Best Mech Games

Why it's here: Start here. FromSoftware rebuilds its mech series around a garage where you bolt together legs, boosters and arms, then throws the result at bosses that punish every wrong choice until you learn to read their tells. The recurring complaint in player reviews is that the opening difficulty wall turns people away before the build system clicks. Push past it. Several endings sit behind repeat playthroughs, and those runs are genuine extra content rather than padding.

Why it's here: The one to play for its story. You wall-run and grapple as a pilot on foot, then call down a Titan and climb in, and the bond between you and the robot BT carries a solo mode that has no business landing as hard as it does. Player reviews return again and again to how short it is. Treat that as a reason to play it rather than a reason to skip it, because nothing else here paces its set pieces this well.

Why it's here: The closest this list gets to actually sitting inside a BattleMech. Heat builds, you torso-twist to spread damage across armour panels, and contracts send you across a galaxy that keeps turning whether you take the job or not. The dependency players flag most often is mods: the base game leans on them to reach its best state. Budget an evening for the workshop before your first drop and it repays the setup.

Why it's here: The oldest pick here and still the fastest. Konami's remaster drops you into Jehuty for combat that moves in three dimensions at a speed the rest of this roster never attempts, all lock-on swarms and blade rushes. Player reviews of the PC release dwell on control and performance problems that do not apply to the PlayStation version listed here. What does carry over is length: this is a short one, built to be replayed rather than stretched.

Why it's here: The competitive pick, and the only game here with no aggregated player reviews behind it, because it never had a Steam release to gather them. What is not in doubt is the format: two-on-two arena duels built on cost management, where covering your partner matters more than winning your own fight. Decades of arcade Extreme VS sit underneath. Come to it for team play with a regular partner, not for a solo power fantasy.

Why it's here: Built for people who grew up on mecha anime and want the crossover taken seriously. Dozens of franchises share one grid, and every attack unfolds as a full animated cutscene you will not want to skip for the first several hours. Reviews consistently flag mission repetition once that novelty settles. The tactical layer is what holds afterwards, so come for the chess and treat the roster as the reward.

Why it's here: The deepest builder on the list. Strip Gunpla kits down to individual thrusters and weld together something that exists nowhere else, then take it out to see whether it holds up. Combat is really a delivery system for the workshop. Players who rate it lowest keep landing on the same point: the missions repeat. If the garage is the game for you, that trade is worth making. If you want the fights to carry it, look higher up.

Why it's here: Proof that a mech game does not need a third dimension. This is 2D action with boosters, blades and boss duels animated like a lost Saturday morning anime, and the moment-to-moment movement is the best argument for it. The honest limit players raise is scope: solo play offers a single mech, and the multiplayer never found an audience. Take it as a short, replayable set of hand-built stages and it delivers exactly that.

Why it's here: Mechs as chess pieces, with limbs you can target and blow off one at a time. The 1995 tactics design underneath is sharper than the presentation suggests, and the political story still has teeth. Reviews are blunt about the interface and menus, which show their age immediately. Anyone who wants the systems rather than the polish will find them intact, so accept the menus and play it for the limb-targeting.

Why it's here: A licensed love letter, and the pick that depends most on who you are. It recreates the 1970s anime set piece by set piece, soundtrack included, and puts you in the saucer-riding mech for all of it. Players who did not grow up on the show consistently call the missions repetitive. Anyone who did will not mind. Everyone else should treat it as a brisk mid-tier action game rather than a headline pick.

Why it's here: Fast, loud, and best taken in short sessions. You rebuild your suit between missions and the combat stays sharp enough to carry the loop on its own. The complaint that dominates its reviews is the open world, which players describe as empty. Treat the map as scaffolding between fights instead of somewhere to comb and the game improves considerably. The side content will not reward the same attention the combat does.

Why it's here: The gentlest way into Gundam on this list. Super-deformed mobile suits, a levelling loop, and three-player online co-op across a remixed tour of the franchise timeline. It sits in the PS Plus Extra catalogue, so a subscription is enough to start it. Grind is the sticking point players raise most, and progression does lean on repeat missions. For three people working through it together, that grind is the point rather than the price.

Why it's here: Free, and the lowest-risk way to find out whether piloting a mech appeals to you at all. You build a robot from parts and drop into twelve-player team battles that look far better than a no-cost game needs to. The complaint running through its reviews is monetisation, which players describe as pay-to-win. Go in treating it as a trial rather than a long-term home and it does that job well.

Why it's here: The free Gundam option, and the one with a roster deep enough to keep people playing for years. Suits unlock and tune across a catalogue that rewards specialising in a single role. Reviews are dominated by one thing, and it is not the combat: matchmaking, servers, and a disconnect penalty that lands hardest on newcomers. Gundam fans push through it. Anyone allergic to queue times should start somewhere else here.

Why it's here: The best-reviewed game on this list, and the loudest. Melee attacks refill your ammunition, so aggression is literally the reload button, and the whole thing is wrapped in heavy metal and hand-drawn armour. The reservation raised most often is the shift away from the action-platformer that came before it. Anyone arriving without that history will not feel the loss, and it is short, linear and built to be run again.

Why it's here: The story-led counterpart to Mercenaries, and the better-looking of the two. You command a five-pilot Clan star through a directed narrative with the sharpest cockpits the series has produced, trading the sandbox for a plot that actually goes somewhere. Bugs are what players raise most consistently. If contracts and mercenary bookkeeping bored you in Mercenaries, this is the version to try instead.