I didn't quite know what to expect when I got my hands on 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn at 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Summer Game Fest. I had a hands-off preview a year or two ago, and was intrigued then, but it seems to dip under the radar at every opportunity. Though I enjoyed my time with it and appreciated the ideas I saw, especially the boldness to drop us in fairly late into the narrative and just tell us 'it might be tough, have fun with it', I couldn't help but feel a little haunted playing it in a room adorned with Xbox posters, surrounded by staff in Xbox lanyards, in the same building Xbo🐓x just rocked the world with its summer showcase while 168澳洲幸运𒁏5开奖网:avoiding🤡 mentioning its recent layoffs completely.
I had never been more glad than when I left the preview, double checked that developers A44 were indeed still independent, and breathed a huge sigh of relief as I saw it was also coming to 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:PlayStation. This was not, as the green-pilled amongst you may think, part of the Xbox tax or inherent bias against Xbox. 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Microsoft undoubtedly won Summer Game Fest and even with Nintendo arriving late, I think that crown still belongs to Xbox. It is just that, given recent events, I would fear for this studio's future if Flintlock were an Xbox exclusive.
To be clear, Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn looked pretty good. The combat was varied and challenging, traversal was interesting as you teleported from rift to rift, and the world it created had a more unique intrigue purely by virtue of feeling tailored to the game's reality, not copied from elsewhere. But facts must be faced: it did not lodge itself in the minds of players during the showcase, being outshone by bigger reveals, and the game is out in a month with little traction. This is a game that may need to percolate with the public and grow into a cult hit through word of mouth. It will not smash sales records from the off and these days, that's a dangerous predicament to be in.
It's a little sad that my first thought after playing a good game was not 'huh, that was pretty good', but 'I hope that studio doesn't get shut down'. It's the environment modern gaming has created and it does suck the whimsy out of three days of hopping from booth to booth playing video games. Summer Game Fest is thankfully pretty heavy on the indie side of things where experimentation is encouraged and risk is not met with certain doom as often as it is for bigger companies (who, ironically, can afford greater risk), but being taken out of the summer sun of Play Days and transported across town to Xbox's off-site and sterile demo site reminds you that behind all the fun of the fayre, jobs are constantly at risk.
But in any case, yes, the game was pretty good. Despite literally being named after a gun, Flintlock is not a shooter in the traditional sense. Instead, you are armed with a melee weapon in one hand, a gun in the other, and must use the pair in conjunction to overcome tough fights. As I say, we were dropped in fairly late, but it's clear that the challenge is part of the draw here. I could hold my own even while figuring things out, so it's not 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Dark Souls levels of punishing, but it's not a hack 'n' slash loaded with weak fodder to tear down either. 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Every battle keeps you on your toes.
It's also surprisingly old school in some of its modern touches. A retro approach to game design, making the old feel new again. Melee hits recharge the ranged weapons, and on reload a meter appears that, if tapped in time, offers a more powerful blast next time around. With highly kinetic battles and enemies that don't give you a moment, these classic touches add a level of challenge and satisfaction that have a pleasingly analogue feel in our digital, meta-infused perfect combo parry world.
The design of the game left me with the same sensation. This is something we've seen before, but not for so long that it comes back around to feeling fresh. Half Victorian, half Ancient Greek, it plays around with aesthetic choices and comes out the other end with a greater personality. This idea of merging is present throughout Flintlock, and not just in the mesh of combat approaches. It half styles itself as an 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Elden Ring, where you roam across a mysterious world and take on huge bosses whose presence is as menacing as it is vague, where battles are hard-fought and require patience, and half as 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:God of War, where the ac𒁏tion is faster and linear, propelled by n♌arrative and built around combos and flair.
The devs themselves have .
Flintlock has the quality to be a hit but many who played last year's Immortals of Avenum said the same thing. Flintlock has all the ingredients to be a great game except people to play it, and they're the one ingredient devs can never really control. Playing it felt like preparing soundbites for a future conversation. "I played that at Summer Game Fest once. Yeah it was alright. Shame it never really found its crowd." I hope I'm wrong, because there is a lot to like about Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn. But just a month out from release, I find myself fearful of its future.
168澳洲幸运5开奖网: Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn
- Top Critic Avg: 69/100 Critics Rec: 34%
- Released
- July 18, 2024
- ESRB
- Ma💞ture 17+ // Blood, Violence
- Developer(s)
- A44 Games
- Publisher(s)
- ꦍ Kepler Interactive
- Engine
- Unreal Engine 4
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