Iki Island is a much better expansion than the average open world DLC, which is often content to add more auto generated landscape or nodes on the same map. The new mechanics are great, new enemy types push and expand the already excellent combat system, and the landscape is still among the most gorgeous in games.

Unfortunately Sucker Punch is owner by Modern Sony, and that means that about a third of any given play session is spent watching long pointless walk n talks while semi human robots spit insipid dialogue at one another while the game desperately tries to convince you that a colonizing imperial force genociding people is a morally complex idea. Every cutscene is still unskippable, even incidental dialogue that's just shot in these incredibly awkward profile shots to hide how under animated they are, and then long stretches of "gameplay" are just holding a stick up while more pointless dialogue drones on and on and on, you can't even walk off the proscripted path, the game will autocorrect your movement to follow the story, why! This and Horizon and Days Gone and even GoW to an extent show just how shallow these modern open worlds are, the bulk of the game is still as tightly linear and controlled as Uncharted 2 (sans the tight pacing and well composed level and encounter design), if not more so, there's just also ten hours of side content where you Repeat The Loop if you care to. At least Odyssey in all its copy pasted glory let you try to approach missions in a slightly freeform way.

I don't like these types of angry reviews, I don't like to bitch about the hard work these devs put in, it's just so frustrating. I want to enjoy this game, I have enjoyed stuff like it, I even got over it for the main game, but when everything a company puts out has its pacing just pummelled to bits like this it's so tiring, Sucker Punch deserves better