This is what you get if you mix the parkour from Mirror’s Edge, the grinding, wall jumps and weapons from Ratchet & Clank and the writing of iCarly.
It’s a shame I had to vote this title negatively, probably the hardest choice I’ve ever made with my reviews: let’s see why
The Good
– The Gameplay
is tight and frantic, really a blast to play. In a nutshell, it consists of shooting enemies while performing some sick tricks.
Although the missions aren’t exactly varied, they still manage to throw some novelties from time to time, notably a few tower defense like quests and the occasional new gimmick (which is often forgotten soon after).
– The Enemy Design
is well made, the AI works efficiently (most of the time) and they’re aesthetically inspired.
– The Level Design
is outstanding. The map is chock full of places where you can grind, bounce, wall-run/jump and more.
– The Customization
is generally well implemented. You can modify your character everytime you want with a plethora of different cosmetics and upgrades.
WE WUZ KANGZ AND SHIET
The Meh
– The Weapon Design
takes way too much inspiration from Ratchet & Clank. Although said weaponry is presented differently, the way they work is often the same.
You can also upgrade your arsenal just by using it, and although this is a nice return of a notorious feature, here it works a bit too slow for my taste.
Nice weapon name
– The Bugs/Glitches
Enemies standing still, embarassing ragdoll physics, critical items not appearing and some props not working properly can either be a negligible issue or a thing that actually soft-locks your progress.
Luckily, the latter is a very rare occurrence.
– The Collectables
It’s nice to branch your game into the collectathon subgenre, but after you get the map that shows where each of these items is placed, honestly, it becomes nothing more than a chore (especially if there are close to 500 collectables).
Houston? We have a problem
Nice ragdoll physics, Insomniac
The Ugly
– The Writing
is abysmal. Let’s put it this way: imagine a 50 years old businessman who wants to appeal to a younger audience through awful memes, gratuitous vulgarity, repetitive use of 4th wall break and predictable cliches.
This is exactly what happens in this game, every single time. Not even once I laughed at a joke — however the times I’ve cringed are countless.
xDD it’s hilarious because it’s relatable!!!!!!1
– The Music
is serviceable, but that doesn’t mean that it’s good… Actually, it’s pretty bad. Blink 182 level of bad. If I had to describe it in a sentence it would be “bland, generic and repetitive”.
The fun factor however increased tenfold when I muted the game and played a RUSH playlist from YouTube. It’s not like I’m missing memorable oneliners and good voice acting anyway.
– The Character Design
is original, but the way they’re written is extremely corny. Pretty much everyone in this game is – in some form or another – a self-insert of the game devs.
That means that each one of those guys is constantly spitting trite jokes and redundant vulgarity. There’s not a single one that is likeable, not even the protagonist.
– The Difficulty Scaling
goes from ‘Very Easy’ to ‘I Could Play This Blindfolded’. One would imagine that since you’re getting progressively stronger, the enemies and the missions would be the same… That’s not the case, at all.
At one point, I even started to play without any upgrade whatsoever — and it was still a cinch. Not only your opponents are extremely forgiving, in the case you do manage to die, you always respawn instantly and from the same spot you got killed.
– The Game Treats You Like A Kid
This is another thing I hate in the current media. We’ve gone from “fuck the player” to “let’s hand-hold him for the entirety of the game” in a heartbeat.
There’s no middle ground, and in this game this thing is very apparent. You get constantly reminded (either via obnoxious text or incessant phone calls from the NPCs) that there’s a new mission, your weapons have upgrades available and whatnot.
You’re never free from this curse, not even in the middle of a mission: they’re already incredibly easy to begin with, you don’t need to remind me what I need to do ten times in the span of five minutes.
– Unskippable Cutscenes
Thank God alt-tab exists.