What does EN Shortfall mean in Armored Core 6?

Armored Core 6 screenshot of two mechs in red environment
(Image credit: Bandai Namco)

What does the Armored Core 6 EN Shortfall label mean? When customising your mech in Fires of Rubicon, you might notice that certain choices cause a big red warning with EN Shortfall to come across, and you won't be able to take your mech out onto missions while that's still an issue. And with FromSoftware's customary unwillingness to explain things clearly, we figured it was worth explaining what EN Shortfall means in Armored Core 6, and how you can resolve it, as it's simpler than you think.

EN Shortfall in Armored Core 6 explained

Armored Core 6 EN Shortfall

(Image credit: FromSoftware)

EN Shortfall in Armored Core 6 simply means that your equipped Generator isn't providing enough power and energy for the entire mech, in the same way that a AA-battery can't power a battleship. The solution is either to equip a Generator with a higher "EN Capacity" stat, or to swap out all your other components for those with a lower "EN load" number - which effectively refers to how much power they use up.

What you need to do is to get the "Current EN load" bar in the bottom right hand corner of the screen to a point where the filled section doesn't reach or exceed the white line, which represents the maximum amount of energy your generator can provide. If that's exceeded, you hit the EN Shortfall problem and can't take your mech on missions.

Certain parts and weapons are built to be energy-efficient, but some are inherently a big drain on power - usually energy weapons, like Lasers, Plasma and similar. If your build is way over the line, you'll either need a high-capacity generator installed, or lower EN-load parts - possibly both.

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Joel Franey
Guides Writer

Joel Franey is a writer, journalist, podcaster and raconteur with a Masters from Sussex University, none of which has actually equipped him for anything in real life. As a result he chooses to spend most of his time playing video games, reading old books and ingesting chemically-risky levels of caffeine. He is a firm believer that the vast majority of games would be improved by adding a grappling hook, and if they already have one, they should probably add another just to be safe. You can find old work of his at USgamer, Gfinity, Eurogamer and more besides.