Quick Look: Forspoken

Feels like I'm the only person that's really enjoying this one. Ah well.

What's funny is I'm enjoying it despite so many of the criticisms here being super valid. Jumping on precise platforms, bizarre stealth sections that have the strangest time-wasting mechanics, not picking up the bag with the money... yep, all there!

Disclaimer: I spent $20 on it.

To Tam's point about the amount of dialogue, that is why i don't get the 'oh but you like marvel.' Even if true, those films are only ~2 hours at a go and the amount of dialogue is appropriate(ish) to the run time (and does not repeat, which can not be stressed enough for games that feature 'dynamic' dialogue in battles or activities.) i imagine even the biggest meta deadpool fan would be getting mighty tired if that film were 20 hours long and he repeated his quips hundreds of times over the course of the film

My issue with the game is that it actively hates its setting, and the direction for each cutscene is awful. The dialogue isn't great, but the camera movements, musical choices, foley work etc. is all terrible as well. It adds up int something painful to watch. Mix in the amount of fade in's/out, the combat being bland early and while it gets to be very pretty spell-wise it never FEELS good to play. It's just a weird mess, and despite all the delays it still feels like a massive amount of content was cut out. I beat the entire story in 6 hours.

Is it harsh that I keep wanting to compare this game to ReCore? Both ReCore and Forspoken are not a terrible idea and you can see a hint of what they’re going for, but the execution just isn’t quite there, and they clearly cut some content from the game which makes it feel kinda thin.

ReCore was more a technical mess, while Forspoken seems to just have tone/writing issues, control responsiveness issues, but in my mind they’re both in the bucket of “Japanese dev tries new IP with a fresh concept that potentially has international appeal but developer fumbled the execution, so probably no sequel.”

@bisonhero: No, I'd agree with that. Part of Forspoken's problem is that there are a lot of interesting/potentially cool ideas going on, but the opening 5-7 hours is a distillation of pretty much every single flaw the game has. Terrible writing, technical issues, walk stand and talk sections, boring combat, pacing problems, etc. It's like they were trying to get people to not like the game. There's fun to be had, but I absolutely wouldn't blame anyone for putting it down pretty quickly, especially when there are way better things like Hi-Fi Rush or the Dead Space remake out there.

Also, Square really needs to find a new visual language for "fantasy world" than "upward curving arches of rock." It makes all their games feel creatively inbred when it's in every single title they do.

Great quick look. This honestly looks like Squeenix trying to squeeze one last thing out of this engine and development processes they’ve put a lot resources into circa FF15. Everything that went wrong with that game is present here.

I really hope some sort of documentary comes out eventually which reveals all the issues with Luminous and that period of Square Enix because its fascinating even on the things you can clearly infer.

@bisonhero: I have a strong fondness for ReCore! I'm much more willing to forgive technical oversights than tone/dialogue. Also it helps that I first played the post-patched Definitive Edition.

@mikachops: I'd be very interested in an in depth look at this game's development too. I finished it on pc over the weekend and there's so many graphical systems that seem bugged and/or broken on both the pc and ps5

Man, I really need to try the demo because everything that I've seen of Forspoken looks fine, and yet people cannot stop shitting all over it. I don't think that the dialogue/Frey's character would bother me, although, that might be because I'm hoping for character development that turns her into a likeable person (hell, even DmC managed to do that with its Dante).

I've, thankfully, got too much on my plate right now. I have a feeling that the price on this will plummet by the time that I'm ready to give it a go for myself.

Lucy and Tam are my favorite pair on the site, and they're perfect for. . .this.

Isekai stories are more common than people realize

Evil Dead 3

TMNT 3 movie

Wizard of Oz

etc

@ultimaxe: From what I'm reading, the character development -is- there, I'm halfway in the story but spending tons of time doing open world bullshit(26 hours in). I really really liked the kotaku review on this one, it highlights the real issues and flaws with the game but goes over what it does well.

If you want a protoype/infamous/ffxv "thing", you could...well, you can't really do worse or better because that game only exists in forspoken, so if that sounds good you should try it sometime.