Armored Core Lore: Navis

[@chaosakazero]

I decide to sleep *armored core lore video pops up * yay a bed time story

[@armoredcorelore]

Ha ha hope you slept well.

[@Toshinben]

Nevis' rise seemed like a really good sign for the lore of the game. The world was growing. More organizations were sprouting up. It seemed like the world was becoming more lively and leaving the monotony of the trifecta behind. But nope. This is Japan and they had to Japanese them: "The nail that stands out gets hammered down" and all that jazz. I see Navis primarily as a stand-in for East Asian conformity. "Don't stand out. Don't draw attention to yourself." I have very harsh response to this worldview. Like other commenters, my thoughts often wandered to 'what if we could have sided with Navis?' The player had a huge impact in the game - defending Mirage's base against a full Crest assault, and then eventually destroying it with the 'aid' of 3 vulnerable missile vehicles; clearing the way to Navis' mine by destroying Pin Fire; decimating the Mirage air convoy flying over Bayload City, personally killing Agraya and Genobee; ETC. If we were ever allowed to side with Navis, we could have easily have turned the tide against everyone who was trying to bring Navis down. I think that 'standing up to giants' story would have made a better lasting impression than the 'play both sides, then team up on the little guy' game that we ultimately got. Imagine a 'Zinaida path' of Nexus. You would be working alongside the bridge defenders to take out armored trains, waves of flying assault craft, and an Amored Core, all on the perilous bridges. You'd fight alongside Pin Fire and a dozen or so flying drones in a hectic battle of taking down air transports while they shoot missiles at you, fighting off the units that manage to be deployed, and stopping Agraya. If they ever remake the 3rd gen AC games, those are the fights we need. One weird thing: did Bayload City ever have defenders? When the Mirage SF come in, it's you and Genobee. Underground attackers? Solo defense. Mirage air transports? Terrorists take over the city? It's always you alone defending Navis' HQ. Was there any single mission where we see Navis combat units around Bayload City? If that's the case, then my mental remake includes Navis bunkers around the city with a defense-in-depth strategy, where they're fighting a war of attrition against unrelenting Mirage (and later Crest) assaults and their defense forces are quickly being eroded by Mirage's superior numbers. On further looking because I got curious, it looks like Navis only ever had two models of MTs - the iconic sniper MTs and CR-MT77Ms (you only seem to see 2 of these in the mission to destroy the mine power systems). They have a bunch of helicopters, jellyfish unmanned units, USE weapon pods, and ground tanks. I was surprised how little of a militia Navis had. I think the Crest and Mirage forces you face to defend and destroy Mirage's base, respectively, stood a decent chance at beating all Navis' non-AC, non-Leviathan units in one big fight. That puts a new perspective on things - Navis was in no position to resist Mirage. The probably should have just sold Mirage the mine and been done with it.

[@armoredcorelore]

As always a very deep look into Navis Toshinben, my kind of read =). Yes that is a good point made about bayload cities defence either the city really had nothing because they thought the walls would stop them or the mt used inside were wiped out. As for the Mts well the real issue there is both of these are Crest creations which is no surprise since Crest was supplying them and when the big red corporation went to war with Navis they stopped selling them mts leaving Navis with what they had.

[@c6rn6g2k1d]

That's pretty funny that you expect a very upstart corporation like Navis to have the same scale of resources as Kisaragi, let alone Crest or Mirage. Their newness compared to the other three is pretty telling as they have little means of defending themselves and were relying on whatever business ties they've had with Crest and Kisaragi to help. The only thing they were banking on were ancient weapons that they had no control over. There is a reason for that Japanese idiom you seem to despise. While it may seem like an expression of resignation and submission, it could also be interpreted as one's biding time and investing in a future where one is stronger, to build one's self up at any cost even if it means kowtowing. But even Navis failed at that seeing as they couldn't conceal their discovery over a new resource.

[@Toshinben]

@@c6rn6g2k1d I didn’t say I expected Navis to have the same scale of resources as Kisaragi, nor anyone else. The closest I got was my surprise that you see stronger Mirage and Crest forces in a single battle, than you see from Navis cumulatively throughout the game (not including Ravens nor Leviathans). This is a wild misinterpretation. Expecting Navis to have a military strong enough to fight against the Crest/Mirage forces deployed for a single battle (defend/destroy the military base) is not equivalent to thinking they should have a military strong enough to rival Crest’s or Mirage’s assets as a whole. Do you have a source for your claim about the ‘biding time’ interpretation of the Japanese phrase? I checked 5 sources. None agreed with your narrative. The most telling can be found with a Google search of “The Mirabellas in Japan Nail that Sticks Up”; there is apparently a no-dying rule in Japanese schools that requires anyone with a non-black hair color TO dye their hair black, in order to conform. Another is a LinkedIn article “Japan Myth # 1- The Standing Nail & The Hammer”, that argues karoshi and the establishment of black companies are directly tied to this phrase and Japan’s conformist culture. The best I can see, you’re making an ad-hoc reinterpretation of established fact. You could interpret ‘cat’s out of the bag’ as a person (cat) wearing new, fashionable clothes (out of the bag). But that would be stupid. Idiomatic phrases don’t work unless there’s consensus understanding of their meaning, since the surface statements are often nonsensical.

[@c6rn6g2k1d]

@@Toshinben Ah... whoops.

[@Jaeger_Bishop]

Well, Navis could have stood up to the others...if Nexus's story allowed you to choose an alternate path. As opposed to the numerous paths in Last Raven.

[@armoredcorelore]

Ah yes the raven that changes history.

[@Jaeger_Bishop]

@@armoredcorelore Worked in Armored Core 3 & Silent line. Granted, to date anyway... FromSoftware have never really reached the heights of the balance that was those games. Gameplay, Story and player choice/customizability. All it needed was some of the more out there levels from Armored Core 2& Another Age, they would have been perfect.

[@signalhunter2290]

Honestly it would be pretty interesting if there was a dividing path in Nexus where if you don't decide to take many of the known Navis missions, they would get desperate earlier than base, but they had the smart idea to just let the damn machine run rampant and hide away. Then comes in another dividing path where if you don't take care of it before heading down to the Suicide Drone mission, it comes barging in as another boss...with more upgrades made to it and to make your life even more hell down there.

[@armoredcorelore]

It would have certainly bee cool and given me more to work with rather then basically the story of nexus in ten minutes.

[@SirPream]

To think that if the tides had turned in Navis' favor, they could have gained control of the Internecine and the technology that came with it, though that probably would have backfired on them given the circumstances that happened in Last Raven (plus they could not control the Leviathan, which Alliance was able to do). In the end, if Navis was looking to stick it to the other corporations by taking them down a peg, they certainly did so even if it cost them a future as an actual corporation, plus not to mention they may have caused more destruction than any other corporation or group known in the 3rd generation of Armored Core.

[@armoredcorelore]

Sadly i think your right and even worse i think navis would not be able to do as much as an alliance member as while mirage, crest and kisaragi had money on thier side, navis may have been very little. Then again who knowns maybe the alliance would not be so bad if it was made up of Crest, Kisaragi and Navis.

[@SilverGlint]

Welcome back Mr ACL, thanks for reviving my meal time ritual of watching your videos.

[@armoredcorelore]

Ha ha well hope you had a good meal and its nice to be back.

[@andrewrogers3067]

Navis actually could have stood up to Mirage if Crest and Kisaragi had stuck with them and continuously provided aid. Least imo

[@armoredcorelore]

I would agree with you here, i think Mirage would have the one to lose if the three had stuck together and picked away at the big blue.

[@blagojpejov4155]

How intresting of Navis nice work man

[@armoredcorelore]

Thank you.

[@Sorain1]

As others have pointed out, a revisit of Nexus having a Navis supporting path seems the way to go. It wouldn't be too hard to get things where they needed them for Last Raven even if you side with Navis. Navis couldn't control the Leviathan, and _knew_ they couldn't control the Internecine so they didn't turn it on. But let's posit a timeline where Navis has been successful. Flush with confidence from successfully standing up (or rather, hiring a skilled mercenary to stand up for them) to the big three, Navis secures their hold by safely activating the Leviathan, which supports you on a mission to eliminate the remnants gathering up to withdraw from the region. It's a sort of victory lap where your biggest concern is not getting caught up in the blasts from your support. Then another mission request comes in. Navis's overconfidence has proven a slow and insidious killer, they accidentally woke up the Internecine, it's pouring out the red drones and when they sent in Leviathan to stop it... the facility took control of the Leviathan too. So now while Navis throws it's entire military might into stopping their own flagship weapon, they hire the Raven to stop the 'ancient unknown facility' by getting inside and blasting out the control runs they had installed in an attempt to take control of it. Que the final mission of Nexus as we know it, leaving Navis destroyed (by their own hubris) and the world devastated by the Internecine's attack. The big three banding together makes sense here, having (mostly) lost a corporate war and then ended up suffering for Navis's mistake we end up with the scenario for Last Raven as we know it even with Navis winning the corporate war. I believe it's important in a remake to stick to a 'what could have been' for such a route and as we know where it was leading, we can do that.

[@armoredcorelore]

Its a good timeline here and well a navis story would have been neat seeing as most likely it would have been the end of mirage and even crest if they decided to have a go at navis with their new raven being there.

[@fluxstrapper3605]

Yay a bed time story after preparing for my exam tomorrow

[@TheFirstRaven]

Good luck!

[@armoredcorelore]

Well i hope your well rested and i wish you the best of luck on your exam.

[@MrWaifuTaker]

Navis using the Low Tier God Drones was basically their "screw you guys, i'm going home" move after folding.

[@TheFirstRaven]

Welcome back Raven & congrats on 9k!

[@armoredcorelore]

Thank you first raven, its a pleasure to be back.

[@swegwardsjdkhaled6870]

Perhaps cover the story of v/verdict day for a vid?

[@armoredcorelore]

Already in the works, i just need to hit LR story do a few videos on some topics there and then 5th gen is the next stop.

[@bgonzales817]

Navis introduced just to be destroyed lol

[@armoredcorelore]

Sad really but when you say no to the big angry blue corporation, what can we expect.

[@ACFoxeye]

Genobee was right. If it wasn't Navis, it would've been one of the big 3. Especially Kisaragi.

[@armoredcorelore]

They never could leave anything alone. The type you say don't press the red button and they press it anyway only then to start taking it apart.

[@ACFoxeye]

Hahahahaha shiny Leviathan go BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

[@aaronofastora2308]

Welcome back Armored Core Lore.

[@armoredcorelore]

Thank you very much =)

[@ReifinDFanchon]

(Pretend this is a funny comment about Navis, because I didn't play Nexus that much.) Also, ACL, are you playing on emulator or real hardware? If the former, have you tried increasing the native resolution to ~1080p to have better graphical fidelity on your video?

[@armoredcorelore]

Ha ha (Ok tick off pretend this is a funny comment) And i have not while I'm working on the next video i will have a play with the settings. Thanks Reifin.

[@swegwardsjdkhaled6870]

Glad to get another video chief!

[@kendo5721]

Can you discuss the lore of the ultimate weapon from armored core 5/verdict day?

[@armoredcorelore]

I'll note it down to do when i reach the 5th gen which is no long now i hope.

[@kendo5721]

@@armoredcorelore yey!＼(^_^)／

[@drwilyecoyote5357]

So what's the subject of your next video?

[@armoredcorelore]

I'm going to have a look over Agraya and if all goes well then i am going to finally tackle LR story.

[@armoredcoreexile]

I can't believe I got busy and forgot you finally uploaded this the other day. Good God I hate being so busy all of the time.

[@armoredcorelore]

Ha ha Ace its cool. The video is not going anywhere and you got to do what you got to do. Be safe.

[@armoredcoreexile]

@@armoredcorelore I will amigo, you be safe as well ACL. It wouldn't be a bad time to go over it.

[@C-Master109]

Good to have you back ArmoredCoreLore, and I hope you have fully recovered by the time you posted this video. ❤️‍🩹 I honestly feel, sort of bad for Navis. Not sure why, though it is probably because they were the clear underdogs in this corporate war. They either get invaded, or betrayed by every other mayor organization in one way, or another for wanting to hold on to what was technically their property. Even the OAE, that is meant to serve as a peace keeping force between the corporations ultimately has no real authority, and will basically just move to the side when it comes to letting Mirage do as they please against a significantly weaker foe. Ultimately though, it is not like any of of the organizations are genuinely upright in a moral standpoint, yet as many others have said beforehand (and in more detail than myself) it would have been interesting if the player Raven from Nexus could have sided with Navis to turn the tides of war in the company's favor. Can not wait for the next video, or to see how you'll eventually tackle the events of Last Raven. 👍

[@armoredcorelore]

Thank you C master and yes i am feeling much better now =). It would certainly have been much like Line ark in acfa, there was a story to be had there after all maybe if crest and Kisaragi had stuck with navis it could have been the end of mirage. And oh I'm getting there hopefully the next video or the one after that LR story is going to get done.