I've been playing Front Mission(1st, DS) cause oh man Front Mission. From Valkyria Chronicles to Shining Force Gaiden to X-Com EU & 2 to Fallout 1's combat to Fire Emblem Awakening & Fates, I have finally realised that I have SRPG brainworms. I also have mech brainworms still so like, picking off a Missileer's shooting arm with a rocket from six gridspaces away is basically better than sex y'know.

What I like abt Front Mission is that the pilot stats/skills plus the mech customisation (you can swap chassis, individual arms, the legs, a CPU for stat augmentation, weapons in each hand and on each shoulder, and power backpacks) means you can do a fuckload of different builds and strats. I really enjoy Meihua's bit, I trained her on missiles by accident a lot so I have her harass enemy attackers with SRMs and shit and then charge in and do stun-punch combos, never gets old. Landing the mech punch that knocks out a foe's cockpit is the height of satisfaction.

The AI is also a little smarter than in say, the new Fire Emblems, like they can focus-fire and pick off weak units, or cut off an over-extended squad. They're also fun because if they have a supply truck and you destroy their weapons, they'll retreat to the supply truck to repair, which means you can force them to retreat and rout em basically. Terrain and height advantage matter greatly, and sometimes it's better to withdraw and bait the enemy into your attacks instead.

Front Bussin was a SNES game originally so it was probably butting up against data limits, the story's not up to much (who gives a fuck about Royd's dumbass ladyfriend) and the game is mostly just menus outside of combat, kind of like a Wizardry or something. The Arena just exists so you can train skills and not run out of money. For a sequel, I'd want a job-board where you can take merc contracts on the side, or side-story skirmishes, or something, maybe even an overworld with random encounters for certain factions of mech pilots. Front Mission is really solid, top 10 for me, but there's so many great ways to improve upon it. Add tank or infantry units to fight, like Mechwarrior? Rifles that can shoot for two or three squares? Towns as walkable RPG-like spaces? More and better dynamic salvage from enemy mechs? Disabling kills (i.e. destroyed arms, cockpit-only) letting you grab entire mechs? Bonus points for disabling kills? Tons of stuff.

Front Mission 2's PS1 translation is only half-done, so I'm excited that Switch dorks are done beta-testing the Front Mission 2 Remake for us and it's coming to PC now. The FM 1st remake is getting some improvements backported which is cool too, and I hope the translation gets tightened up when the PC FM2 launches.

Otherwise I am gonna play Tactics Orge on Playstation once I'm done FM.