Havent finished the game yet, but I can already recommend it.
This review is 3 years late, so any hope for a patch to fix is long gone. It's still a good game though.
Some minor spoilers ahead.
The good
1. combat is 10/10. it's fast, flashy, responsive and you can have up to four weapons to use instead of most other games where you only have one. range matters, speed matters, timing matters, positioning matters.
2. the weapons and parts have strong variety and are thematic, despite the balancing issues. you can build a fast mech that zips around the air launching countless missiles, you can build a laser helicopter, you can build a ratatatatata tank. the customization is great.
3. weapon animations are great. specifically the missiles, they launch in a salvo and chase enemies and some will miss on fast targets. if this was any other game the devs would lazily code the missiles to all launch at once, fly like one projectile and never miss.
4. graphically it's both beautiful and gritty. although some of the office buildings look like they could use a bit more detail.
5. some boss designs are really cool thematically. giant mechs, laser beam spiders, spaceships.
The bad
1. the heavy reuse of maps. although i wouldnt call this a negative per se but it could be so much better.
2. some weapons are not really viable. while it fits the lore, most kinetic weapons like rifles, SMGs, pistols are just bad. it's not just the stagger system, the damage values are just low. melee also mostly sucks if you're not trying to cheese a boss. the whole EN load/weight tradeoff rarely matters because thats more tied to the body parts than weapons.
3. the credit system is just bad. it's pretty grindy and adds nothing but meainingless hassle, because it's just forcing you to buy and sell stuff in a rotation. after a short grind in the first chapter, the shop is nothing but a second storage.
4. some missions are just unimpressive. go here kill a couple mooks and press F at several locations. normally I wouldn't care if they were optional side missions, but every mission has to be cleared at least once to progress
5. generic damage upgrades in the OS tuning. kinda boring, especially when it costs the same currency as cool unlocks like weapon swap. also makes switching builds less attractive.
The mid?
1. the lore is deep and well constructed. but for most people me included, it's not well told at all. there's too much lore hidden in random logs that you can easily miss. and if you miss them you need to replay the mission which is kind of stupid. i'd recommend to just watch a lore video instead and play through the game as normal.
2. damage is unavoidable because there's just too many homing missiles and bullets everywhere. yea some savant maniac probably did a hitless run. but my point here is that it just makes light builds undesirable, especially with the stagger mechanic. not a bad as a whole though, I never liked the full parry/dodge glass cannon meta in other Fromsoft games
3. Build > skill. some builds just straight up counter some bosses, rather than all builds being viable. I like the idea of building a counter, but it does feel a little too unbalanced
Conclusion
8/10
It's a fun game. You customize and build different mechs, send them into missions and blow stuff up. the game is very focused on being good at that.
The game does leave me wanting a bit. better weapon balance, fixing the stagger system, maybe more exploration, allowing a full melee build in both arms and less overheat downtime (e.g. a specialized Arm part)
