Forspoken is trying very hard to build a magical world and forge its own identity
The release date for Forspoken, the new IP from Luminous Productions/Square Enix, is fast approaching. With just over a month to go and a new trailer showcased at The Game Awards, Square Enix has dropped a demo version on the PS5 so that players can experience what the magical land of Athia has to offer.
“FIND YOUR FIGHT
Forspoken follows the journey of Frey, a young New Yorker transported to the beautiful and cruel land of Athia. In search of a way home, Frey must use her newfound magical abilities to traverse sprawling landscapes and battle monstrous creatures.“
After a brief cinematic introduction, you are dropped into the world with very little explanation. Taking control of the lead character, Frey, there are a few simple tutorials before you are given five tasks to complete and let loose to interact with the creatures and features to explore a limited part of the world. You can do the tasks in any order, before facing a final tough enemy boss fight. It took me around an hour to complete the demo, but there is plenty of opportunity to find other locations and pad the experience if you so chose.
My initial reaction was that the visuals were underwhelming, to say the least. I appreciate this is the demo version of the game, and things could be different for the final release version of the game, but there’s an awfully long way to go for it to compete with other visually superior open-world third-person games already on the market.
The world is fairly sparse, devoid of artistic interest, and frankly just bland. Having played games like Horizon Forbidden West and Tales of Arise this year, Forspoken’s visuals pale into insignificance when we’ve seen what modern-day consoles can achieve. Where the artwork and effort appear to have been concentrated is in the character, especially the particle effects and character movements. Frey has an arsenal of sparkly magical spells to cast, each of which are detailed in their execution. However, I found there to be too much going on visually when the fights get up close and personal. As you can see from the gameplay video I recorded below, it can sometimes be difficult to see what’s happening.
Something else I picked up on was the character interactions. There is no explanation of who the male character talking to Frey is, and on more than one occasion, I noted how often Frey would utter F-bombs and curse words. Having such a young character swearing profusely at every opportunity wasn’t endearing to me, and it felt at odds with the magical, child-friendly aesthetic of the world Forspoken is trying to craft.
In terms of visual fidelity, there are three modes to try: Ray Tracing, Balanced, and Performance. Ray Tracing offers the best visuals, balanced aims to lock the frame rate at 30fps with 4K visuals, and performance mode runs in 1440p and at a steady 60 fps. It was disappointing that the Ray Tracing and Balanced modes ran so jerkily, as they rendered the game almost unplayable. There are some genres of games where a lower frame rate doesn’t become an issue, but for an action-adventure game, with lots of fast-flowing movement, it does. Thankfully, Performance mode coped with the fast action and was by far the most enjoyable way to experience the game.
“Frey’s unique abilities allow her to fluidly traverse the open world with ease.
Scale walls, vault across canyons, leap from dizzying heights, and dash through vast landscapes.
Using her newfound magical abilities, Frey is not only able to nimbly traverse the treacherous terrain of Athia and explore her strange new surroundings. This Magic Parkour also comes in handy when she comes toe-to-toe with the multitude of enemies lurking in the corrupted landscape of the Break.”
One of the main selling points is that the traversal of the world is supposed to be a major feature of the game. In previously released trailers, Frey can be seen vaulting across vast canyons and leaping from dizzying heights with aplomb. Unfortunately, none of these wonders can be performed in the demo. Forspoken utilises a lot of verticality in the game world, and being able to scale these features in a parkour-like style would have been a fun way to experience the demo, but sadly we don’t get to experience that. What you actually get is a glitchy, unsatisfying double jump up steep surfaces. Of course, these abilities are being saved for players to enjoy in the full game, but for demo purposes, it would have been welcome if they’d given us more than just the ability to sprint fast over flat surfaces.
Despite the negatives, there are also quite a lot of positive and interesting aspects. Combat is most certainly high on this list. In the demo, Frey has two types of Magic available: Frey and Sila. Sila is for up-close melee attacks, whereas Frey’s magic is ranged. Each magic type has a variety of spells that can be assigned to R2 and L2. The R2 spells were used for attacks, whereas the majority of the L2 spells are for buffs or counters. For example, one of the L2 spells in the Silas wheel sets a ring of fire that traps enemies within or burns them if they touch it, while the R2 attacks (of which there are three types in the demo) performed fire melee attacks. At first, mixing and matching spells felt convoluted and unintuitive, but after some experimenting and practice, it was actually highly gratifying.
The RPG features also had a unique element about them. As well as skill trees for the different types of spells, you can also add a variety of buffs and passive abilities by painting Frey’s fingernails in different colours.
Although the artwork of the world is standard at best, the character movement was excellent and felt weighty. There was also a great use of the PS5’s haptic feedback. It was superb to feel Frey move around the world and, with a slight resistance, heft her weapons. Also, as you’d expect from a Square Enix game, even though there weren’t many cinematics in the demo, they were superbly rendered and very detailed.
Another aspect of the game that excelled was the audio, both in effects and the soundtracks. The wonderful score conveyed a Harry Potter-esque vibe, which combined with the ethos of the magical world was very compelling. Sound effects during traversal and from spells being cast, alongside the few moments of voice acting, were also of a very high standard.
Summary
Forspoken is trying very hard to build a magical world, with a unique set of combat mechanics, and forge its own identity. The story in the demo is glazed over, but Square Enix has a strong track record of developing and publishing games that have great narratives, and it could be the shining light that makes this game special. The world-building is a little bit of a mixed bag, but there is certainly enough here to entice anyone wanting to experience a new kind of action-adventure game and a new IP
The Forspoken demo is available now on the PS5, and the full release is scheduled for the 24th of January 2023, for PS5 and PC.
