On a pocked battlefield, a mech kneels, its frame silhouetted against the pink sky. Singed and shredded, in places its armour plating has been blown away, exposing sparking cogs and circuitry. The machine’s left hand is missing. The pilot, somewhere inside the safety cage of its chest, steadies the machine using a gun as a walking stick. This image, used for Armoured Core VI’s box art and loading screens, suggests a task of incredible effort. Tellingly, it echoes the original box art used for FromSoftware’s 2009 game Demon’s Souls, which showed a knight slumped against a wall clutching a shield pincushioned with arrows. Both covers share a message: you might survive, but only just.