6 mecha anime to watch if you love Armored Core 6

polygon.com:

Armored Core 6: Fires of Rubicon, the latest game from developer FromSoftware of Dark Souls and Elden Ring fame, was released last week to critical and commercial acclaim. The first installment in the Armored Core series in a decade, Fires of Rubicon marks not only a much-welcomed return for the franchise, but also a revitalizing jolt to the slumbering genre of giant robot action games.

Armored Core 6 taps into a specific niche of giant robot media: military sci-fi mecha. Unlike classic anime like Tetsujin 28 and Giant Robo or more contemporary series like Neon Genesis Evangelion or Gurren Lagann, the Armored Core mech suits that players pilot and customize in-game are not their semi-sentient friends, nor are they animated by the soul of the protagonist’s dead mother or the anti-entropic power of friendship. Instead, Armored Core suits are treated much like they would be in a real-life context: as a form of artillery equivalent to that of tank, piloted by soldiers and mercenaries as weapons in an ongoing war for resources and political dominance.

To celebrate the release of Armored Core 6, we’ve pulled together a list of some of the best entries in the subgenre of military sci-fi mecha anime available to stream online. Honorable mentions like Gasaraki and Blue Gender are not currently available to stream, but are available to purchase either on home media or VOD.

Of all the anime included on this list, 86 is the series whose premise most resembles that of Armored Core 6. Set in an alternate future, the series centers on Major Vladilena “Lena” Milizé, a military officer for the Republic of San Magnolia who has been locked in a bitter war of attrition with the Empire of Giad for nearly a decade. The San Magnolia military