Despite the lovely Armored Core 5 artwork displayed in AC Chronicle Art Works there are also two interviews within the small book. One with series producer Toshifumi Nabeshima and another with two designers; Miki Masahiro and Satake Daisuke.

Nabeshima talks more about AC5’s change in functional approach, emphasising that the game will be more about tactics and using the geography of level rather than high-speed finger work. This harks back more to the original PSone games, especially the first, as many levels were set within city type environments and were more tactical as a consequence (the reduced size of the AC’s is also to do with this too apparently, as it would make it far easier to take cover). The other interesting element is that apparently you won’t just view your AC from behind and that you will have some form of camera control. Apart from that, the approach they’re taking is one of coarse realism and that you’ll have to “think” more in combat. The narrative will mirror this too apparently, as the characterisation won’t be simply friend or foe but instead more grounded and realistic. Again, like the older games, they’ve opted to keep the characters “faceless” so much of this will be inferred through dialogue and in-game text. This doesn’t really bode well for a Western release, as this kind of narrative has never been localised properly in terms of the series’ history.

As for the two designers, Masahiro worked on Chrome Hounds and is helming the main mechanical design of AC5 (as we suspected, as he is an internal designer). Whereas Satake is assisting him and comes from working on both Nexus and Ninebreaker (interestingly he designed the Mayfly head that adorns the new Nineball on the cover of Ninebreaker), they both also recently worked on Demon’s Souls. Over the years they’ve penned multiple designs for the Armored Core games as well, which helps to explain why Shoji Kawamori’s involvement was scaled back after Silent Line and why parts began to look more angular. They also talk a fair bit about how the realism in AC5 is dictating the design of the respective parts, citing a new revolver hand gun and vertical missile launcher. In any case, having a mecha desginer from Chrome Hounds and his assistant who contributed to Metal Wolf Chaos can only bode well for AC5, as those designs were truly exemplary and fit the new realistically grounded approach that seems to be the new direction for Armored Core as a whole.