Armored Core VI Fires of Rubicon, the long-awaited next game in the FromSoftware series that most definitely isn’t a Soulslike, dropped its first gameplay trailer on April 27. The trailer comes along with an official release date: August 25 of this year.
This is the first new release in the Armored Core franchise in over a decade (Armored Core 5 released in 2012), so, naturally, fans have been waiting for more details since it was announced at last year’s Game Awards. The three-minute-long trailer that dropped is the first glimpse of what to expect from its the third-person mecha gameplay, from fast-paced firefights full of missiles and explosions to the surprisingly lithe movements of the massive mech you’ll be piloting.
“Think giant, heavily equipped robots with the ability to zip around across ground and air, reacting at lightning-fast speeds to attacks and threats while trying to one-up dangerous foes with even more firepower at their disposal,” the official PlayStation blog post reads. I’m in.
Expect extensive customization and boss fights worth of a FromSoftware game, as well, if the giant Dune-looking mecha sandworm and huge spider-like robot are any indication.
“There will be missions where you’re fighting across sweeping battlefields–very combat-oriented,” game director Masaru Yamamura says in the PS blog. “But you’ll sometimes be recovering data logs from wreckage and doing other side objectives too.”
A new feature coming to Armored Core VI is Assault Boost, an “instantaneous switch between long-range gunfighting and close melee.” This will help you get up close and personal fast to some metal beasties, while also letting you chain abilities to pull off some ridiculous maneuvers.
If you’re curious as to how that will compare to other games in the franchise, Yamamura has you covered: “The average movement speed across the game is somewhere between Armored Core III and Armored Core V. But Armored Core VI has been developed to bolster the changes of tempo and combat...[it] can often reach the dizzying heights of say, Armored Core IV.”
The official Fires of Rubicon page offers some more insight on what to expect from the game’s plot:
A mysterious new substance was discovered on the remote planet, Rubicon 3. As an energy source, this substance was expected to dramatically advance humanity’s technological and communications capabilities. Instead, this substance caused a catastrophe that engulfed the planet and the surrounding stars in flames and storms, forming a Burning Star System.
Almost half a century later, the same substance resurfaced on Rubicon 3, a planet now contaminated and sealed off by the catastrophe.
Extra-terrestrial corporations and resistance groups fight over control of the substance. The player infiltrates Rubicon 3 as an independent mercenary and finds themselves in a struggle over the substance with the corporations and other factions.
Welp, all aboard the Armored Core VI hype train. The game drops for PlayStation, Xbox, and PC on August 25. You can pre-order it right now.