Armored Core: Last Raven

released on Aug 04, 2005

Two powerful groups, the Alliance and the Vertex, are fighting for world dominance and victory hinges upon the "Raven" pilots. You are a Raven, an elite mech warrior who must choose sides between the fighting powers. Ravens face the ultimate decision in the fight for survival, either to fiercely defend their chosen side or fight alone and face the wrath of all Ravens.


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I'm glad you were here with me. Here at the end of all things, Zinaida.

When it became official that I had gone insane and was going to Play Every Armored Core, I knew Last Raven had to be the last one. On top of being thematically the end of an era, it is by reputation the hardest game in the series, or depending on who you ask, the hardest FromSoftware game ever. I made the right choice, because this was an incredible note on which to end my idiotic nerd ass journey.

First things first: I think the difficulty is somewhat overhyped. I could be wrong; they say Nine Breaker, piece of shit that it is, is supposed to legitimately teach you how to play Armored Core properly. Maybe it actually worked. Maybe I'm good at video games now. Either way, Last Raven is definitely hard, but for my money, if you know how to counterbuild there are only a few really extreme spikes. It's not a grueling game. For my money.

More importantly, it's just, fuck. FUCK, this game is good. It further refines Nexus's big mechanical changes and then gives you drastically better material to engage with them. The mission design here is just about peak; there are a limited number of maps and it pulls that Another Age trick of having multiple missions where you're on different sides of what is clearly the same incident, but the map design is great (mostly), the scenarios are rich and varied and keep you guessing, and the pacing is airtight.

Combat itself is also incredible. This is my favorite arena in the series; I beat most fights in one or two tries but they were brutal, exciting tries. The AI behaves differently in Last Raven than in most games, but I don't know if I should say it's smarter or slightly dumber. Enemy Ravens have preferred strategies, are aggressive yet reactive to what you're doing, and generally seem to behave more logically--which can make them more predictable, in a good way. They're not pushovers (infamously, every single one of them has Human Plus/OP-INTENSIFY effects even though the player can't get those in this game), but beating one really feels like you're outsmarting a rival.

In general, the level of polish and depth on display here is as much what makes it natural Grand Finale material as anything. There's such a sense of completeness to Last Raven; every game that came before it was study material, and this is the exam. It's oldgen Armored Core in its most evolved form. There's a sense that something has been perfected, not in the sense that it's totally without flaws but in that it's realized its full potential at being what it is. It gives you kind of an insight into why AC4 was such a huge shift in direction; where the hell else would you go from here?

The story is kind of gonzo (affectionate), if only because of the structure. This is the first game in the series with multiple endings, and the one with the largest number at six (or seven, depending on what you count). The way this works is: a single playthrough is only between ten and fifteen missions long, you're choosing between several mission options at almost every stage, and there's an absurdly intricate and totally invisible pathing system in which previous mission choices dictate future options, eventually locking you into an ending.

Use a guide. You can get your first ending blind if you want (I did), but if your goal is to find everything yourself I do not know how long it's gonna take you. This is all paired with the ridiculous (affectionate) premise that the game, representing about a dozen discrete fully organized combat missions carried out by a single person, takes place over the course of 24 hours--you know, like that TV show. What was it called again?

This wacky progression structure is a double-edged sword, though; I consider it both one of the many good things about the game and probably the worst thing. It's a type of ambitious jank I tend to love and respect, but it must be said that on top of playing through six times for the six endings, according to the guide I'm using it takes at least another four to complete all missions, which is the requirement for unlocking a sort of EX Boss that I very much intend to get to. It's a short game, but ten runs is pushing it, especially considering how many times you have to repeat certain missions to get to the new ones.

In a lot of ways I was surprised by how forgiving Last Raven is, considering the reputation. As in Nexus before it, it's honestly quite difficult to lose money on a mission; even if you barely survive, most payouts are going to be larger than expenses on the order of a full digit or even two. Nexus's tuning mechanic no longer costs you anything, either. The upshot is that if you're importing a save and getting a head start on collecting parts, you will have more money than you could possibly spend at pretty much all times.

This is important context for the parts damage mechanic you may have heard of, in which it's actually possible for parts of your AC to be permanently destroyed so that you have to buy replacements; with how rich you are, this is not a major concern. And frankly it's very rare anyway; you have to be VERY near death, and even then it's far from a guarantee that a particular body part will have taken enough hits. The mechanic is more of a funny curiosity; it's kind of hilarious to get out of a really clutch fight and see the default legs on your AC in the garage.

That said, when the game decides to get really hard it does get really hard. A lot of people wholeheartedly advise you to give yourself an approximation of Human Plus with cheat codes; if every enemy is using it, why not level the playing field, right? I definitely don't blame or judge anyone who decides to do that, but I was having a good enough time that I didn't want to. The final boss of the sixth route, the most notorious fight in the game, almost broke me. Part of what stopped me is that it seemed so impossible at first that I wasn't sure how much H+ would even help.

But it was, unironically, a skill issue; I wasted a lot of time overthinking what build would be best, but I ended up literally just doing it with double rifles. All you need for Zinaida is patient, defensive play, good movement fundamentals, and Execution. Can't relate to people who get tilted at her. I for one love to see a girlboss win.

Armored Core: Last Raven is absolutely one of the best games in the series. I can't recommend it enough, but it's definitely worth playing at least through the rest of gen 3 first. The whole experience is designed to be an Ending, so make it a satisfying one.

Good work, Ravens. Let's head back.

Al principio odiaba este juego y probablemente sea el más difícil de la saga pero cuando fallas una misión en vez de cabreate y dropearlo te sientas con tu robot a ver el hermoso cielo de una noche estrellada y hablas con él sobre el significado de vuestra existencia (que no sólo la tuya, no seas egoísta; sus pensamientos y experiencias de vida tienen tanto peso como las tuyas y deberías aprender de ellas también) obtienes una nueva perspectiva muy curiosa que te hace ver las cosas de otra manera y no se hace tan duro. Recomendadísimo

Shadow The Hedgehog if it was good

You couldn't ask for much better as a finale for the PS2 Armored Core games, at least from a mechanical perspective anyway. Last Raven takes the heavy rebalancing done from Nexus and rebalances it all yet again, making the overheating system a little more lenient and once again adjusting old and adding new parts to try and retool things one last time. Is it the perfect iteration of AC balance? Honestly no idea, I'll leave that discussion up to the hardcore multiplayer guys.

Beyond the additions though this game features vastly improved enemy AI, easily the most aggressive and dangerous the series has seen so far. Mission design is eager to show this off too as the stages here are among the most challenging From has put together for the series, with numerous multi-AC fights, surprise ambushes and other tricks up their sleeve. If you managed to fumble your way through the previous games by the skin of your teeth then Last Raven will absolutely humble you. It's a game that demands you understand these mechanics on more than just a surface level if you want to survive (either that or look up the cheesiest builds online and pray you get lucky).

Coming from the very breezy Nexus this is a huge jump in what it asks and it took me some time to adjust, but ultimately I found the challenge to be refreshing. It encouraged me to try out a variety of different builds and strategies, to finally master bunny-hopping and boost jumping on more than just a surface level, and to all around just put everything I had learned from playing the series so far to the test. It was a great time. And if From Software knew this would be their final game in this style then it absolutely made sense to push the game mechanics to their limit.

Even when stages don't involve fighting enemy ACs they usually offer some degree of challenge. There's almost no filler here, something that the previous game Nexus, for as much as I liked it, was full of. The game's high level of challenge can also be taxing too, so maybe be smarter than me and don't do an entire playthrough in one sitting if you start to get frustrated.

While Last Raven has the usual assortment of missions which diverge based on which jobs you take (and in some cases even how well you complete them) the way they're presented marks a huge tonal shift. The game takes place in just a single day as Alliance (comprised of the major organizations from the previous few games) and Vertex, an organized terrorist force, prepare to go to war with one another. With each mission you complete the clock ticks down slowly toward the final battle. This constant reminder of the impending end really helps to sell the darker tone that Last Raven goes for.

There's no levity here, something the game makes clear from its intro. There is no retreat of friendly duels with other pilots as most missions see you eliminating your fellow Ravens in brutal fashion. Probably more than half of the total missions here are hit jobs against other pilots. And while the arena is back in form (after the less than stellar version in Nexus) it is now relegated to a VR sim, enforcing that there's now time for leisure or pleasantries as the clock counts down.

The branching path system that originated all the way back in Armored Core 1 finally sees innovation in this game. Last Raven sports several endings depending on which choices you make over the course of the game. These decisions will open or close various paths and do so in a (mostly) natural feeling way, although there are some well-hidden branches. As someone who had been hoping to see this feature expanded upon since the very first game it was great to finally see the series evolve.

The only real weakness of this approach is that not all of these endings are made equal. The first one I got was extremely disappointing from a climactic perspective, with the second making for a far more fitting finale. Like most AC titles this is a very short game so replaying to see different endings doesn't take too long.

While Last Raven is great at selling its tone I do think it comes at a cost. The soundtrack is far weaker than usual, which was really disappointing after the absolutely incredible variety and use of music in Nexus. And while there is mission variety it does ultimately come down to mostly fighting other ACs for most stages. As great as these fights are I think I ultimately prefer a larger variety of stages.

Still, Last Raven marks itself as one of the best entries in the series and an extremely fitting way to send off the "classic" style of Armored Core game before moving on to the next generation. It's a title that builds upon everything that came before it and asks much of you as a player, but rewards just as much in return.

It's fun how what is for many the hardest game in the series can also be one of the easiest if you equip tank legs and the CR-WBW98LX. That thing is evil itself. Oh, you're a tank? No prob, 5 hits and you're dead. You're a lightweight? The moment you stop flying like a bee you get devastated. Two ACs? I don't care, get fucked. The arena? The only one in the series that doesn't require you to change build because it's completely doable with that cannon. Whoever put THAT THING in the game is an evil genius. The only times it doesn't work is when you need to complete objectives fast for the more complex routes AND against the "true" final boss (at least I couldn't make it work). Basically if tank legs are bad play hover or middleweight or whatever you want, if tank legs are ok for that mission equip the cannon and absolutely ANNIHILATE everything in your way.

Nexus wasa mistake

This is too hard. Yes it's good and has crazy amount of parts but its genuinely insanely difficult. it's not that bad if you import your nexus save but they really wanted to break you with this one.