Shelly “Bombshell” Harrison is back in this highly interactive mix of first person action and road movie adventure. Embark on an adrenaline-fueled journey around the USA. Use an enormous arsenal of weapons and skills to battle treacherous soldiers and vile mutants, all while trying to save mankind.
Also in series
Released on
Genres
Reviews View More
6/10📜
The fact that I like Half-life, and admire the original Ion Fury, didn`t guarantee pleasure from Phantom Fury (a sequel, but from other devs), I received only 12 hours of unbearable boredom, the game simply has nothing to surprise, there’s nothing to show that you haven’t already seen, although the game has some interesting beginnings, as well as excellent work with the Unity engine, only in terms of visual.. You know it`s like sequels to suddenly successful films from major studios, when the publisher decided that you can build an entire franchise on this, “Phantom Fury” feels like such an aimless studio product, although what sky-high profits are they counting on for a specific boomer-shooter, which stood out mainly for its technical work with the “Build engine” of the 1990s and 2D art design?
It’s difficult to classically describe the gameplay of the game, because they were trying to create a reference/copy from literally every more or less recognized shooter, the list of things I thought about could be endless.. so I would spoil your only pleasure, if you suddenly decide play it for yourself (and what kind of epic nostalgic music is constantly playing, you would know, as if you should just flow from every moment of the game - no),
But still corу gameplay is a rather interesting mix, enemies constantly run across, like in Half-life, different types can “lively” fight with each other in arenas (and btw shoot each other in the back - it can be very useful, but I don’t know if it’s intended that way), mechanically in terms of gunplay - this is also, approximately HL, but rather the second part, but at first everything happens in the surroundings of endless sci-fi corridors ala "Black Mesa", but the pace of the character is slower, run by pressing shift not holding, Shelley "Bombshell" higher and heavier, just like in the recent “RoboCop” 2023, so the heads of enemies in our sight are much smaller and seem more frisky, and in hand-to-hand combat we take out any enemy with 1 click with an endless and short recharge of our robotic arm, 2nd ability shield from the same hand,
There is stealth from sniper towers, which explode only by throwing a grenade, here "manhacks" (and not only it) suddenly fly out of the ventilation, and sometimes run into their own trap mines, the turrets must be destroyed by following the wire that leads to the shield, but you can do it head-on, they hung with different types of ammo throughout the whole game,
There is object physics, but it’s default, and doesn’t allow you to “play”; you’ll often fly up somewhere due to run boost because of it, and you can also abuse the system by building a mountain of folders and climbing somewhere without solving the necessary puzzle, in HL2 2004 there were no such ill-conceived moments, the only justification for the presence of physics in the PF game is the enemies ability to throwing of objects blocking their path.. there is also a funny moment about the player`s ability to open any trash can or office drawer, as if the prop assets were copied from the engine, but not once out of 100 pieces didn`t have anything inside - that’s the “charm” of template engines, although I’m not against modern colorful effects and dismemberment,
At the same time, the second game that the Phantom Maiden most resembles is Halo, which is logical, in 2001 it received almost 100-point ratings on Metacritic. The Halo is visible in half of the platformer's mountain levels of the game, where they often allow you to drive an SUV from 3rd person, and, of course, turrets can be removed from racks (btw, at the beginning where you don`t have this ability yet there is a cool backtracking moment when we pass through the same turret several times, and there are exactly as many cartridges in the clip as there are enemies), and well, there’s also a reference to the parasitic “Flow”, unlike Half-Life moments, this cannot be called a direct imitation, everything is in the form of mixes, vibes, and your conjectures, but I’m sure that the developers looked at “Halo” (but lacking shield enemies to complete the picture),
By the way, despite the fact that the game is mostly linear, the “arena-shooterness” is imparted by the destructions of barriers, which does not allow you to sit in one place, as it could be done in almost any shooter, although the bosses-helicopters (yes, yes, the most ordinary helicops straight from the first hl which are repeated several times) done quite the opposite - standing behind a wall and shooting at a pixel is easy way to win.. damn, and also this bait from a trawler about piloting, this is another mini-game, that is, essentially just a rail shooting scvene - we only control the sight, the rest of the side entertainment is just as basic, I don’t see any point in mentioning it, the plot is the same, there are only 10-second cutscenes with a couple of lines from animated characters for some reason (for what?), and the finger/hand of the main character, which she always points to someone,
Why did they also connect this with the universe of the “Sin” games with such a conversation (well, there’s just a remake from 3D Realms coming, you know), adding another unnecessary pistol to the already overloaded arsenal, in general, weapons in Fanta are more or less fine, have 2 types of shooting, which open in a simple upgrading, but these are far from those awesome designs from Ion Fury - it doesn’t look the same in 3D, our electric baton is now used less often and charges very small shields, not generators, but although another key feature - bowling grenades came in handy here much more often,
You can also endlessly criticize game for technical flaws, I have already assumed that the game is purely a publishing request (considering what serious financial losses 3D Realms is currently experiencing), the game was postponed from 2023, the final location didn`t even have time to be tested, there are lanterns hanging in the air, and invisible walls are in the wrong places, enemies always don’t see you, and if they do, they can freeze trying to shoot through the barrier, or they can fall into ledges, the turret can kill itself by shooting into its own debris, and the helicopter-boss can fly into space from your shotgun shot, in the story cutscene it may be unclear where to go, there is a very unintuitively made weapon-tool-saw, which can help in backtracking and requires searching for batteries and charging stations,
The Slipgates hardly expected to create a masterpiece for all time, but they weren’t even given time to come up with a overall creative vision for the game; it turned out to be just another boomer shooter with a couple of good arenas, the buyers of which were angry fans of the diamond original, a game-phenomenon, the repetition of which will most likely be impossible, although the idea itself of technically repeating each eara of the great shooters is not bad, I would like to see the final Ion Fury 2 in the graphics of the Playstation 3 generation, but now, alas.
😊 Sub to my Steam`s Curator`s page: https://store.steampowered.com/curator/41977550
//
То, что мне нравиться первый и второй Half-life, и восхищает оригинальный Ion Fury 2019 года, совершенно не гарантировало мне удовольствие от Phantom Fury (сиквел, но от других разрабов), я получил лишь 12 часов невыносимой скуки, игре просто нечем удивить, нечего показать из того, чего вы уже не видели, хотя интересные зачатки в игре присутствуют, а также тут прекрасная работа с движком Unity по части визуала.. Знаете, как бывают сиквелы внезапно успешных фильмов от крупных студий, когда издатель вдруг решил, что на этом можно построить целую франшизу, "Призрачная ярость" чувствуется вот таким бесцельным студийным продуктом, хотя на какую заоблачную прибыль вы рассчитываете для специфичного жанра бумер-стрелялки, которая выделялась, в основном, именно технической работой с движком "Build engine" 90-ого года и 2D-арт-дизайном?
Сложно классически описать геймплей игры, ибо тут как-будто бы пытались создать отсылку/скопировать буквально от каждого более менее заметного шутера, перечислять на что я подумал можно было бы бесконечно, поэтому зачем.. так я бы заспойлерил бы вам единственное удовольствие, если вы вдруг надумаете поиграть сами (а какая же эпическая ностальгическая музыка играет просто постоянно вы бы знали, будто вы должны прям течь с каждого момента игры - нет!),
Но всё таки кор. геймплей представляет из себя достаточно занятный микс, враги постоянно перебегают, как в Half-life, разные типы могут "живо" сражаться друг с другом на аренках (и кст друг дружке в спину стрелять тож - очень полезно бывает, но хз задумано ли так), механически по ганплею - это тоже, примерно, Халфа, но, скорее вторая, но происходит поначалу всё в антураже бесконечных сай-фай коридоров аля "Блек Мезы", а вот темп персонажа помедленнее, бежать на нажатие шифта, а не удерживание, Шелли "Бомбшелл" выше и тяжеловеснее, прям как в недавнем "Робокопе" 2023 года, поэтому головёшки врагов в нашем прицеле гораздо меньше и кажутся более резвыми, а в рукопашке мы выносим любого врага с 1 нажатия с бесконечной и короткой перезарядкой нашей робо-руки, на 2 способность из руки вылезает щит,
Тут есть стелс от снайперских вышек, которые взрываются только закидыванием гранаты, тут "манхаки" (и не только) резко вылетают из вентиляций, и иногда набегают на свои же trap-мины, турели надо уничтожать, прослеживая за проводом, который ведёт к щитку, но можно и в лобовую, их напихали разных видов на протяжении всей игры,
Тут есть физика предметов, но дефолтная, не позволяющая "играться" как в Халфе, зачастую вы будете куда-то подлетать из-за ран буста, а также вполне можете абузить систему выстраивая гору папок и закарабкиваясь куда-то без решения необходимой головоломки, таких непродуманных моментов в HL2 2004 года уже не было, единственное оправдание наличия физики в Фантоме - это швыряние преграждающих путь врагам предметов в нас.. тут ещё есть забавный момент возможности открытия любого мусорного бака или офисного ящика, будто ассеты пропов скопировали из движка, но ни разу из 100 штук ни разу ничего не положили в них - вот вам и "прелесть" шаблонных движков, хотя против современных красочных эффектов и расчленёнки я не против,
При этом второй игрой, на которую наиболее смахивает Фантомная фурия я бы назвал - Halo, что логично, в 2001 году она получила почти 100-бальные оценки на Метакритике, Хало видится в половине рельефных платформенных горных уровнях игры, где зачастую дают по управлять внедорожником от 3-его лица, и, конечно, турели можно будет снимать со станков (кстати, в начале они не снимаются и есть прикольный бэктрекинговый момент, когда мы несколько раз проходим через одну и ту же турель, в итоге патронов хватает прям ровно до нуля) ,а ну ещё отсылка на паразитный "Поток", в отличии от Халф-Лайфа это нельзя назвать прямой имитацией, всё в виде миксов, вайбов, и ваших домыслов, но я уверен, что разрабы на "Гало" оглядывались (ток врагов-щитовиков не хватило для полной картины),
Кстати, несмотря на то, что игра в большинстве линейная, "арена-шутерности" придаёт разрушение заграждений, не дающее засесть в 1 месте, как можно почти в любом шутере, хотя боссы-вертолёты (да да, самые обычные вертолёты прям из первой хл, которые повторяются несколько раз), именно таким способом - вставания за стеночкой и расстрелом пикселя, легко побеждаются.. блииин, а как же ещё байтил трейлер полётом на вертолёте, в итоге это очередная мини-игра, то есть по сути просто тир - мы управляем только прицелом, остальные побочные развлечения такие же базовые смысла упоминать не вижу, с сюжетом тоже самое, есть только 10-секундные катсцены с парой реплик зачем-то анимированных персонажей (ради чего?), и тыканьем главной героини в кого-то пальцем,
Зачем они ещё 1 таким разговором это связали со вселенной игр "Sin" (а ну там просто ремейк от 3Д Рилсмов на горизонте понимаете), дав к итак перегруженному арсеналу ещё один ненужный пистолет,
в целом, оружие в Фанте "сдобно стреляет", имеет по 2 вида стрельбы, которые открываются в простенькой прокачке, но это далеко не те охеренные дизайны из Ion Fury - в 3D уже выглядит не так, наша электрическая дубинка теперь используется реже и заряжает очень маленькие щитки, а не генераторы, но хотя ещё одна ключевая фишка в виде боулинговых гранат тут мне пригождалась гораздо чаще,
Можно долго ругать ещё за технические огрехи, я уже предположил, что игра чисто издательский запрос (учитывая какие серьёзные финансовые убытки 3D Realms сейчас переживает), игру переносили с 2023, и, финальную локацию даже не успели дотестить, там фонари висят в воздухе, и невидимые стены бывают не в тех местах, враги постоянно тебя не видят, а если видят, то могут зависнуть, пытаясь стрелять через заграждение, а могут свалиться в уступы, турель может убить себя в свой же обломок, а босс-вертолёт может улететь в космсос от выстрела дробовика, в сюжетной катсцене может быть непонятно куда идти, есть очень не интуитивно сделанное оружие-инструмент-пила, которая может помочь в бэктрекинге и требует нахождения аккумуляторов и зарядных станций,
Врядли "Слипгейтсы" претендовали прям на шедевр на все времена, но им не дали времени даже придумать общее творческое видение игры, получился просто ещё один бумер-шутер c парой неплохих аренок, покупателями которого стали разгневанные фанаты бриллиантового оригинала, повторить феномен которого, наверное, невозможно, хотя сама идея каждую часть технически повторять великие шутеры того времени неплохая, я бы хотел завершающий Ion Fury 2 в графике поколения Playstation 3, но теперь, увы.
😊 Поддержка подпиской: https://store.steampowered.com/curator/37365104
The fact that I like Half-life, and admire the original Ion Fury, didn`t guarantee pleasure from Phantom Fury (a sequel, but from other devs), I received only 12 hours of unbearable boredom, the game simply has nothing to surprise, there’s nothing to show that you haven’t already seen, although the game has some interesting beginnings, as well as excellent work with the Unity engine, only in terms of visual.. You know it`s like sequels to suddenly successful films from major studios, when the publisher decided that you can build an entire franchise on this, “Phantom Fury” feels like such an aimless studio product, although what sky-high profits are they counting on for a specific boomer-shooter, which stood out mainly for its technical work with the “Build engine” of the 1990s and 2D art design?
It’s difficult to classically describe the gameplay of the game, because they were trying to create a reference/copy from literally every more or less recognized shooter, the list of things I thought about could be endless.. so I would spoil your only pleasure, if you suddenly decide play it for yourself (and what kind of epic nostalgic music is constantly playing, you would know, as if you should just flow from every moment of the game - no),
But still corу gameplay is a rather interesting mix, enemies constantly run across, like in Half-life, different types can “lively” fight with each other in arenas (and btw shoot each other in the back - it can be very useful, but I don’t know if it’s intended that way), mechanically in terms of gunplay - this is also, approximately HL, but rather the second part, but at first everything happens in the surroundings of endless sci-fi corridors ala "Black Mesa", but the pace of the character is slower, run by pressing shift not holding, Shelley "Bombshell" higher and heavier, just like in the recent “RoboCop” 2023, so the heads of enemies in our sight are much smaller and seem more frisky, and in hand-to-hand combat we take out any enemy with 1 click with an endless and short recharge of our robotic arm, 2nd ability shield from the same hand,
There is stealth from sniper towers, which explode only by throwing a grenade, here "manhacks" (and not only it) suddenly fly out of the ventilation, and sometimes run into their own trap mines, the turrets must be destroyed by following the wire that leads to the shield, but you can do it head-on, they hung with different types of ammo throughout the whole game,
There is object physics, but it’s default, and doesn’t allow you to “play”; you’ll often fly up somewhere due to run boost because of it, and you can also abuse the system by building a mountain of folders and climbing somewhere without solving the necessary puzzle, in HL2 2004 there were no such ill-conceived moments, the only justification for the presence of physics in the PF game is the enemies ability to throwing of objects blocking their path.. there is also a funny moment about the player`s ability to open any trash can or office drawer, as if the prop assets were copied from the engine, but not once out of 100 pieces didn`t have anything inside - that’s the “charm” of template engines, although I’m not against modern colorful effects and dismemberment,
At the same time, the second game that the Phantom Maiden most resembles is Halo, which is logical, in 2001 it received almost 100-point ratings on Metacritic. The Halo is visible in half of the platformer's mountain levels of the game, where they often allow you to drive an SUV from 3rd person, and, of course, turrets can be removed from racks (btw, at the beginning where you don`t have this ability yet there is a cool backtracking moment when we pass through the same turret several times, and there are exactly as many cartridges in the clip as there are enemies), and well, there’s also a reference to the parasitic “Flow”, unlike Half-Life moments, this cannot be called a direct imitation, everything is in the form of mixes, vibes, and your conjectures, but I’m sure that the developers looked at “Halo” (but lacking shield enemies to complete the picture),
By the way, despite the fact that the game is mostly linear, the “arena-shooterness” is imparted by the destructions of barriers, which does not allow you to sit in one place, as it could be done in almost any shooter, although the bosses-helicopters (yes, yes, the most ordinary helicops straight from the first hl which are repeated several times) done quite the opposite - standing behind a wall and shooting at a pixel is easy way to win.. damn, and also this bait from a trawler about piloting, this is another mini-game, that is, essentially just a rail shooting scvene - we only control the sight, the rest of the side entertainment is just as basic, I don’t see any point in mentioning it, the plot is the same, there are only 10-second cutscenes with a couple of lines from animated characters for some reason (for what?), and the finger/hand of the main character, which she always points to someone,
Why did they also connect this with the universe of the “Sin” games with such a conversation (well, there’s just a remake from 3D Realms coming, you know), adding another unnecessary pistol to the already overloaded arsenal, in general, weapons in Fanta are more or less fine, have 2 types of shooting, which open in a simple upgrading, but these are far from those awesome designs from Ion Fury - it doesn’t look the same in 3D, our electric baton is now used less often and charges very small shields, not generators, but although another key feature - bowling grenades came in handy here much more often,
You can also endlessly criticize game for technical flaws, I have already assumed that the game is purely a publishing request (considering what serious financial losses 3D Realms is currently experiencing), the game was postponed from 2023, the final location didn`t even have time to be tested, there are lanterns hanging in the air, and invisible walls are in the wrong places, enemies always don’t see you, and if they do, they can freeze trying to shoot through the barrier, or they can fall into ledges, the turret can kill itself by shooting into its own debris, and the helicopter-boss can fly into space from your shotgun shot, in the story cutscene it may be unclear where to go, there is a very unintuitively made weapon-tool-saw, which can help in backtracking and requires searching for batteries and charging stations,
The Slipgates hardly expected to create a masterpiece for all time, but they weren’t even given time to come up with a overall creative vision for the game; it turned out to be just another boomer shooter with a couple of good arenas, the buyers of which were angry fans of the diamond original, a game-phenomenon, the repetition of which will most likely be impossible, although the idea itself of technically repeating each eara of the great shooters is not bad, I would like to see the final Ion Fury 2 in the graphics of the Playstation 3 generation, but now, alas.
😊 Sub to my Steam`s Curator`s page: https://store.steampowered.com/curator/41977550
//
То, что мне нравиться первый и второй Half-life, и восхищает оригинальный Ion Fury 2019 года, совершенно не гарантировало мне удовольствие от Phantom Fury (сиквел, но от других разрабов), я получил лишь 12 часов невыносимой скуки, игре просто нечем удивить, нечего показать из того, чего вы уже не видели, хотя интересные зачатки в игре присутствуют, а также тут прекрасная работа с движком Unity по части визуала.. Знаете, как бывают сиквелы внезапно успешных фильмов от крупных студий, когда издатель вдруг решил, что на этом можно построить целую франшизу, "Призрачная ярость" чувствуется вот таким бесцельным студийным продуктом, хотя на какую заоблачную прибыль вы рассчитываете для специфичного жанра бумер-стрелялки, которая выделялась, в основном, именно технической работой с движком "Build engine" 90-ого года и 2D-арт-дизайном?
Сложно классически описать геймплей игры, ибо тут как-будто бы пытались создать отсылку/скопировать буквально от каждого более менее заметного шутера, перечислять на что я подумал можно было бы бесконечно, поэтому зачем.. так я бы заспойлерил бы вам единственное удовольствие, если вы вдруг надумаете поиграть сами (а какая же эпическая ностальгическая музыка играет просто постоянно вы бы знали, будто вы должны прям течь с каждого момента игры - нет!),
Но всё таки кор. геймплей представляет из себя достаточно занятный микс, враги постоянно перебегают, как в Half-life, разные типы могут "живо" сражаться друг с другом на аренках (и кст друг дружке в спину стрелять тож - очень полезно бывает, но хз задумано ли так), механически по ганплею - это тоже, примерно, Халфа, но, скорее вторая, но происходит поначалу всё в антураже бесконечных сай-фай коридоров аля "Блек Мезы", а вот темп персонажа помедленнее, бежать на нажатие шифта, а не удерживание, Шелли "Бомбшелл" выше и тяжеловеснее, прям как в недавнем "Робокопе" 2023 года, поэтому головёшки врагов в нашем прицеле гораздо меньше и кажутся более резвыми, а в рукопашке мы выносим любого врага с 1 нажатия с бесконечной и короткой перезарядкой нашей робо-руки, на 2 способность из руки вылезает щит,
Тут есть стелс от снайперских вышек, которые взрываются только закидыванием гранаты, тут "манхаки" (и не только) резко вылетают из вентиляций, и иногда набегают на свои же trap-мины, турели надо уничтожать, прослеживая за проводом, который ведёт к щитку, но можно и в лобовую, их напихали разных видов на протяжении всей игры,
Тут есть физика предметов, но дефолтная, не позволяющая "играться" как в Халфе, зачастую вы будете куда-то подлетать из-за ран буста, а также вполне можете абузить систему выстраивая гору папок и закарабкиваясь куда-то без решения необходимой головоломки, таких непродуманных моментов в HL2 2004 года уже не было, единственное оправдание наличия физики в Фантоме - это швыряние преграждающих путь врагам предметов в нас.. тут ещё есть забавный момент возможности открытия любого мусорного бака или офисного ящика, будто ассеты пропов скопировали из движка, но ни разу из 100 штук ни разу ничего не положили в них - вот вам и "прелесть" шаблонных движков, хотя против современных красочных эффектов и расчленёнки я не против,
При этом второй игрой, на которую наиболее смахивает Фантомная фурия я бы назвал - Halo, что логично, в 2001 году она получила почти 100-бальные оценки на Метакритике, Хало видится в половине рельефных платформенных горных уровнях игры, где зачастую дают по управлять внедорожником от 3-его лица, и, конечно, турели можно будет снимать со станков (кстати, в начале они не снимаются и есть прикольный бэктрекинговый момент, когда мы несколько раз проходим через одну и ту же турель, в итоге патронов хватает прям ровно до нуля) ,а ну ещё отсылка на паразитный "Поток", в отличии от Халф-Лайфа это нельзя назвать прямой имитацией, всё в виде миксов, вайбов, и ваших домыслов, но я уверен, что разрабы на "Гало" оглядывались (ток врагов-щитовиков не хватило для полной картины),
Кстати, несмотря на то, что игра в большинстве линейная, "арена-шутерности" придаёт разрушение заграждений, не дающее засесть в 1 месте, как можно почти в любом шутере, хотя боссы-вертолёты (да да, самые обычные вертолёты прям из первой хл, которые повторяются несколько раз), именно таким способом - вставания за стеночкой и расстрелом пикселя, легко побеждаются.. блииин, а как же ещё байтил трейлер полётом на вертолёте, в итоге это очередная мини-игра, то есть по сути просто тир - мы управляем только прицелом, остальные побочные развлечения такие же базовые смысла упоминать не вижу, с сюжетом тоже самое, есть только 10-секундные катсцены с парой реплик зачем-то анимированных персонажей (ради чего?), и тыканьем главной героини в кого-то пальцем,
Зачем они ещё 1 таким разговором это связали со вселенной игр "Sin" (а ну там просто ремейк от 3Д Рилсмов на горизонте понимаете), дав к итак перегруженному арсеналу ещё один ненужный пистолет,
в целом, оружие в Фанте "сдобно стреляет", имеет по 2 вида стрельбы, которые открываются в простенькой прокачке, но это далеко не те охеренные дизайны из Ion Fury - в 3D уже выглядит не так, наша электрическая дубинка теперь используется реже и заряжает очень маленькие щитки, а не генераторы, но хотя ещё одна ключевая фишка в виде боулинговых гранат тут мне пригождалась гораздо чаще,
Можно долго ругать ещё за технические огрехи, я уже предположил, что игра чисто издательский запрос (учитывая какие серьёзные финансовые убытки 3D Realms сейчас переживает), игру переносили с 2023, и, финальную локацию даже не успели дотестить, там фонари висят в воздухе, и невидимые стены бывают не в тех местах, враги постоянно тебя не видят, а если видят, то могут зависнуть, пытаясь стрелять через заграждение, а могут свалиться в уступы, турель может убить себя в свой же обломок, а босс-вертолёт может улететь в космсос от выстрела дробовика, в сюжетной катсцене может быть непонятно куда идти, есть очень не интуитивно сделанное оружие-инструмент-пила, которая может помочь в бэктрекинге и требует нахождения аккумуляторов и зарядных станций,
Врядли "Слипгейтсы" претендовали прям на шедевр на все времена, но им не дали времени даже придумать общее творческое видение игры, получился просто ещё один бумер-шутер c парой неплохих аренок, покупателями которого стали разгневанные фанаты бриллиантового оригинала, повторить феномен которого, наверное, невозможно, хотя сама идея каждую часть технически повторять великие шутеры того времени неплохая, я бы хотел завершающий Ion Fury 2 в графике поколения Playstation 3, но теперь, увы.
😊 Поддержка подпиской: https://store.steampowered.com/curator/37365104
Never let these mfs make a single video game ever again
As someone who enjoyed Ion Fury and Ion Fury: Aftershock, I was really excited at the reveal of Phantom Fury. It captures the visuals of a late 90s/early 2000s FPS. Regardless of what I have to say about it later, it absolutely nailed its graphical style.
I played the Phantom Fury demo in anticipation and in the nicest way possible, I would be fucking embarrassed if I was the one to release a demo in that state. I was hoping that they would delay the game to iron out its glaring issues and a lot of people felt the same way, then they announced that the game would be released 6 months later. From there I went in with very low expectations.
Phantom Fury is a skinwalker taking the identity of Half-Life 1 and 2 alongside the early builds of Duke Nukem Forever. With its nostalgic visuals, it hides such a blatantly unfinished, buggy and half-assed game inside that's trying to lure you in based on its looks, vibes and its John Blade cameo, because kids these days totally know what SiN is and who this John Blade guy is when he only appears for 30 seconds. While I don't agree with people calling Phantom Fury the new generation Blood 2 (because I would gladly replay this over Blood 2 any day of the week), if people are making those comparisons, you've seriously fucked up.
Phantom Fury wants to be Half-life 1 and 2 so badly, its got all the set pieces like a jeep section, except the jeep is a Halo Warthog that controls like a drunken ice skater, with instances of cars shooting at you with rockets like in the Water Hazard chapter. Its got helicopter fights like in Surface Tension, except they don't work here because the AI is beyond stupid. You can replicate Half-Life's set pieces all you like, it's not a substitute for good level design. It's like the game is jangling keys at you trying to jog your nostalgia for a much better game while you play this slog. The levels range from desert region to tech-base and that's all there is to it. I get that the game is trying to invoke that feeling again, but it's 2024, we don't need all these physics-based puzzles in here like the technology for that stuff hasn't been around for 20 years. The level structure constantly goes through an identity crisis. Phantom Fury can't decide whether it wants to be a linear narrative experience, or a classic key hunt with excessive backtracking through the same looking hallways that you will get lost in because there is no sense of direction. Maybe instead of adding in all those quirky environmental interactions so you hopefully tug at people's nostalgia, you instead devoted that time into some better level design.
Onto the combat, it's so weightless like in the demo. Yeah they added in proper gibbing but nothing packs a punch, the automatic weapons feel like staplers and the shotguns feel like a gentle sneeze. The bowling bombs are so unreliable and bounced off enemies most of the time that I ended up never using them towards the end, the Motherflakker reloads too slowly for it to be useful as a crowd clearing weapon, the Ion Bow feels like a shell of its former self and instead of its very useful alt-fire, RMB is now for aiming down the sights like in Half-Life because why? Once again the Loverboy got the most use out of me, even if its lock on alt-fire feels slower, less snappy and has this annoying bug where it can lock on to props such as laptops. Seriously, how does this shit even make it into the final product? You can buy weapon mods for some of your guns. Yes, only a few weapons have purchasable mods. It's like they never finished the full weapon mod line-up. The weapons that do get mods though either have two or only one and it just feels unfinished. Am I supposed to believe that the standard shotgun was only gonna come with ONE weapon mod whereas that foam gun I never used came with two, and the fucking Ion Bow gets NO mods?
Enemies barely flinch or react to getting shot and when they die, they just ragdoll awkwardly. I'm not talking Painkiller ragdolls where enemies are sent flying across arenas in a satisfying way, I'm talking Source engine ragdolls that collapse onto themselves when you unfreeze them with the physics gun in Gmod. Enemies are on the spongey side and the game's way of making them difficult is to just send 20 of them bunched up in your direction, tanking your frame rate in the process. It also doesn't help that the AI is dumb as shit. Sometimes they take cover in the open, most of the time they get stuck on level geometry, and a frighteningly common occurrence were enemies just stand around doing nothing as if I'm not even there. I played this game on Hard and it felt so inconsistent. Sometimes the game would just freely give you health, armour and ammo for an hour for really basic fights, then it'll pull some insane resource conservation shit onto you during the tougher fights.
The story is laughably bad. Why is Shelly siding with the GDF again? They're acting like nothing happened in Aftershock. The Colonel just becomes a twist villain as he betrays you out of nowhere and after killing him, you have to fight ANOTHER FUCKING TWIST VILLAIN that comes way out of left-field and makes no sense. The game tries really hard to make you feel bad for Shelly, but it doesn't work when you hamfist her "tragic" past and trauma to the player and then she gets over it in a single anti-climatic cutscene.
I can't believe I paid $32 fucking Australian dollars for this unfocused, undercooked mess. I fucking gave Slipgate Ironworks and modern day 3D Realms my hard-earned money for this shit. I got Wrath: Aeon of Ruin and Graven from a cheap bundle and finished their early access campaigns ages ago and I'm terrified on what those games have become on their full releases when I eventually replay them.
I do not recommend Phantom Fury and to 3D Realms/Slipgate Ironworks, you guys gotta pull your shit together, because acting all pissy and childish towards reviewers in private who rightfully criticised your unfinished product that you gave out early copies for is not gonna fix this. Don't bite the hands that feed you.
I played the Phantom Fury demo in anticipation and in the nicest way possible, I would be fucking embarrassed if I was the one to release a demo in that state. I was hoping that they would delay the game to iron out its glaring issues and a lot of people felt the same way, then they announced that the game would be released 6 months later. From there I went in with very low expectations.
Phantom Fury is a skinwalker taking the identity of Half-Life 1 and 2 alongside the early builds of Duke Nukem Forever. With its nostalgic visuals, it hides such a blatantly unfinished, buggy and half-assed game inside that's trying to lure you in based on its looks, vibes and its John Blade cameo, because kids these days totally know what SiN is and who this John Blade guy is when he only appears for 30 seconds. While I don't agree with people calling Phantom Fury the new generation Blood 2 (because I would gladly replay this over Blood 2 any day of the week), if people are making those comparisons, you've seriously fucked up.
Phantom Fury wants to be Half-life 1 and 2 so badly, its got all the set pieces like a jeep section, except the jeep is a Halo Warthog that controls like a drunken ice skater, with instances of cars shooting at you with rockets like in the Water Hazard chapter. Its got helicopter fights like in Surface Tension, except they don't work here because the AI is beyond stupid. You can replicate Half-Life's set pieces all you like, it's not a substitute for good level design. It's like the game is jangling keys at you trying to jog your nostalgia for a much better game while you play this slog. The levels range from desert region to tech-base and that's all there is to it. I get that the game is trying to invoke that feeling again, but it's 2024, we don't need all these physics-based puzzles in here like the technology for that stuff hasn't been around for 20 years. The level structure constantly goes through an identity crisis. Phantom Fury can't decide whether it wants to be a linear narrative experience, or a classic key hunt with excessive backtracking through the same looking hallways that you will get lost in because there is no sense of direction. Maybe instead of adding in all those quirky environmental interactions so you hopefully tug at people's nostalgia, you instead devoted that time into some better level design.
Onto the combat, it's so weightless like in the demo. Yeah they added in proper gibbing but nothing packs a punch, the automatic weapons feel like staplers and the shotguns feel like a gentle sneeze. The bowling bombs are so unreliable and bounced off enemies most of the time that I ended up never using them towards the end, the Motherflakker reloads too slowly for it to be useful as a crowd clearing weapon, the Ion Bow feels like a shell of its former self and instead of its very useful alt-fire, RMB is now for aiming down the sights like in Half-Life because why? Once again the Loverboy got the most use out of me, even if its lock on alt-fire feels slower, less snappy and has this annoying bug where it can lock on to props such as laptops. Seriously, how does this shit even make it into the final product? You can buy weapon mods for some of your guns. Yes, only a few weapons have purchasable mods. It's like they never finished the full weapon mod line-up. The weapons that do get mods though either have two or only one and it just feels unfinished. Am I supposed to believe that the standard shotgun was only gonna come with ONE weapon mod whereas that foam gun I never used came with two, and the fucking Ion Bow gets NO mods?
Enemies barely flinch or react to getting shot and when they die, they just ragdoll awkwardly. I'm not talking Painkiller ragdolls where enemies are sent flying across arenas in a satisfying way, I'm talking Source engine ragdolls that collapse onto themselves when you unfreeze them with the physics gun in Gmod. Enemies are on the spongey side and the game's way of making them difficult is to just send 20 of them bunched up in your direction, tanking your frame rate in the process. It also doesn't help that the AI is dumb as shit. Sometimes they take cover in the open, most of the time they get stuck on level geometry, and a frighteningly common occurrence were enemies just stand around doing nothing as if I'm not even there. I played this game on Hard and it felt so inconsistent. Sometimes the game would just freely give you health, armour and ammo for an hour for really basic fights, then it'll pull some insane resource conservation shit onto you during the tougher fights.
The story is laughably bad. Why is Shelly siding with the GDF again? They're acting like nothing happened in Aftershock. The Colonel just becomes a twist villain as he betrays you out of nowhere and after killing him, you have to fight ANOTHER FUCKING TWIST VILLAIN that comes way out of left-field and makes no sense. The game tries really hard to make you feel bad for Shelly, but it doesn't work when you hamfist her "tragic" past and trauma to the player and then she gets over it in a single anti-climatic cutscene.
I can't believe I paid $32 fucking Australian dollars for this unfocused, undercooked mess. I fucking gave Slipgate Ironworks and modern day 3D Realms my hard-earned money for this shit. I got Wrath: Aeon of Ruin and Graven from a cheap bundle and finished their early access campaigns ages ago and I'm terrified on what those games have become on their full releases when I eventually replay them.
I do not recommend Phantom Fury and to 3D Realms/Slipgate Ironworks, you guys gotta pull your shit together, because acting all pissy and childish towards reviewers in private who rightfully criticised your unfinished product that you gave out early copies for is not gonna fix this. Don't bite the hands that feed you.
That is a tough one, for sure. Clocking just under 8 hours, you can see the potential of a great game, but there are many problems. "Phantom Fury" is clearly unpolished; it's a hitscan galore with dumb AI (to the game's defense, recent shooters pretty much all have that problem) and music so in the background and bland that I can't remember a single track even after just finishing the game. The story is so simple I could summarize it in a few sentences.
One thing I must give the game credit for, is the level variety and its pixel graphics, which are top of the line (though performance is really lacking). But even after all that, I had fun "some/most" of the time. It could be because there are so few games like this anymore and I was just craving a half-like. I'll admit it might just be a 2.5, but I'll push it to a 3... I really hope Slipgate Ironworks where pushed by Embracer Group to release their games unfinished and now that they are no longer under their control, they can release games to their full potential.
One thing I must give the game credit for, is the level variety and its pixel graphics, which are top of the line (though performance is really lacking). But even after all that, I had fun "some/most" of the time. It could be because there are so few games like this anymore and I was just craving a half-like. I'll admit it might just be a 2.5, but I'll push it to a 3... I really hope Slipgate Ironworks where pushed by Embracer Group to release their games unfinished and now that they are no longer under their control, they can release games to their full potential.
Ever since Phantom Fury was announced, I was very excited. I really like the overall look of the game. It's a sort of modern version of the graphics from the year 2000, and the artists have done a good job of creating a visually appealing title.
However, the game itself is sadly very disappointing. It feels like an aimless project that isn't sure what it wants to be. It's like Ion Fury, but without the fun and violent action nor the clever level design. It's very inspired by Half-Life 1 and 2, but without the well crafted narrative structure that makes the adventure engaging. It's like DNF 2001, but without the charm or the humor. It's even a tiny bit like Deus Ex, but without the complex mechanics and systems that make immsim so interesting to explore.
Combat is at best dull, at worst frustrating, especially because of the bullet spongy enemies and the lack of quick saves which sometimes forces you to replay a 5 minutes sequence all over again.
Enemies' AI is shockingly stupid, even for a small indie title. They often get stuck and stop attacking the player.
The developers had fun implementing numerous interactions with the environment. At first, this seems cool, but it quickly ends up feeling pointless and superficial. There's no gameplay purpose, and it's also inconsistent since some buttons can be pressed or objects picked up, but many others are purely decorative. Honestly they should have used the time spent making those interactions to improve the core gameplay instead.
Phantom Fury is a very unfocused game. It is ambitious and tries to do a lot of things (there are even some completely unnecessary vehicle sequences, or HL2-styled physics-based puzzles that seem to be there just for the sake of it), but everything feels half-baked, from the gameplay to the story (what story?). There are also a lot of bugs, such as scripts that don't execute properly and force us to reload the previous checkpoint. The bugs can be fixed, but I don't think the adventure will improve with a few patches.
However, the game itself is sadly very disappointing. It feels like an aimless project that isn't sure what it wants to be. It's like Ion Fury, but without the fun and violent action nor the clever level design. It's very inspired by Half-Life 1 and 2, but without the well crafted narrative structure that makes the adventure engaging. It's like DNF 2001, but without the charm or the humor. It's even a tiny bit like Deus Ex, but without the complex mechanics and systems that make immsim so interesting to explore.
Combat is at best dull, at worst frustrating, especially because of the bullet spongy enemies and the lack of quick saves which sometimes forces you to replay a 5 minutes sequence all over again.
Enemies' AI is shockingly stupid, even for a small indie title. They often get stuck and stop attacking the player.
The developers had fun implementing numerous interactions with the environment. At first, this seems cool, but it quickly ends up feeling pointless and superficial. There's no gameplay purpose, and it's also inconsistent since some buttons can be pressed or objects picked up, but many others are purely decorative. Honestly they should have used the time spent making those interactions to improve the core gameplay instead.
Phantom Fury is a very unfocused game. It is ambitious and tries to do a lot of things (there are even some completely unnecessary vehicle sequences, or HL2-styled physics-based puzzles that seem to be there just for the sake of it), but everything feels half-baked, from the gameplay to the story (what story?). There are also a lot of bugs, such as scripts that don't execute properly and force us to reload the previous checkpoint. The bugs can be fixed, but I don't think the adventure will improve with a few patches.
While the beginning was alright, the further you go into the game, the more you start to realize how unfinished this game is - with developers breaking even most basic game design ideas for seemingly no reason - like for example, if you miss a rocket launcher in one of the levels, you will be given ammunition for it all the time later in the game, but you'll never find the weapon itself ever again aside from that ONE SINGLE point in the game. Or for example making sure, when - if you've just completed a driving section and now you are in a smaller section where you have to finds elements to progress, to lock the player into the area in order to not make him drive for like 5 min to the beginning of the level. Then of course you have bugs, story that goes nowhere and generally you ever forget exists until some cutscene happens after like 2 or 3 levels. This would be a mediocre shooter with a cool aesthetic - but Slipgate yet again managed to mess it up.