played it for a couple hours last night -- it's very similar to ac4, and at least the early mission design is the usual vague from software stuff. i've fought one of those giant 'arms forts,' which was pretty cool. and i'm sure it'll get stronger as it goes along, with more appearances by enemy 'nexts' with power comparable to your own -- imo those encounters are the highlights of these games.
the biggest improvement seems to be weapon balance...in ac4 you could quickly seize on some overpowered weapon type (say laser cannons) and stick with it through 95% of the game, whereas a lot of different weapons seem viable in 4a. mech tinkering is still the real hook -- and if you haven't played ac4, you'll be impressed with the sheer boosty mobility that mechs can easily attain. oh, and the intro fmv gave me a boner
seems like the game is structured in such a way that you can't do all the missions in one playthrough -- at the end of the first chapter you're given a choice of two arms forts to attack. replay value is nice, i guess, but this is slightly annoying when there are eleventy billion games coming out this fall and my time is limited!
