 So today I present the second to last video in the Armored Core series. Last time we talked about the themes of Armored Core, but today I want to talk about the actual story of Armored Core. If you don't like Armored Core or you think it doesn't have a story then I'm not going to try and convince you otherwise, but this video is for the players who really enjoyed the game and would like to understand the story a bit more deeply. That being said, there will be major spoilers for Armored Core 6, so if you haven't beaten NG++ then come back after you have. Okay, Armored Core's story is designed much like its themes and gameplay in that it's not a passive experience. If you try and experience the story the same way you experience Halo or Final Fantasy, it's not going to work because the story is as much of a gameplay mechanic as it is a narrative tool. It's actually designed much more similarly to something like the Metroid Prime series where you can beat the entire game and go through all the levels without collecting any logs or finding any missile expansions or energy tanks or scanning all the monsters, but if you do that you are going to be missing the vast majority of the content the developers were intending for you to experience and you are depriving yourself from truly understanding the world and the characters who live in it. Much the same way you can just equip broken weapons and plow your way through the story in Armored Core and the devs put that option in the game specifically for players who just wanted to win and be able to say they beat the game. There's nothing wrong with that, but you will completely miss out on most of the story because when you play the game to 100% completion, get all the endings, get all the parts, S rank all the missions, get all the battle logs, all the data logs, all the emblems and read everything in the arena, then the story will start to make a lot more sense. The arena is actually where a huge amount of lore is located in almost every single Armored Core game. This is where you realize the backstory of a lot of the pilots in that world. Some pilots are just there to advertise the weapons they want to sell. Some pilots are just professional assassins. Some pilots are just assholes and some pilots really shouldn't be pilots, but it's the only way they can make enough money to support their family. Some pilots want to save the environment and that's why their AC only has energy weapons. There's a lot of details in the story that you're not going to find unless you read all the stuff in the arena. If we just take a second to read the first three descriptions in the arena, we will learn that Rummy is addicted to coral drugs, which explains why he sounds kind of insane. And he actually believes he's invincible and his AC's name is Mad Stomp, which is why his emblem is a foot. He's also made entirely of RAD parts, which tells you who he works for. Index Dunham is a blue collar worker who helped build the giant towers you see around you. He actually feels more at home on a construction site than in an AC. And if you look at his emblem, it's a pickaxe, which is a construction tool. Then we have Hermit, who was inspired as a kid by whatever you saw on TV about Commander Michigan, who was apparently a victorious badass during the Jupiter Wars. Now, this info is really cool because we don't really hear too much about the Jupiter Wars in the game. But after reading this, we know that that was a thing. And that's actually how Michigan built his reputation and became the leader of the Red Guns in the first place. On top of that, we learn that this pilot worked his ass off just to have a chance to join the Red Guns. And he did all of this while struggling to support his siblings who lived in poverty. And when the time came, he barely made the cut and is now a proud member of the Red Guns. Now, something I always loved about this was his emblem, which is a tiny little crab wearing an army hat. And the reason I think this is his emblem is because that's probably how he feels in the presence of so many other veteran, battle-hardened Red Gun soldiers above him. He feels like he's a small little hermit crab, but he's still a proud soldier, and that's why it's wearing the army hat. Personally, I love this. Like, I don't know how you can read all this and then come away saying Armored Core has no story. Because those are just the first three descriptions in the game. And if you were wondering why Iguazu is so insufferable, if you read his description, you realize he was a gambler who made a bad bet and lost everything, and was forced to undergo the Armored Core surgery to pay off his debt. Like, all these characters and their personalities and actions start to make a lot more sense when you read the descriptions. And it's not just the descriptions, it's also the designs themselves. All of the Red Guns ACs have that military green color shade to them. All the pilots who work for Carla have RAD parts on them. These are small details about the characters that you really wouldn't notice if you just play the game blindly. One of my favorite examples of this is with the character Michigan, who is the Red Guns leader. Initially he comes off as the typical Sergeant Douchebag kind of character. In the beginning of the story, he treats you like a disposable soldier and he doesn't really care. But as you go through the game, he actually starts to really respect you. And he even invites you to join his company and promises opportunities for promotions and advancements that he thinks you won't get from your handler Walter. He legitimately starts to try and help and respects you. And even in the last mission where you are hired to kill him, when members of his troops start to disrespect your name, he shuts them up and tells you why they should respect you and begins to recite all of your achievements. And through this, you can tell he has enormous respect for you, the player, not like a standard villain. And depending on how you do in that mission, you actually get more story about his character revealed through extra dialogue. If you fail the mission and he kills you, instead of putting you down with insults like a normal villain, he calls you a big one and immediately orders his troops to take care of the wounded right after. Also, if you further inspect his AC, Michigan equips the pulse protection armor, which deploys a safe barrier around his troops. And he does this in the middle of the fight when you attack them. The fact that he picks this weapon and judging by what he says after he beats you, tells you about his values, what he actually thinks is important. He cares for his troops in a way that a lot of the other commanders really don't. Now, when you put all this information together, a lot of questions about these characters start to make sense. For example, early in the game, Iguazu makes it very clear that he hates working for Michigan. So I always wondered, why doesn't he just leave? But when you read Iguazu's description, and you realize that he was already in debt from a bad gamble before the Red Guns, and he's probably still not done paying it off, and you combine that with a combat log that you find in the wall climb mission, where if you go to the corner, you will see the remains of G4, who was the tank that fought alongside you in Iguazu and that really fun mission before. Now remember, G4 Vorda was essentially the only friend Iguazu had. When you find his remains, and if you read his last message, it says, Iguazu, I'm telling you man, you gotta give Michigan a chance. He's different from the other suits at HQ. Look, I know he's an asshole, but he's looking out for us, you know? Almost like we got family here. And then it all makes sense. Yes, Iguazu hated working for Michigan, but he also knew Michigan would protect him. If people trying to collect Iguazu's debt came after him, they would have to deal with Michigan first. Nobody wants to mess with Michigan as long as Iguazu stayed in the Red Guns, nobody was going to touch him. So you can say what you want about Michigan, but the man did his best to take care of his people. And personally, I really respect that. Another good example of characters with a lot of unspoken backstory is Carla. When you first meet her, she sounds like your typical hotshot businesswoman just talking trash to you. But just like Michigan, the farther you get into the story, the more she starts to warm up and trust you. And by the end of the game, she actually risks her own life to save yours. And I think one of the most underappreciated details in the game is when it comes to Carla's second in command, Chatti. Now, when I first saw him, I was like, who the f**k is this Wally wannabe? But by the end of the game, Chatti really grew on me. See, Chatti is an AI that Carla originally created to help her out with things. And he doesn't really talk too much, but she's constantly trying to teach him to have more emotion and personality. And she actually named him Chatti in hopes that one day he would actually become more Chatti. And one of her goals is to try and get Chatti to laugh. But so far, she's never been able to do that. Now, Carla in many ways treats Chatti like a son. And you can tell that Chatti really respects and looks up to her as a leader. And later on, you learn that even though Chatti is an AI and a completely digital being, Carla made the intentional choice to never back up his program because she felt like as soon as she did that, it would be like sucking the life out of his soul. And as long as he wasn't backed up, he was truly unique and one of a kind. Now, Chatti develops a lot. And in the end, he became one of my favorite characters because he really felt like that awkward introverted friend of yours that doesn't really say much, but you know, always has your back. And every time you do something cool, they send you a small little text message that just says, nice or cool or great. And throughout the game, as you get to know him, you also get to know Carla, because he always tries to tell you things that Carla taught him. And I think my favorite moment with Chatti is when you're fighting one of the biggest, baddest, most dangerous bosses of your entire life. And when shit hits the roof, he says this to you. Now, maybe I'm just being sentimental, but I felt like that was exactly what I needed to hear in that moment. It's okay. This sucks. You might be at a pretty low point in your life right now, but that's all right because that's exactly the reason why this might be the greatest comeback of your entire life. Chatti's words really spoke to me during this mission. And that's why at the end of the game, where I had to kill Carla, I was shook because I knew I would have to kill Chatti too. And depending on the order you kill them, you actually unlock different dialogue. Remember how Carla was never able to teach Chatti how to laugh? In the final battle with Carla and Chatti, when the battle starts to get tough, under all the pressure, Chatti laughs for the first time. Because what else can you do when everything's going to shit? And Carla congratulates you on achieving this. And it's absolutely fucking traumatic. But just to screw with your heart more, if you play the game a second time and you take the other path where you don't kill them, this mother fucker shows up and does this. And then you as the player are like, oh my fucking god, you mother fucker. But again, these are all details that you probably would miss if you're not really paying attention. The final aspect of Armored Course Story that I think is equally crucial to understanding every single game is the soundtrack. Remember when I said every game is a conversation between the player and the developer? Well, that is equally true for the game's music. Hans Zimmer, which is the composer for literally every single best movie you've ever watched, describes it like this. In music, you're basically having a conversation. There's a question, there's an answer. Ooh, there's a bit of a dodgy question here. I can tell you everything you need to know in one word, story. Four French arms on the right, four French arms on the left, and they're up in a gallery, up way above the orchestra. Two notes, but the amount of expressiveness you can put into them. Music can tell a story, just like a book. And the lead music composer for Armored Course that's been in the game since 1997 is Kota Hoshino. And he is the reason the AC games have a similar feel. It's the same guy has been making the music for 26 years. And for those of you who are interested in how expert game music is created, there's an excerpt from the director of Armored Course 6, Masura Yamamura, in which he describes the process of the soundtrack creation for the game. And basically every Armored Course game has a main theme. Sometimes it's rebirth or a new age or discovery or mystery. Whatever that theme is, basically the producer just gives a few nebulous words to Kota and then Kota just makes the soundtrack from those ideas. And the theme for Armored Course 6 was loneliness and nostalgia. And that's why we have the old sense that you probably recognize from the 1990s but we also have the new age atmospheric sounds that give you that sense of emptiness. The soundtrack for Armored Course was literally built from the ground up for the game. And it's absolutely magnificent. The soundtrack is the reason why, even when you're not quite sure what's going on, you feel it in your bones, whether you're in danger, whether you're safe, the enemy is looking you in the eye and you know that only one of you is going to walk away alive. Soundtrack in the game is part of the story itself. And I want to talk about one song in particular because I think it's pretty much accepted that the fight with Baltaeus is one of everyone's favorite and most memorable parts of the game. This boss is known for being crazy hard and also when the game truly starts to feel like it's coming alive. And I think part of the reason so many people felt this way is because that's exactly what the music captured. Now I'm going to let the theme song for the fight play in the background. And I'm going to scroll through the comments so you guys can see how other people felt during this fight. Because I think it's important for people to understand just how deep and emotional this experience was for the players who made it this far into the game. As you can tell, this song spoke to the heart of so many players and they probably didn't even realize it was intentional. It was by design. The name of the song combined with how it sounds tells you what this part of the story is really about. Contact with you. This is the name of the song and this is when you meet air for the first time. You don't quite understand how but in a massive explosion that should have killed you instead by some miracle you survive and you find yourself now connected with this new soul from the coral. And when you encounter this beautiful new spark of life for the first time in the game she tells you you need to live up to this point. You were just a disposable soldier in a crazy war torn world. You never really cared about whether you lived or died because you didn't even know why you were fighting. But this fight is when all of that changed because now for the first time in the game something beautiful wants you to live. Someone wants to be your companion to guide you to help you and by the end of the game literally protect and fight alongside you. See in the actual story air is a miracle that travels and grows with you but I believe that she's also a metaphor for the beauty that exists in the worst of time. She is a symbol for all the things that you're lucky to have despite not deserving or earning them. She is a literal spark a light and a flame for that moment when you finally realize what you want to live for what you're willing to die for when you find your passion and your purpose. It's not an accident that you meet air and this song plays in the middle of the most difficult battle of your life. It's symbolic for the fact that often during our lowest points is when we find out what truly matters to us and in the story of armored core six they literally write that concept into the story in the form of this character and there are so many incredible songs that were made for this game but to sum everything up the story for an armored core game is found within completing the game itself. Get all the endings get all the parts S rank each mission read all the descriptions in the arena look at each raven's name look at their emblems look at the names of their acs pay close attention to the dialogue pay attention to the music look into the names of each song survive adapt grow find your purpose and choose your path with the freedom you've earned that's what it means to be a raven and that's how you'll understand the story of every armored core game thanks for watching hope that helps and as always hope you have a fantastic day and i'll see you around