UrLocalBanktoad
Log Status
Completed
Playing
Backlog
Wishlist
Rating
Time Played
--
Days in Journal
6 days
Last played
March 6, 2023
First played
February 26, 2023
Platforms Played
[Average Reading Time: 4 Minutes]
I will be avoiding story spoilers here, so no worries there. I go into gameplay stuff and talk about some mechanics, but I don't detail any specific items or enemies here.
There's a lot to unpack with this one.
Graphically, it looks great in the headset. Each mountainside you approach looks really nice up close, allowing for great immersion. However, there's some texture pop-in issues that you will notice quickly. It's nothing disorienting, but it is a little immersion-breaking.
Aside from a few rare dips in framerate, the game ran fine, overall. There are also plenty of accessibility options to help make the game more enjoyable if certain gameplay styles cause motion sickness.
The story is pretty weak. I didn't really get attached to the characters, and the plot is pretty straightforward. Don't go into this expecting a jaw-dropping narrative, or much of an interesting narrative at all, sadly.
Where this game shines and flickers, though, is its gameplay. Climbing mountains, ropes, and other things feels natural, for the most part. Moving too rapidly to quickly climb a mountain can cause some controller detection issues that can rarely lead to you missing an important grab and making you fall, but for the most part it works well.
Throughout the game you'll acquire different traversal tools to spice up climbing. Some of which you'll be using constantly throughout the game. However, there's one item you get that sadly doesn't get much use outside of the first area you get to play with it in. You'll reach the end of the game and forget it exists. The final traversal item gets plenty of use in the end, but you'll often need to be using it while looking directly up, which can make your neck pretty stiff after a while. If you have lights on in the room you're playing in and they're above you, this will also cause the VR headset's cameras to lose track of your environment, causing the game to stop for you to reorient yourself.
One half of this game is climbing and traversal. The other half is enemy encounters. Sadly, this is the weakest part of the game. Enemy encounters feel like they're designed for you to be facing one or two enemies at once at max. When 3 or more enemies appear, it quickly goes from exciting to stressful, requiring you to keep track of multiple enemies all doing different attacks while finding small pockets of time to allow you to shoot or eat a healing item.
As you progress, you'll acquire different types of ammo for your bow that cause status effects when you shoot enough of them at an enemy. Because enemies are constantly moving, for the most part, you'll either miss shots or spend too much time trying to aim. Along with needing to hit the enemy with enough of a status type, you also need to hit them rapidly. Wait too long and the status effect meter goes down, nullifying your hard work. It would be better if one or two arrows did the job regularly, instead of the multiple enemies and bosses require.
Speaking of bosses, there are some here. Visually, they're impressive. Fighting them, however, is kind of a nightmare. Bosses have multiple area-spanning attacks that will quickly tear through your health bar. You'll spend more time hunting for tables with apples on them during these matches than you will be actually fighting back. Enemies and bosses all have weak points that the game shows to you, allowing you to do good damage to them. It's great for common enemies, but when it comes to bosses, they can often be small or hard to hit, and with some bosses moving around rapidly, aiming for these points becomes an arduous task.
Enemy and boss arenas contain not only infinitely respawning healing items but also a limited number of special ammunition. Using special ammo is encouraged, if not required, for having a more fun experience fighting bosses as you expose weaknesses with them. However, the fun stops when you run out of special ammo. At this point all you can do is unload your basic infinite ammo into a boss until it falls over. Bosses take very little damage from regular ammo, turning fast-paced fights into boring slogs.
Perhaps the worst part about fighting bosses is that there is no checkpointing during them. If you're a few shots away from taking one down and you die, you restart from the beginning of the fight. This is highly frustrating, especially if a certain fight is dragged out due to previously mentioned special ammo problems.
Overall, I don't hate this game, but I don't think I'll be returning to it anytime soon. It does some cool stuff and is a long playthrough, so you do feel like you get your money's worth here. It's also a great workout, since you're moving your arms a lot during gameplay sessions.
If this game ever goes on sale for like $20 or $25, give it a shot if you want. While this game is not without its flaws, it isn't something I dislike.
One thing's for sure, it made me realize just how big the robots are in this universe. Honestly the coolest part of the game is getting to see these things up close. You can just boot it up to look at them and you'll immediately get your money's worth, if ya ask me.
I will be avoiding story spoilers here, so no worries there. I go into gameplay stuff and talk about some mechanics, but I don't detail any specific items or enemies here.
There's a lot to unpack with this one.
Graphically, it looks great in the headset. Each mountainside you approach looks really nice up close, allowing for great immersion. However, there's some texture pop-in issues that you will notice quickly. It's nothing disorienting, but it is a little immersion-breaking.
Aside from a few rare dips in framerate, the game ran fine, overall. There are also plenty of accessibility options to help make the game more enjoyable if certain gameplay styles cause motion sickness.
The story is pretty weak. I didn't really get attached to the characters, and the plot is pretty straightforward. Don't go into this expecting a jaw-dropping narrative, or much of an interesting narrative at all, sadly.
Where this game shines and flickers, though, is its gameplay. Climbing mountains, ropes, and other things feels natural, for the most part. Moving too rapidly to quickly climb a mountain can cause some controller detection issues that can rarely lead to you missing an important grab and making you fall, but for the most part it works well.
Throughout the game you'll acquire different traversal tools to spice up climbing. Some of which you'll be using constantly throughout the game. However, there's one item you get that sadly doesn't get much use outside of the first area you get to play with it in. You'll reach the end of the game and forget it exists. The final traversal item gets plenty of use in the end, but you'll often need to be using it while looking directly up, which can make your neck pretty stiff after a while. If you have lights on in the room you're playing in and they're above you, this will also cause the VR headset's cameras to lose track of your environment, causing the game to stop for you to reorient yourself.
One half of this game is climbing and traversal. The other half is enemy encounters. Sadly, this is the weakest part of the game. Enemy encounters feel like they're designed for you to be facing one or two enemies at once at max. When 3 or more enemies appear, it quickly goes from exciting to stressful, requiring you to keep track of multiple enemies all doing different attacks while finding small pockets of time to allow you to shoot or eat a healing item.
As you progress, you'll acquire different types of ammo for your bow that cause status effects when you shoot enough of them at an enemy. Because enemies are constantly moving, for the most part, you'll either miss shots or spend too much time trying to aim. Along with needing to hit the enemy with enough of a status type, you also need to hit them rapidly. Wait too long and the status effect meter goes down, nullifying your hard work. It would be better if one or two arrows did the job regularly, instead of the multiple enemies and bosses require.
Speaking of bosses, there are some here. Visually, they're impressive. Fighting them, however, is kind of a nightmare. Bosses have multiple area-spanning attacks that will quickly tear through your health bar. You'll spend more time hunting for tables with apples on them during these matches than you will be actually fighting back. Enemies and bosses all have weak points that the game shows to you, allowing you to do good damage to them. It's great for common enemies, but when it comes to bosses, they can often be small or hard to hit, and with some bosses moving around rapidly, aiming for these points becomes an arduous task.
Enemy and boss arenas contain not only infinitely respawning healing items but also a limited number of special ammunition. Using special ammo is encouraged, if not required, for having a more fun experience fighting bosses as you expose weaknesses with them. However, the fun stops when you run out of special ammo. At this point all you can do is unload your basic infinite ammo into a boss until it falls over. Bosses take very little damage from regular ammo, turning fast-paced fights into boring slogs.
Perhaps the worst part about fighting bosses is that there is no checkpointing during them. If you're a few shots away from taking one down and you die, you restart from the beginning of the fight. This is highly frustrating, especially if a certain fight is dragged out due to previously mentioned special ammo problems.
Overall, I don't hate this game, but I don't think I'll be returning to it anytime soon. It does some cool stuff and is a long playthrough, so you do feel like you get your money's worth here. It's also a great workout, since you're moving your arms a lot during gameplay sessions.
If this game ever goes on sale for like $20 or $25, give it a shot if you want. While this game is not without its flaws, it isn't something I dislike.
One thing's for sure, it made me realize just how big the robots are in this universe. Honestly the coolest part of the game is getting to see these things up close. You can just boot it up to look at them and you'll immediately get your money's worth, if ya ask me.