The game Forspoken, developed by Luminous Productions, takes inspiration from the popular isekai genre, but ultimately falls short in delivering a compelling story that makes the player care. The game's protagonist, Frey, finds herself trapped in the magical world of Athia and must bond with a sentient brace, Cuff, and help a group of survivors living in the last city free from the effects of a dangerous miasma called the Break.
Forspoken's story centers around the theme of belonging and finding a place to call home, however the characters and their emotional connections to Frey are flat and uninteresting. The game's combat is clunky and the regular exposition often stalls the action. Although the parkour and movement in the game are enjoyable and exhilarating, the lack of precision in platforming and levels within enclosed spaces can be frustrating.
The game's narrative setup is intriguing, but the characters let it down. It's difficult to connect with Frey, who is standoffish and stubborn, Cuff, who is incessantly sarcastic, or the survivors who rely heavily on Frey's protection but ask her to complete mundane tasks. The characters don't take the threat of Athia's imminent destruction seriously and any tension that arises from their perilous existence is repeatedly undermined by meaningless busywork.
The facial expressions of the characters in Athia are stilted and uncomfortable, which creates a disconnect with the emotional core of the story. The game fails to adequately flesh out the characters and their motivations, making it hard to believe and understand why Frey should care about them.
Forspoken fails to deliver a satisfying answer to the question of why the player should care about the story and characters. With not much keeping the player invested in the last bastion of human life in Athia, the game encourages players to explore the wider world, using Frey's parkour abilities and blasting enemies away with explosive magic. However, the lack of precision in platforming and levels within enclosed spaces can be frustrating.
In summary, while the world and setting of Forspoken are intriguing, the game falls short in delivering a compelling reason for the player to care about the story and characters. The clunky combat and regular exposition that stalls the action add to the disappointment. The game's parkour and movement mechanics are enjoyable but the lack of precision in platforming and levels within enclosed spaces can be frustrating.
Forspoken's movement is far more fun, especially in the latter half of the game
Forspoken is an action-RPG game that takes inspiration from the popular isekai genre, but ultimately falls short in delivering a compelling story that makes the player care. The game's protagonist, Frey, finds herself trapped in the magical world of Athia and must bond with a sentient brace, Cuff, and help a group of survivors living in the last city free from the effects of a dangerous miasma called the Break.
Forspoken's story centers around the theme of belonging and finding a place to call home, however the characters and their emotional connections to Frey are flat and uninteresting. The game's combat is clunky and the regular exposition often stalls the action. Although the parkour and movement in the game are enjoyable and exhilarating, the lack of precision in platforming and levels within enclosed spaces can be frustrating.
The game's narrative setup is intriguing, but the characters let it down. It's difficult to connect with Frey, who is standoffish and stubborn, Cuff, who is incessantly sarcastic, or the survivors who rely heavily on Frey's protection but ask her to complete mundane tasks. The characters don't take the threat of Athia's imminent destruction seriously and any tension that arises from their perilous existence is repeatedly undermined by meaningless busywork.
The facial expressions of the characters in Athia are stilted and uncomfortable, which creates a disconnect with the emotional core of the story. The game fails to adequately flesh out the characters and their motivations, making it hard to believe and understand why Frey should care about them.
Forspoken fails to deliver a satisfying answer to the question of why the player should care about the story and characters. With not much keeping the player invested in the last bastion of human life in Athia, the game encourages players to explore the wider world, using Frey's parkour abilities and blasting enemies away with explosive magic. However, the lack of precision in platforming and levels within enclosed spaces can be frustrating.
Frey can let loose a wide variety of bombastic spells and magical abilities, all of which are visually impressive displays. She can crush enemies with massive boulders, engulf whole groups in a molten eruption, or fry everything around her with brilliant green lightning. It all looks very cool, but there's not much in the way of strategy to it. Cuff can inform Frey what flavor of her magic is most effective against a particular enemy, and then all you have to do is switch to that element and keep tossing out attacks. Early into the game, you encounter enemy types that encourage you to think a bit beyond that--enemies who can block magic from the front or foes who can't be damaged until you destroy their wings, for example--but they only really appear in the first quarter of the story. After that, most enemies are bullet sponges designed to create challenge in how much of a magical beating they can take. It's not hard to switch magic types to mindlessly exploit weaknesses and so combat--though visually impressive--quickly loses all sense of enjoyment.
Forspoken's movement is far more fun, especially in the latter half of the game when you start unlocking and chaining new mechanics that increase the variety of ways that Frey can journey across Athia, like slingshotting herself through the air with a flaming whip or manipulating gravity to skate across the water. Even if there's nowhere interesting to go in Forspoken--its open world is dotted with an assortment of run-of-the-mill side quests like time-limited parkour challenges and photo ops--there's fun to be had in the act of simply getting to your next main story mission. The quiet hum of Forspoken's excellent soundtrack
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