First things first: Armored Core Verdict Day is NOT an “expansion pack” at all. You don’t NEED a copy of Armored Core V in order to play, there have been a ton of improvements and additions in key areas and in fact, this might be a more enjoyable experience for players diving in for the first time as well as returning veterans. FromSoftware is polishing up this online experience to a beautiful shine and if the recent demo on display at Namco Bandai’s Global Gamers Day was any indication, this should be one of those mech games that keeps players coming back for more once they get to take it for a spin…

Fans of From’s Xbox 360 exclusive Chromehounds will notice similarities to that game in a few areas, but that’s not unintentional, as members of the Verdict Day team worked on that sleeper. The three faction setup is there and allows players to pick a side and stick with it or swap allegiances to another side. This, of course means your former faction will probably come at you hard, so unless your team of allies is powerful enough to stave off a few assault missions, it’s probably best to play this one for a bit and get your mechs able to take down the opposition.

If you’re playing solo or as a team against the AI, you’ll be pleased to know that From has made the CPU enemies REALLY good at the game. How good? Well, some hands-on time against the dev team using only AI players showed that it was quite efficient at taking down almost all the opposition during each press meeting. At the point our demo took place, the dev team had only lost one match all day and even though I took out two of their AI with a fellow journalist type, we eventually went down in flames thanks to some pretty slick tactics on the part of the enemy AI. That “adaptive AI” is even a bullet point feature (he said, cutting and pasting from the game’s fact sheet):

• 90 NEW MISSIONS ACROSS 7 BATTLE RAVAGED CONTINENTS
• 150 PARTS TO CUSTOMIZE YOUR LOAD OUT
• BATTLE ALONE OR WITH YOUR FRIENDS WITH IMPROVED ONLINE MATCHMAKING
• USE THE ADAPTIVE A.I. TO CREATE UNMANNED AC UNITS TO EVEN THE PLAYING FIELD FOR ONLINE MATCHES

There are a ton of map screens, menus and options to deal with before you get to that action (which controls wonderfully, and looks spectacular by the way), so this isn’t for the casual player nor anyone not used to an online-only experience at all. In addition, there’s a deep strategic element to the game where you don’t “play” it at all, but oversee your mechs, ordering them around the map and watching the results. It’s almost like a sports management simulation (but with well-armored metal behemoths blasting the hell out of each other).

While I was hoping to see another single-player focused AC game (and want to at some point!), Armored Core: Verdict Day just might tempt me to hop into the online space for a bit, whereupon I’ll probably get trounced by a group of annoying 14-year old led by some over-talented whip-cracking smart-ass. Oh well – at least my AI team will look good going down in flames and up in smoke…