While I've never played an Artcore, I seem to prefer the Epiphones to Ibanez guitars. Just my general preference.
Two of my friends play Artcores in a band and they sound pretty good, but I still like the sound I get from my Epiphone.
While the Ibanez are great guitars, you may want to change the pickups in it if that's your choice, though. My friends who play Artcores said that it sounds trashy at first. But once they changed the pickups they were good guitars. One put in Seymour Duncans and the other put in Burstbuckers.