Highlights

  • Armored Core 6: Fires of Rubicon is a distinct game with its own identity and gameplay, separate from FromSoftware's Soulslike formula.
  • The differences between Armored Core and Soulslike games are fundamental, including the player's sense of power and the thematic relevance of the armored cores.
  • The Surge games offer a middle ground between Dark Souls and Armored Core, providing a blend of mech action and deliberate combat, which may deter FromSoftware from creating a mech-focused Soulslike game.

When Armored Core 6: Fires of Rubicon was first revealed, many unfamiliar with the series may have expected FromSoftware to release a game that followed the formula of the company's Soulslikes. However, those fans would soon come to find out that Armored Core is a long-running series with its own distinct identity and gameplay fundamentals that FromSoftware has been working on since long before Demon's Souls. While the idea of an Armored Core-style game with Soulslike foundations may sound appealing, there's a good chance it will never happen.

The Dark Souls games and its spiritual successors follow a very particular template, despite their many differences. Of course, they are characterized by their at-times extreme difficulty, but more specifically, they are designed to make the player feel severely underpowered, especially at the start of the game. While many games will pit players against enemies and bosses that are either at or above their character's power level, Soulslike games take every opportunity to put the player at a disadvantage. Many of the trends of FromSoftware games stem from this philosophy, from the slow-paced combat to the interconnected, dense level design.

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Why an Armored Core Soulslike Wouldn't Work

Armored Core 6-2

Armored Core Is Fundamentally Different from Souls Games

While Soulslikes are built around making the character feel small and powerless, games like Armored Core 6: Fires of Rubicon almost take the opposite approach. The player controls a ten-meter-tall mech, with a wealth of incredibly powerful machine guns, laser weapons, and explosives at their disposal. These games can certainly still be difficult, but the player is supposed to feel powerful, and it would be hard to make them feel weak or insignificant given the circumstances.

The differences between Armored Core and Dark Souls -style gameplay go beyond just combat; the level design, movement mechanics, and general pacing are all wildly different between the two franchises.

Players can make incredibly powerful builds in Armored Core, but the differences between the Armored Core franchise and Soulslikes go beyond just gameplay. The Armored Core series is about many things, but one of its core themes is related to the horrors of far-future advancement, where corporate greed and a disregard for extraterrestrial ecosystems can turn planets into hellish battlegrounds. The armored cores themselves serve to support this theme, as they represent how far humanity can go when it comes to creating tools for destruction. If these armored cores were powered down, or used for slow and methodical combat wherein the player can be killed with just one or two quick hits, it would undermine their thematic relevance.

The Surge Franchise Fills The Niche

It may not have the in-depth customization of Armored Core or the FromSoftware label, but The Surge games live somewhere in the middle of Dark Souls and Armored Core, and are likely the closest players will get to a blend of the two franchises for the time being. In The Surge, players don't control a typical mech but rather a human with auxiliary mechanized attachments which make him stronger. Most of the threats the player is up against are close to their power level, which helps keep the games challenging. Meanwhile, the restraint from going full mech lets The Surge retain the deliberate combat of a typical Soulslike game. FromSoftware likely wouldn't want to be seen as playing second fiddle to another franchise, considering the developer's reputation for setting trends, so The Surge may well be another deterrent when it comes to a mech-focused Soulslike.

FromSoftware is working on multiple new projects, so anything is possible; players could very well get their hands on a game that combines the mech action of Armored Core with the Soulslike formula, but it seems unlikely. Moreover, both Armored Core 6: Fires of Rubicon and the more traditional Soulslikes by FromSoftware are successful and realize their artistic visions, so there's not much reason to combine the two.