Enslaved: Odyssey to the West Review

[repivemag]

Before I start my review of the game I recently played I want to clarify something. I'm a story junkie. Most of the time I don't care if the game sucks as long as the story is well put together. Thankfully thats not the case with this game, its just something I thought you guys should know about me before I did this. Okay, on to my review.

There are few games that I've played in my 9 year gaming career that I've felt the need to tell everyone I know about and tell them repeatedly to play. These include games such as KOTOR, Mass Effect, Assassins Creed, and Dead Space. Enslaved has recently rocketed onto my list after playing it all night last Wednesday. There are several things about Enslaved that I absolutely love but like al games it also has a couple downsides.

First, the game has a really great story. It is inspired by an old Chinese novel and I'm not sure how much it takes from the novel but from what I've researched its just the main characters. These characters are named Monkey and Tripika(Trip for short). The story kicks off with them escaping a slave ship. After their crash landing it is discovered that Trip has placed a slave headband on Monkey that has him do whatever she commands while also ensuring her survival, as they establish right off the bat, if she dies you die. I really don't do it justice but it really gets better from there as they travel to return Trip to her village. The story takes place in a post-apocalyptic world where civilization has been destroyed by robots that were designed to fight a great war. I know what your thinking "Post-apocalyptic wastelands have already been done by Fallout. Yawn." And your right its been done before but not in this way. Instead of a bleak world of dust and destruction Enslaved uses a very colorful palette of various greens and blues to convey a world of not dirt and death but of re-growth and life in a world devoid of any. You see skyscrapers being overtaken by overgrowth and highways covered in grass making the game quite possibly one of the most beautiful I've ever played. Gameplay wise the game doesn't shine but its a refreshing change. You control Monkey throughout the game and as his name implies he's really good at climbing. This makes the main method of travel platforming that feels very fluid, albeit a bit simplistic. At periodic points in the game you also get to use a device called a "Cloud" which is a lot like the hover-board from Jak 2, if you ever played it. Combat feels very cinematic with Monkey jumping around all over the place smashing robots with his staff but it also gets a bit repetitive near the end of the game, a reason I suspect they also made your staff a plasma gun that you find ammo for periodically. However the biggest overall reason I have to love this game is the character development. Monkey and Trip are the most Human characters I've ever played. This is helped with some great facial animations and amazing voice work. The overall effect is two characters that develop in believable ways and react accordingly, and it creates a really emotional story in the process.

On to the Bad News. The game ends in a way that leaves you wanting more but there is no sequel planned. Creating what I call a "Emotional Gap" in the gamer where the person wants to know what happens next but the story doesn't leave any clues. There's also a supposed Frame-rate issue but I've never encountered it. Also sometimes the game leaves you to wander around aimlessly trying to find where your supposed to go only giving you a hint AFTER you've found where to go. In addition to the aforementioned combat representativeness these issues end up being minor inconvenience rather than game ruining bugs.

Overall, Enslaved is a really great game with no real reason not to buy it especially when you can get it for 10$ on Glyde. However if you have some pre-conceived hatred of platformers you may want to stay away.

Anyways thats my review there are a couple others I'm debating reviewing I'll see what you guys think of this one. Maybe I'll even get pretty pictures like the last guy who reviewed things did.
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That Guy

[repivemag]

I don't know why but this spambot made me laugh so hard.
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That Guy