Avatar - Frontiers of Pandora

[Snowy]

After a fine delivered curry and a few glasses of wine the other night, I was feeling quite mellow and looking at my Xmas holiday stretching off ahead, and decided to get a cheap CD key for the new Avatar game. I had liked the idea of playing as a Na'vi in that world from the outset, and while the reviews hadn't been stellar they also weren't bad, and I do like open-world gaming.

After an introduction where you learn about how you have basically been abducted as children and your tribe subsequently wiped out, you are let into the world. And what a world. The devs clearly had a passion for their subject matter and Pandora is just stunning. The movement is very nice too, considering it is first person. It is not quite at the level of Dying Light in terms of your demonstrable agility but it is not far off either. It is not long before you are running up tree-limbs and leaping chasms and on the whole the movement feels good.

Those early steps are some of the most fun too, in that you are really rather squishy and need to watch yourself. I was watching a group of big flat-headed dinosaurs as they rolled around in the grass and drank from the river, and had used my "Na'vi vision" (used for seeing everything of importance in the game, collectibles, enemy tagging, waypoints etc) and seen that they were not the red scent-trail of a predator. Didn't think they might be aggressive, to my cost, next I know I am absolutely legging it trying to find something I can climb to escape them as they thunder along behind me. As you pick up skills and weapons, those moments become of less impact although I have still had my share of hectic moments.

Traversing the world is great, but the map is bloody huge and you can't keep running everywhere. Thankfully you can ride direhorses and also get your own Ikran (four-eyed Pterodactyl effectively) that you can take to the skies on. While it is very nicely done, I do miss having to plan my way across-country that characterised the early game.

Enemies take the form of the RDA, like the film. They consist (so far) of grunts, grunts in the big mech suits which vary in terms of weapons and armour, flying helo-type affairs and various turrets. While you can take a fair bit of punishment, getting it wrong ends up in your dying fast.

What do I like then? Well, graphically it is incredible - on a pokey PC granted. Movement is good and the combat fits nicely between stealth and bursts of all-out violence. Flying feels really good too. Also the setting - I am not the biggest fan of the films, but being there in a game works brilliantly and the whole world is a real love-letter to the films.

What am I less keen on? A lot of the missions are quite dull and can involve a lot of travel. They have AC style 'link the clues' missions too, which are just bloody tedious and not the least fun. There is a ton of exposition too, with many cutscenes. I tend to watch the ones related to the main story quest, but often skip the dialogue on the side quests. If you want gunplay then this comes with a health-warning - the firearms are not the best and not overly accurate either. I personally have no interest in them, I want to play with bows, spears etc and embrace my inner tribesman, , but this could be a turn-off if you want to go in guns blazing.

All told, it is an Ubi open world game with all that entails. You will either like what they have to offer or you won't based on your experience with titles like that. For me, it is a worthy sequel to Far Cry Primal, which I enjoyed. I find it is a game which stimulates my imagination, and I forget what the mechanics are, and only pay loose attention to the quests, instead just exploring and having little adventures in the world provided. I am enjoying it, but I know that for many the Ubisoft formula is just a bit too overused to be appealing.

[Rusty]

Thanks for the review. I've got my eye on that one. I love Avatar (the first one, the second one made my eyes and brain hurt) so fancy a bit of running around Pandora.

I just decided to buy AC Mirage which is pretty uneventful at the moment but it was quite cheap using the Epic store discount sale.