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PS3 | Action | Armored Core 4

Boxart for Armored Core 4
Armored Core 4 11 screen shots
  • GRAPHICS: 3.00
  • SOUND: 3.00
  • CONTROL: 3.50
  • FUN FACTOR 2.50
  • AVG USER SCORE 2.3
  • AVG CRITIC SCORE 3.2

Review: Armored Core 4

Review by The Watcher | 03/21/2007 | 13:39:24 PM PST

Armored Core 4 is a disappointment to mech fans everywhere because the game does such a poor job of recreating the thrill of tooling around in a 100-ton death dealing behemoth.

The mechs are highly customizable--a franchise hallmark--but the environments are sparse and the gameplay experience itself feels ultimately soulless.

Mechanical Missteps

Harsh words, I know, but after so many entries in the series, you'd expect that someone would figure out how to make a decent Armored Core game. Sega had to know that releasing the game on the PS3 would raise expectations but the title fails to live up to even current standards. The visuals manage to push quite a few more polys than its predecessors, and the mechanized Cores themselves are detailed and convincing enough, but a pretty face can't make up for the shallowness of the overall game.

What's odd is that the game is, in some ways, far more complicated than it needed to be. The plot is cryptic and never fully fleshed out and the menu layout is so archaic and frustratingly unintuitive that only the most masochistic of players will bother to trudge through the process of upgrading and customizing their mech. Of course, given the pedigree of the Armored Core franchise, this should probably come as no surprise.

Those issues alone would have been enough to condemn the game to mediocrity, or worse, but they don't stop there. The missions are repetitive and the maps are far too small. Because of this, you'll find yourself playing for short spurts of 5-10 minutes only to face more loading screens as you wait to choose your next short-lived mission. That is not my definition of fun--what about you?

Since I feel like I've beaten the proverbial dead horse, I'll say something nice about the game: its controls are surprisingly decent. They are complicated, but once you master them, your mech will be doing cartwheels in no time. Okay, that's an exaggeration but you get my point. Ultimately, Armored Core 4 offers only an empty experience that's as lifeless as the cold metal contraptions that star in the game.

Find more of GamePro.com's reviews at our Reviews Index!


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