Is Fate Accelerated Edition lighter in tone than Fate Core? To rephrase is Fate Core inherently better at running dark or noir games than Fate Accelerate Edition?
This is the impression given by the examples in the two books, and also the competency ratio of the two games (using the default skill list).
Fate Core starts characters being competent (ie any skill bonus) in 10 of 18 skils.
Fate Accelerated Edition starts characters with a bonus in 5 of 6 approaches.
Best Answer
You can run dark gritty games in Fate Accelerated, and light games in Fate Core. Fate Accelerated is Fate Core in a lot of ways—it's built out of that engine—it just shows you how to run the game with less mechanical detail. But mechanical detail is not an equivalence for grit, despite what other games in the RPG field have tried to teach us on that point.
The art in Fate Core is certainly a little darker in tone, while Fate Accelerated's art is lighter. That was a deliberate choice, but it's a deliberate choice made for marketing and audience targeting reasons rather than system-driven ones.