One of the worst mech games I have played in a long time.
Now Armored Core 4 has been released on the 360, and I was hoping it would bring new love to one of my favorite genres. Unfortunately, it falls flat, and to be honest, I'd rather play Chromehounds.
GAMEPLAY
Where to start? The good part is that the mechs in AC4 are much faster, and more responsive than in Chromehounds. But that's about it. Targeting is a huge pain in the ass. It's very difficult, if not impossible to target specific enemies within a group. Therefore, if you want to take out a mech that's surrounded by tanks or helicopters, you need to take most of the weaker enemies out before you can target the real threat.
Although you can customize your mechs, I highly recommend against it because the GUI is so bad. You often times can't tell what type of weapon you're assigning, and weather or not it will be useful in the current mission. Then once you're in the game it's difficult to tell what weapon you're using without firing it, as there's no GUI to say what weapon it is other than the ammo count for it.
The story is barely coherent. Maybe you need to have played the earlier AC games, but if you're new to the series, don't expect to understand anything about the story. It's presented in such abstract cut-scenes that you often have no idea if the narrator is talking about the game, or what he had for lunch. This leads to unclear mission objectives, and frequent replaying of missions that were failed due to having no idea what's going on.
On top of all this, the mission levels are tiny, and over quickly. One mission early in the game had me fly down a sewer type tunnel, and blow up 2 mechs at the other end. That's it! 10 seconds and the mission was over before I knew it. It took longer to load the mission and listen to the "objectives" than it did to finish it.
GRAPHICS
The videos on the web looked halfway decent, and that's what probably made me try out AC4. But in practice, the visuals are sub-par for 360 standards. Again, on the positive side it's fast-paced, and has nice blur effects. But the textures are terrible. Mechs lack any kind of detail, or markings. Good thing you aren't fighting along side teammates, because all the mechs are grey and feature-less. It's nearly impossible to tell mechs from the surrounding buildings except for the red targeting diamond.
Environments are also bland, and uninteresting. You'll frequently be playing in the same cities and battlefields over and over again. Just fighting different enemies. As mentioned above, the GUI is also terrible. It's difficult to tell what options are available, and further removes the player from the game.
SOUND
Again, not up to 360 standards. Many of the weapons sound the same, and forgettable. Music is like-wise bland, and forgettable when you do notice it. The voice-overs aren't' bad, but the dialogue is so abstract that it's difficult to tell what's happening, or what needs to be done. Add to this the fact that your "mission operator," for lack of a better term, will frequently relay non-essential, or trivial information to you during a mission. I can't tell you how many times I heard her say, "you're leaving the mission area!"
VALUE
I know there's a good game somewhere underneath all the problems with AC4, but I can't seem to find it. This game needs a lot of help, and feels terribly rushed. The achievements are heavily one-sided to the single player game, and most involve something called data packs. I have no idea what this is, and didn't care to find out. There's also a multiplayer mode via Xbox Live. I wasn't impressed with the single player game, so I had no desire to even bother with multiplayer.
I'm sure fans of the series are going to like this game, but if you're not already familiar with the franchise you'll want to make a pass on this game. The Gamespot review said the game was made more accessible to new players, but I found the game to be boring and a chore to play. There aren't many mech games on the 360, but the ones that are available way out class Armored Core 4.