Forspoken Preview: Excellent Combat Held Back By A Terrible Personality

thegamer.com:

Forspoken is a fundamental evolution of everything Square Enix and Luminous Productions achieved with Final Fantasy 15. As polarising as that game came to be, it still managed to present a series of vast landscapes to explore, with movement and combat that inspired players to experiment before venturing off the beaten path in search of new discoveries.

It had potential, and one day I hoped to see it fully realized. Forspoken does exactly that, but I fear these steps forward won’t be enough to escape from its woefully corporate identity and fantasy world that inspires little more than annoyance. Frey Holland is an irksome heroine with a bitter personality playing on the worst kind of youthful tropes, depicted as a bad girl who got mixed up with some bad people and thus must be rough and guarded in ways that only the most distant boomers would view to be resonant. It isn’t, and even in a preview designed to ignore the narrative entirely, I couldn’t help but cringe my way through it all.

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My preview took place in the illustrious region of Avaolet as I clambered across its mixture of foreboding swamplands, floating islands, and abandoned ruins. This world was once bustling with life, and it seems Forspoken is eager to showcase it in a state of disrepair. I only ever stumble across the occasional smattering of wildlife and all manner of creatures corrupted by The Blight - which is what the game calls its generic evil energy that has brought the realm of Athia to its knees. Super evil energy is doing super evil things, and we have super cool powers and a super cool destiny that means we are the only super cool person capable of saving the world. We’ve