Forspoken's magic combat, which might feel a little familiar to Final Fantasy fans, is surprisingly deep and well thought out. The same elemental magic that aids Frey's excursions also fuel her fighting abilities. With these abilities, Frey can run like the wind, skip like a gazelle, and shimmy like a figure skater, covering vast distances within minutes in the fantastical world of Athia. Frey, the game's reluctant protagonist, stumbles upon elemental powers that let her perform feats of remarkable and otherworldly magic. But, when you stop and take stock, it resembles a classroom.Īll the fun playground stuff lies in Forspoken's magic combat and parkour. Forspoken's open world is a playground when you're whizzing through it on magic NOS. It is also, in many places, as far removed from the concept of fun as a dental exam. It's a game that often presents incredibly fun escapades, through its flashy combat and frenetic traversal. Sound familiar?ĭeveloped by Luminous Productions, a Square Enix subsidiary, Forspoken flits between many such contradictions, zig-zagging though the good and the bad, but - to its credit - it never flirts with the ugly. It is an open-world action RPG with an interminable map where points of interest dot every sliver of space like a particularly bad case of measles. And, at the same time, Forspoken is also treading conventional terrain. But then, it is also helmed by Square Enix, a behemoth of the industry, with a name as recognisable as names can get. It is neither a sequel, nor a part of a pre-established universe with existing social capital. It is a completely new IP, unattached and unfamiliar to industry precedent. The stakes are high and a new intellectual property that doesn't bear a recognisable name involves risks.įorspoken, which came out January 24 on PlayStation 5 and PC, is exactly that. Big publishers and developers, for understandable reasons, have to play it safe. Smaller, independent games are probably the final garrison of innovation and art in the medium, with a few exceptions. A brief sift through significant releases of past few years will reveal an alarming conveyor belt of sequels, remakes, and remasters of varying degrees of merit. Major video games, like any other mass-market products in these times, are plagued by conservatism.
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