Gamer reviews for Artery Gear: Fusion
Artery Gear: Fusion Review - Mech waifus, anyone?
Artery Gear Fusion is a gacha mobile game by Bilibili HK that features badass mech girls in a post-apocalyptic world overrun by murderous Puppets. The game has a considerably interesting story that falls into similar narratives of other gacha games like Punishing Gray Raven and Counter Side. However, this doesn’t mean that the game is just another cheap copycat of these titles or other mobile games in the market nowadays.
First, let’s talk about the game’s aesthetic and character designs. The mech girls in the game are coined AGs (the titular Artery Gears). They’re wonderfully designed and filled with personality, even with their futuristic riggings and equipment attached to them. Even the generic fodder units in the game are detailed, which really fits them perfectly in the game’s world.
The gameplay is quite straightforward as well. If you’ve played other gacha games before, you’ll be able to get the flow of the game quite easily. You’ll start off with a default team of AGs which you can expand by Recruiting (summoning/pulling). Each team can have up to four members, with their individual power contributing to the team’s overall combat power (called “efficiency” in the game). The AGs are also divided into different types (classes/roles) and cores (elements). The cores form a rock-paper-scissors triangle, with one core both stronger and weaker than the others.
The combat is streamlined as well. You’ll unlock auto-combat quite early in the game and it’s a very welcome feature since you can just select your opponents and let your girls do the fighting. Eventually, “proxy combat” will also be unlocked, allowing you to set repeatable battles on certain battles as long as your energy permits it to do so. You can even log off in the middle of this A.I. - controlled combat and still get the rewards upon logging in. This is a great way of effortless resource grinding.
Next, you’ll have to push through the main story to unlock more features, while improving the stats of your main AGs. As you gain access to more features, you’ll be able to farm for additional resources that you can use to further improve the combat capability of your AGs. Some of these contents are rotated or refreshed regularly, as part of the game’s scheduled reset. The game has a lot of PvE content that will satisfy solo players and a PvP mode in the form of the Military Exercises.
Unlike idle-rpg type games, you can’t collect lots of loot even after logging off. As such, you’ll only be able to earn resources while actively playing the game. There’s a Dispatch system that allows you to earn rewards passively after your units return to base once the dispatch timer/duration is over and an AI-assisted auto combat system that continues the set number of battles even after you go offline but you’ll still need to actively grind and play regularly to get the necessary resources.
As for the gacha, the game offers a free, infinite 10-pull until you confirm your selection. You’re guaranteed to have a random 5-star AG, with a chance to get x1-x3 4-star AGs as well. This will allow you to keep refreshing until you’re satisfied with the results. After confirming, you’ll get to keep the 10 AGs you have pulled. This free and unlimited recruitment attempt is a great welcome gift for new players so they’ll start off with a powerful 5-star unit immediately.
Once you’re in the game there are two ways of recruiting AGs: use Special Hiring Agreements (these function as free summon tickets/coupons) or Forging Crystals (which is the game’s premium currency). You can earn both currencies in-game by completing missions and tasks but the easiest way is by using real money to “recharge” or purchase them outright of course. The game doesn’t have a discounted rate for a “10-pull” or recruiting 10 characters at once but at least, you’re guaranteed to get a 4-star or above AG. Thankfully, the game does have a “pity system” that guarantees a 5-star AG of your choice from the AG Direct Hunting tab once you’ve reached 200 Regular Recruitment.
Additionally, you also have some facilities to maintain, in the form of a Fleet which is composed of several ships. You have the main ship where your AGs can hang out. You can also interact with them there or give them gifts to increase their affinity towards you. The other ships in your fleet produce consumables, a vessel that allows you to dispatch allies, and one that enables you to fuse various gears. You can upgrade these facilities to improve their performance and capacity.
The game boasts excellent visual quality in several aspects. First, the UI is not cluttered and responsive. The character models are intricately designed and L2D animated, even the low-rarity ones (except the fodder units). You can even interact with them if you set them in your home screen. The SD (chibi) models that you’ll see in the battle screen or while your AGs are hanging out in your mothership are cute and animated as well.
The combat animations and effects are smooth. The ultimate attack of certain AGs are also a sight to behold, though you’re better off adjusting the setting to display those flashy ultimate attacks only once per day, to save time and resources. The audio quality isn’t that bad either; either in combat, cutscenes, or simply being idle in the homescreen. Almost all AGs have voicelines, with additional voice lines to be unlocked by growing close to them (increase their affinity/favorability).
As for the game’s overall quality, the fact that you’re not forced to watch ads is already a good starting point for any mobile game. There might be occasional prompts about ongoing promotions or discounts but at least they’re not annoyingly persistent or intrusive. The game can be enjoyed by free-to-play players, low-spenders, or even whales as much of the game’s content is not locked behind paywalls. By simply playing the game daily, regular players will be able to enjoy what the game has to offer.
Overall, the game is a satisfying gacha game experience - especially if you’re a fan of mech girls. The mechanics and features are very familiar, the in-app purchases aren’t predatory, and there’s something for every type of gacha gamers. There are some optimizations needed here and there but these are quite forgivable, especially if you’re running the game on a device that can handle it. Playing the game on emulator is smooth, stable, and quite pretty with consistent 60 FPS - almost makes it feel like a premium mobile game. However, the game feels different when playing it with default settings on an average android tablet (running 8-core CPU, GE8322 GPU, 4GB RAM) so the hardware should also be considered.