Godfall (2020)

Playtime: 1h23m (tutorial plus part of one mission)

Intro

Godfall is a third-person ARPG. The Challenger Edition of Godfall levels you up to 50 (the max for normal levels) and limits you to one of three multiplayer modes.

The Good

I like the idea of the different suits of armor, it seems like a solid way to have different 'classes'. The combat technically could have been decent too.

The Bad

• The tutorial is terrible. It takes over 75 minutes and just has you beat up people in a boring, endless gaudy palace filled with vases that you want to smash for loot. This could have been an e-mail.

• After the tutorial the game just throws a million things at you that still aren't explained, like the various game modes.

• Two of the three game modes require currency to enter. What?

• The free game mode is just boring MMO stuff. Go to place X and beat enemies. Nothing interesting about it, it makes Destiny 2 look deep.

• You only get 4 respawns in this mode. Wow.

• Enemies constantly knock you down.

• You get locked into animations. This basically ruins the combat.

• The controls are awful, of course. Blocking is done with Q? And special attacks have to be charged by holding E? Huh?

Conclusion

I slogged through the boring tutorial hoping for something interesting but ended up Alt+F4-ing the second time i died during the first mission. You are outnumbered 3/4 to 1, constantly get attacked from behind by newly spawned enemies you couldn't see and can't properly block because a) the button is Q (lol) and b) you get locked into animations. Imagine how stupid you have to be to design a melee combat game where you can't properly intercept enemy attacks.

Played the full edition, campaign only, played just over half way through the campaign.

Story

The story actually could be interesting. But it's presented in the worst way possible, there's a guy who's kinda bad and here's a stone version of Cortana and you're the bad guys brother, or sister?, depending on the skin you put on, and we need to stop our somehow evil? brother from becoming a God. It's weird because there's a lot of lore and if the campaign engaged in any world-building whatsoever to deliver it more effectively it could have been passable, but it's presentation is so slapped together I can't imagine anyone caring about it.

Graphics

Godfall designers seem to love Versace, gaudy gaudy gaudy opulence without any of the ingenuity. The particle effects, the shininess, the colours: all are impressive. But at a base level the visual design is just mediocre at best, it's giving mobile game advertised on FB. I liked stone Cortana but that's about it, and I think the reason I like her is because she's the only character with an actual FACE. Everyone else is an empty husk with voice lines attached, and I would extend that metaphor to the game as a whole: a pretty shell without anything inside.

Combat

At first it reminded me of classic God of War, then I realised it's nothing like that, nothing of the sort. The main issue for me was: no animation cancelling and being staggered. It's not even stagger, every other enemy KNOCKS YOUR ASS TO THE FLOOR and despite how fast they attack, you're locked in to an attack until it completes its entire animation cycle so you'll see you're about to be attacked BUT YOU CANT DO ANYTHING ABOUT IT. Enemies between zones are just re-skinned. Bosses seem cool but then it falls apart because of the terrible baseline combat design.

Progression

JAIL! Grinding out tokens on crappy hunt missions to unlock the next campaign mission, wherein you'll just be doing the same sh!t because they put zero thought into making each mission unique, memorable or interesting. There are no cutscenes beyond the opening, no set-pieces, no gravitas - every mission is just hacking away at whoever the game wants dead this time, maybe you'll get to break a special pot or light a beacon but that's about it!

Overall