Firstly, I'm a huge fan of the armoured core series and I feel that if you don't like building giant robots, arming them to the teeth with missiles and lasers then there's something wrong with you. Now I'll start with the good points: The quick boost. Thats it. Out of the whole game this is the only feature thats any good.
The new targeting system could be good but it doesn't look like they thought about it very much. Pressing L3 to lock on doesn't lock on, it makes a little window appear with a picture of what your aiming at in it. Not a bad idea but as target lock keeps swinging off to look at something else or simply refuses to lock onto what your looking at even if its the only thing in front of you it s pretty pointless.
The targeting reticule isn't clear you cant tell whether your locked on or not and whats the deal with missiles now. Being able to fire them without locking on I don't have a problem with but the old way of keeping the target in sight while the system locks on successive missiles was great. Maybe having direct control over how many missiles you lock on upto the max would be a good idea.
Being able to boost indefinately on the ground isn't a good move either, part of AC is managing your energy and being able to boost forever is a bit to much like cheating for my likes.
The energy bar itself is too small and unclear.
Jumping is also a lot harder. On previous games you can boost along the ground and then by tapping the boost button again, jump into the air. On AC4 most of the time you have to stop moving jump into the air and then carry on moving. If your in the air, falling for example, you can't move around unless you boost and when you do that its really difficult to land where you want to.
The Primal Armour I don't really have a problem with although no one seems to have put much thought into that either. I've read on some forums that you can make yourself invincible to all but a few weapons. While I haven't verified that, primal armour should only reduce the damage you take and maybe block low caliber weapons depending upon its strength. When the primal armour is deactivated you take a lot more damage than in the other games.
The missions are too short. I completed the game in two days and I didn't spend the whole of those two days playing Armoured Core. Part of the fun was exploring environments not having to rush through everything. They could have put a few more missions in as well.
The briefings have also changed for the worse. you used to be able to read the briefing and then decide whether or not to take the mission, now you accept the mission with no idea of what you will face or which parts will be required.
The briefings themselves aren't much good. The same voice does them all, you never find out who she is, she just whines about her father once or twice and then at the end of the game the male narrating voice says you hook up with her. No explanation of any kind.
The story is almost non existent. It mentions kojima particles are used with primal armour. Thats it. No mention of what they are, where they come from or how they work.
The archive menu in The Last Raven had lots of info on everything in the game. Including something like that isn't too difficult and adds a lot of depth and enjoyment. Its a shame they couldn't be bothered to add something like that to AC4.
I know AC is more about action than story but they made a good effort with the other games and AC4 just seems to have random bits of story that make no sense.
AC2 was one of the best for briefings with the different voices for different people.
getting mail from people the operator and companies as well as other ravens was a good feature but that doesn't seem to have made it into AC4 either. I particularly like the mails from other ravens as you progress in the arena in AC2.
While we're on the subject of arena's whats happened to it. Again AC2 had the best arena system, being able to challenge your way up. What they did in AC3 I thought was a step down from AC2 but i can see the logic in it so I wasn't too upset but the system in AC4 is rubbish.
The arena locations weren't very good, the VR locations were just crap. As for the others they could have done with a bit more imagination.
Now for the hundreds of parts, most of them are boosters and stabilsers. Being able to equip four different sets of boosters was quite a good idea however I'm not sure about the over boost one, That should come with the core.
Stabilisers, again I was looking forward to this but after spending a while setting them up I couldn't tell any difference. There is an auto function to do it for you but the amount of stabiliser parts seems to have replaced other stuff like heads, arms, legs, cores, weapons, extentions and there aren't any inside parts anymore. There are no exceed orbit cores. I don't know about you but I loved them in the other games.
There isn't as much variety in weapons, Am I the only person who liked the energy machine gun from AC2. I know it was awkward using it but it was still good. The next game should have a couple of them at least.
Schematics what the hell are they about. every couple of missions I do when I go back add new parts to my mech it says the schematic has changed do I want to overwrite it or make a new one. Being able to build an enemy AC is fun and having a list of all the parts makes it easier but the whole schematics thing is complicated and unpleasant.
The shop doesn't exist anymore. You put stuff on then exit then pay for it. You can press a button to sell things but there is no garage like the other games where you can see everything you own and put your robot together. Ac4 has all the parts in the same menu, bits you own mixed with bits you don't.
The heads don't seem to come with radars, night vision or any of the sensors that they had in previous games and nor do the back radars.
Ammo can sometimes be a problem and the extra ammo back parts were a life saver. Then they improved this with extra magazines as an extension. Then in AC4 they didn't bother.
There are no missile interceptors either. You can can flares but not the missile or laser interceptors from previous games which were a lot better than flares.
Some of the weapons and other parts don't look very good. When I'm flying about blowing the hell out of everything, I like to do it with a nice robot, Thats part of the fun of building them, something that looks good and kicks ass.
The values and statistics for the parts aren't as clear as they used to be and it takes the fun out of putting everything together and fun is the whole point of the game, or at least thats what I thought. AC4 feels like a chore rather than a game.
I looked forward to completing The Last Raven again and again to get all the missions and secret parts but I can't bring myself to play AC4 again. I completed it once and haven't touched it since.
When you start and set up the controller you can choose an auto boost option which stops you from sinking if you land on water. Now, this sounds like a good idea until you realise that the only reason it's there is because there are more than a few missions that have you boosting around on the water. This is just an extra feature to try and make the game seem less crap but it fails miserably just like the rest of the game.
In AC Silent Line (a brilliant game) you could choose to change the view so you see from the operators view, inside the core. This was only in Silent Line even though it great idea. It added new depth. It was a bit awkward at first but you get used to it and it makes you feel closer to the action. You don't have to pick that view, you can have the standard view but theres nothing wrong with a bit of choice.
The developers don't seem to have put much thought into AC4 they seemed to preoccupied with showing off the new fancy graphics, which weren't that impressive, and a host of rubbish new features that make this game not only the worst of the Armoured Core series but one of the worst games of all time. They're gonna have to do one hell of a job on the next AC game for me to spend £50!!! on it. I found AC4 for £15 on play.co.uk but if I'd payed £50 for it I'd be REALLY pissed off with them.

I too feel AC was dumb downed a bit, but you could also think of it as AC's are getting more advanced and with it, can do things the old AC's can do. I do like the increased speed, I haven't seen that kind of speed since Master of Arena. Shooting both back weapons is awesome, multi-directional turning is good too.

The part values are different, but they're not that hard to grasp. My only gripe is that the designs are so visually different, that part swapping from various companies, the AC doesn't look cohesive. Instead it looks like a franken-AC due to all the unique looks.

Just think of it like you're playing a super Nine-ball. His AC flew all over the damn place, shot missiles on the move without locking and lasers.

i completely agree on both counts and last raven rocked it really dosn't make sence to put in such little effort on the first version of the game for a new system as you heavily risk losing both your target audience and your loyal followers ... having said that i went back to playing last raven recently and i've again had the same problem as last time . i've finished every path except zinaida's which is a problem cause all i want is the python so i can recreate the opening movie ac . i need help ..... desparately . dose anyone have any usefull tips as i've have tried everything you can think of . i even caved at one and looked in to getting a cheat device just for the sake of getting the part but on the count of living in australia cheats aren't even avalible and i don't know anyone who's finished the game to copy the file off . if anyone can think of a fix my problem let me know

I loved Silent Line and bought this game without a second thought, expecting it to be pretty much the same game on the 360. Well, how wrong was I? I can't get to grips with the game, everything feels so different and the customizing seems completely revamped? Anyway, I'll probably be selling this soon, or trying to.

i agree. ive been a huge fan of the series ever since it first came out on PSX, but i was totally ashamed by this title. it was an EPIC FAIL. one of the biggest flaws that PULSAR seemed to have missed that pissed me off is, where the hell is the HUD? its virtually non existent and i didnt see any way to make it more detailed. what kind of crap is that? the HUD was full of important information about your AC and everything around you.

Last Raven is still the best.

This message was edited by Shinobi_razor on Sep 20 2008.

Armored Core: for Answer.
I don't know if this is good news or bad but a new game 'Armored Core: for Answer' is coming out soon. It's been out in Japan since March. According to some ubi soft poll (Ubi soft made this one) it scored less than AC4 but it's supposedly very different. So here's hoping that it's an improvement!

FROMSOFTWARE makes all the AC titles.

The other companies (Agetec, Sega, Ubisoft) only translated them for distribution in North America.