Review: Enslaved Odyssey to the West

The development team responsible for the PS3 launch title, Heavenly Sword, have finally released their sophomore adventure title, Enslaved: Odyssey to the West, for Namco. While hugely controversial thanks to their recently announced involvement with the Devil May Cry reboot, Ninja Theory once again prove that they are a team with obvious core competencies while at the same time, emphasizing their shortcomings. I hate to even mention the new DmC in this review but I feel it is unavoidable and important since I feel many people will be drawing conclusions about that project based on the quality of Enslaved. While I have been one of the few supporters of the new DMC and the design choices made by Ninja Theory, Enslaved has finally given me a few actual reasons to be both concerned and incredibly excited about DmC. Ninja Theory has once again created a magnificent world with characters that I care about while at the same time stumbling on almost every other aspect of the game's execution.

Enslaved (PS3, Xbox 360)
Developer: Ninja Theory
Publisher: Namco
Released: October 5, 2010

Heavenly Sword, while a generic God of War clone, is a tough act to follow when it comes to story and characterization in gaming. Ninja Theory proved that they know how to create an interesting character and portray them in a light that is actually interesting to an audience. If that weren't already enough, they did what few developers had the balls to do (SPOILER WARNING) and killed off the main character for the sake of telling an engaging story (END SPOILER WARNING). In Enslaved, Ninja Theory doesn't let up, once again crafting a set of characters that will no doubt be mentioned at the end of the year when we discuss our best new character award. What I found to be most impressive was that they strength of the story in Enslaved relies almost entirely on these two characters. There are three characters in this game. Three. Even with such a small cast of characters, there is enough personality throughout to compete with games like Uncharted.

Unfortunately for me however, I feel as though I may have fallen victim to hype since I found myself ultimately disappointed in the end. Not because the storytelling or character development wasn't good but because it just wasn't enough to satisfy me. Monkey and Trip both represent characters that I will remember for a long time as examples of the best this industry has to offer. For months prior to release, I imagined all of the potential situations these characters could be thrown into. The contempt they would initially have for each other and the friendship that would eventually blossom. Unfortunately, the disparity between what I imagined and what I experienced was a bit too wide. The interactions between Monkey and Trip and the adventure they go on together can be boiled down to the most predictable aspects of the dynamic they were going for. The relationship between them never amounted to much more than a playful distaste for each other's company. The story was simply a missed opportunity in some ways and could have benefited in my opinion from swapping out some of the more unnecessary action set pieces with more character development.

But I digress. In the grand scheme of things, my lofty expectations for the characters didn't detract too much from the enjoyment of the actual game. The game-play that is there is a mish-mash of button mashing combat and platforming, a combination that has become incredibly popular recently. While the combat is not necessarily the most intricate or complex out there (this isn't any Devil May Cry), enough attention was paid to nailing the player feedback to earn my respect. Simple button presses usually resulted in fun and satisfying points of contact that were often accentuated by slow motion destruction. When thrown into boss fight situations, victory was usually a matter of balancing combat, dodging, and platforming. As for the platforming, fans of Prince of Persia 2008 will be right at home seeing as you can't fall to your death or fail in execution. All in all, the game is fun but not groundbreaking by any means.

Where the package does falter is in the technical aspects. The frame rate is atrocious for the most part and character movement in game is rigid and awkward. Not to undermine the excellent motion capture cinematic presentation of the game but the moment to moment game-play visuals can really seem jarring when compared to the smooth animations during cut-scenes. In addition to these annoyances, major bugs plagued a lot of my time spent with this game. On multiple occasions, I was forced to reload a cut-scene because Monkey or Trip were invisible. Of course, with a new IP like this, I'm sure the budget restricted some of the development and ultimately led to many of these technical issues. With that said, a few extra months or even weeks in the oven could have done this game some good.

In the end, Enslaved comes together as a nice little package that stumbles in a few areas and doesn't necessarily execute on any one aspect exceptionally well (with the exception of story presentation). The predictability of the story is not necessarily a detractor but just an annoyance that I can't overlook. While the game-play won't win any awards, the game transcends most games in terms of presentation and should be acknowledged as such. Ultimately, by attempting to re-imagine a classic piece of traditional Chinese literature (Journey to the West), the game itself became just that; traditional.

Score: 78
(70-79%: Solid - A solid title that has a few major issues.)