November 29, 2023 - Day 332 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 352
Game: Forspoken
Platform: Steam
Release Date: Jan 25, 2023
Installation Date: Nov 29, 2023
Unplayed: 0d
Playtime: 71m
Forspoken is a third-person ARPG, with a magic-based weapon system, and parkour oriented open-world(ish) traversal.
You play as Frey, a young woman who was abandoned as a newborn, and grew up in a series of foster homes; after aging out of the foster system, she found herself living on the edge of society.
The game opens with Frey entering a New York courtroom, leading to a lengthy cutscene with minimal interaction. Several scenes like this follow, which slowly (and frustratingly) introduce you to the basic mechanics of interacting with the world.
Hijinks ensue, resulting in Frey being transported through a magical portal to the land of Athia, where she finds herself bonded with a magical (and sarcastic) talking vambrace she calls Cuff.
Once in Athia, a "beautiful and cruel land" under a matriarchal rule of "The Tantas", the game introduces you to the rest of the gameplay mechanics and the spell-based combat system.
Forspoken was released in January this year to some fairly mixed reviews. Having read through the reviews, I'd decided that it probably wasn't a game I would play, even though it has a female protagonist.
However, Forspoken is only an "unplayed" game on a technicality. Square Enix made a demo of the game available earlier this year, which I installed, played five minutes of, and utterly hated. A few months ago, I decided to give it another go, and fell in love with it.
The magic-based combat system requires some getting used to; playing the demo exhausted was not a success; when I wasn't exhausted it all clicked into place. Steam does not count time played on demos against the full game, so here we are.
I put a little bit of money aside in case Forspoken went on sale, & Black Friday saw a 60% discount so goodbye piggy bank.
However, there are some little quirks to the game. Because access to the various skills is gated, I found myself trying to do basic RPG things like jump, and being unable to; at other times the game forces Frey into a frustrating slow walk for narrative reasons.
Once you start picking up the combat spells & particularly the parkour spell, the gameplay improves massively.
Also frustrating are conversational interactions with Cuff, which freeze you in place for the duration, and it doesn't let you replay conversation options, which means if you don't catch something he says, too bad. On the other hand, the interplay between Cuff & Frey during gameplay can be amusing (if occasionally repetitive).
With that said, I found myself over an hour into Forspoken without even noticing, and for my money, it's: