that will immediately shoot you in the face in an ambush, just... tunnels and exploding terrain.


Overall the maps don't feel like actual places, but rather well maps? for people to fight on in mp?

SIGSEGV
Nov 4, 2010


The SP lacks character, The briefings in AC4A were wonderful and the variation in maps instead of always fighting in the same maps made the game seem a lot bigger than it was. Also it would make more sense if they took the time to make people speak the right bits so there's at least something to understand.

I have to say the lack of a radar screen is a bit annoying, they could have kept it and made enemies appear on radar only if you had line of sight and beat a radar strength and range to ECM and distance ratio, they probably tried but as it is it feels like a mechanic was bolted on top of the game in a not entirely convincing way. Maybe some C3 functions? As it is it messes with my situational awareness and also annoys me when I get close to the borders of the map.

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Atlatl
Jan 2, 2008

Art thou doubting
your best bro?
I don't mind the lack of radar since almost every map has fairly dense cover and it rewards teamwork. You can tell they were trying to figure out how to make city fights more frantic, and they actually succeeded quite well. It just doesn't work out in singleplayer because the AI can't take advantage of sneaking around as well as players. Most of the C3 stuff isn't prominent in SP since you need an operator and other people dropping probes to really make it effective.

If these were huge open maps like in 4/4A then yeah, no radar would've been stupid.

MaterialConceptual posted:

Well that was a low effort plot indeed. Is Verdict Day's just as bad?

Possibly worse? I'm not really sure since it's hard to rank plots past a certain level of nonsense. At least in Verdict Day you get a cool badguy monologue as voiced by a transformer and get to see how massive the things from 4/4A were.

In reality none of the AC games really have much of plot and we probably just choose to remember the cool stuff from way back when. I think we can all agree that 4A is likely the best of series, but I went back and played 4 recently and holy poo poo is that a bad game. It's bad. I had really fond memories of it and still thought it was painful.

Positronic Spleen posted:

The game wasn't just foreshadowing, it literally tells you via subtitles at the beginning of the game, remember?

I actually blocked out the subtitles there, unless I missed one and spoiled it. Not that it's much of a twist.

AtomikKrab posted:

Yeah honestly, these are the most incompetent ai ever. They really failed on the single player part. I mean there are not even any doors with fun stuff/hordes of enemies that will immediately shoot you in the face in an ambush, just... tunnels and exploding terrain.

Overall the maps don't feel like actual places, but rather well maps? for people to fight on in mp?

Almost every space is basically a repurposed multiplayer map, yeah. At the same time, gently caress doors forever and good riddance. I hope to never see any more in these games. Room ambushes have no purpose but to soften up the player in order to increase the difficulty of a later fight.

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