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This is an incredibly difficult game to talk about because after finishing it a couple of days ago I find myself here for getting most things about it. Not so much the mechanics, but the story. I'll get a bit more into that, but what we have is a bit of a more weeby Armored Core game. Build your mech in a variety of ways, fight against swarms of AI's, battle giant robots called Immortals, and even occasionally come in conflict with your fellow mercenaries. 

The world of Daemon X Machina is fairly interesting at first, you fight as Outers in a zone sealed off from the rest of the world. As outers, you are basically mercenaries who can survive the Phemto Particles that exist in the area, and you take on jobs from the three organizations that rule over the zone. All this started when a chunk of the moon fell into the earth, causing a catastrophe. 

At first, it seems interesting because the game does a good job at slowly building the actions of Grief, leader of the mercenary group Terrors. The game is also constantly hinting that somewhere down the line you will have to make a choice, and you'd think it might have something to do with the three factions and their plans, as everyone seems to have some kind of hidden agenda and are trying to convince you of their ideas throughout the game. Maybe it has something to do with the various mercenary groups and their own goals and ambitions. 

Then the big twists come, you get a binary choice of how to proceed, and it all kind of ends on a wet fart of an ending. From a narrative standpoint, the game fails as most things you experience are little more then buildup to the end, all for none of that to be paid off. It's a shame because there are a lot of interesting things going on. You have the Western VII, a group of convicts fighting to shorten their centuries-long sentences to earn their freedom, and even'Immortal Innocence', a group of mercs who seem to be able to survive things that would surely kill anyone else. None of this really amounts to anything. 

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Looking past the story, you have a solid game. The few times you fight outside of your mech for certain missions are kind of lame and uninteresting, but those are few and far between. The actual bulk of the gameplay has three different things you'll be doing. Fighting AI drones, these make up your mobs of enemies that have a variety of different abilities and attacks. You have guys that jam your radar,tanks rolling on the ground, and a variety of air units with different levels of defense and flight patterns depending on what you are fighting. 

The second is the Immortals, giant mechs essentially. These are where the real fun is had, especially fighting the different kinds of Immortals the game has to offer. A giant snake-like Immortal that flies, or the first kind of Immortal you fight which is a giant Guardian with a sword and shield. You are able to fire on its joints to get rid of its sword or shield or force it down to a knee if you take out its leg joints. They are fun to fight, and you're not strictly limited to one way to approach them. 

Where the game feels a bit lacking is fighting against other mercenaries. Even when facing enemies with a variety of different weapons, it never really felt like I had to tackle any of them differently. Whether I faced off against the Western VII or Terrors,I felt like I was having the same fight. The fights are alright to have from time to time, but the game didn't do enough to make them feel all that different. 

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The game also comes across a problem where it kind of blows it's load a bit early. It's not long before you come across every type of enemy, so even the normal AI battles start feeling repetitive as you near games end, and really only the Immortal battles stand out after a certain point. And that's not getting into an issue with facing the final boss of the game, which you end up having to fight in a way you have yet to need to fight thus far. It's like right at the end rather than finding an interesting way to use existing mechanics and strategies in the game, it just kind of forces you to play a different kind of game then you've been playing until now. Mind you,once you realize what you need to do the fight becomes almost laughably easy, but I hate when games do something like this. 

As far as online goes, it's pretty solid. It's basically just harder version of Immortals or gauntlet fights against groups of mercenaries. It's fun to play co-op, but I suggest playing with friends rather then randoms online. If you end up getting paired with a really good player, someone out of your skill level, you kind of end up just winning the match without feeling like you contributed at all to the fight. If you play this game at a very high level you likely won't mind this, but if you aren't looking at game mastery and just want to play some matches from time to time, you're much better off playing with your friends when you get the chance. 

The actual mechanics of the game are solid. You can go in with up to four main weapons, two in each arm, with a good variety to pick between. I would have liked more, but the amount of variety is acceptable. I do like that some of the weapons with unique effects,such as the arc gun that stuns enemies, can be used on certain Immortals to good effect. You have a shoulder-mounted weapon as well,plus your support gear. This can be anywhere from mines to an additional ammo pack so you're less likely to end up ammo less in fights without a large amount of enemy AI's to kill for ammo. A personal favorite for most of the game was a piece of gear that boosts you downward, makes for fast descents an easy method of avoiding enemy fire. 

The game may not be a game-changer, and it's not likely to go down as a classic for anyone who plays it, but at the same time, it's worth grabbing. The combat is fun and remains so for most of the game,there are an interesting world and visuals, and you end up with a solid amount of options for your gameplay. If you need a game to kill some time, it's worth grabbing. 

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Also, I know it's been a while since I uploaded it here. Been a lot going on between some IRL stress from family issues, switching to anew job, and some other things. That said, I should be back to my normal output of 2-3 a week, though I'll likely keep it closer to 2 now.