It may not be as big a name as Mario Kart World or Donkey Kong Bananza, but Daemon X Machina: Titanic Scion was one of the biggest reveals of the Switch 2 Nintendo Direct for certain audience members. Namely, mech sickos. Now, the sequel to a cult hit Switch action game has shown off a bit more of how its combat will work, and it’s surprisingly got more than a little Monster Hunter packed into its robotic frame.
The original Daemon X Machina is essentially a spiritual successor to Armored Core (released before FromSoftware revived the series with 2023’s Fires of Rubicon), featuring giant mechs blasting away at each other with missiles and lasers. Titanic Scion switches things up a bit, focusing on smaller exosuits, which has put some fans of the original game on edge. However, the switch to nimbler suits also comes with a vicious addition to melee combat that will have players ripping enemies about with their bare robotic hands.
In a new gameplay trailer, developer Marvelous runs down the details of how Titanic Scion’s combat will work. From the start, there’s a focus on melee and short-range combat, with an exosuit (called an Arsenal, like the original game’s mechs) using a sword along with a rifle in close range. Other interesting weapons like bows and railguns are also shown off, and it seems like Titanic Scion will put more emphasis on rapidly switching between weapons depending on which has an advantage against the foe you’re currently facing.
Where the trailer really starts to diverge from the original Daemon X Machina is in Titanic Scion’s new knockdown and grab attacks. When an enemy unit takes enough damage, it will be knocked down, letting the player grab it for a high-damage attack, or, hilariously, pick it up and throw it at other targets to take them both out.
Like the original, and other mech games like Armored Core 6, Titanic Scion also has you sometimes facing off against opponents much larger than your own Arsenal. Here, the new grab abilities of your exosuit take on a different, altogether more interesting form seemingly inspired by Monster Hunter and Dragon’s Dogma. When fighting these large enemies, grab attacks will let you rip off parts of their mechs, which exposes weak points you can target for more damage, building on a system from the original game that let you damage parts with weapon fire in boss fights. Even better, you can then pick up some of the parts that get torn off and use them as weapons. The trailer shows a player tearing a horn from one massive creature, then picking it up and wielding it like a club.
Daemon X Machina is already a great mech game that calls back to some of the classics of the genre, but Titanic Scions carving out its own identity definitely seems like the right move. With Armored Core itself now back and a wave of games like Mecha Break bringing giant battle bots back, Titanic Scions’ more brutal combat definitely helps it stand out from the crowd, and from its own predecessor.
Titanic Scion will be available on the original Switch, but from what’s been shown off in trailer, it also looks like it’s taking full advantage of the updated hardware in the Switch 2. While the original’s fast-paced combat was impressive, it was clearly held back a bit by the console’s relatively humble specs, as evidenced by the significantly better looking PC version. The sequel looks like a huge step up in that department, both in its more detailed environments and the silky smooth combat shown in its trailer. The first Daemon X Machina is a fun but niche entry in the Switch’s library, but Titanic Scion could make a bigger splash when it launches later this year.
