This review contains spoilers
While the game does have fun moments and offers a massive world, I cannot help but feel it is often quite shallow. I enjoy exploring the handcrafted locations whilst the generated planets become background filler very, very fast. My favourite part of any RPG is the interesting stories, worlds and lore than can stem from the side quests and while I think the faction questlines have some decent moments, sadly the majority of side quests are purely fetch quests or filler and feel like a massive step back from previous games.
I think the weapons in the game are great, I have had a blast using the Magstorm and silenced pistols depending on heavy or stealthy approaches, I have found the weapon play to be one of the strong points of this game.
The factions themselves are pretty cool unfortunately I wish we could have a deeper dive into a few of them such as house varu'un, the ecliptics etc and there were times it seemed like we would get deeper insights to factions only to be misled, one short questline has you join a street gang but just as things start going, they abruptly end and the gang is no more. The space exploration is ok, and as mentioned I do think the hand crafted locations are enjoyable, I very quickly stopped visiting the generated locations however as they repeat very regularly.
While it is true most of the planets are barren, there are more than enough planets if you are wanting to scan flora and fauna like in no mans sky. On that point, there are a couple lifeforms hyped up as super dangerous and unfortunately I was disappointed when I actually met them, however I do think the overall creature designs are pretty neat looking.
Overall there is some of the appeal I find from Fallout 4 and 76 which while not perfect games at all, have fun moments and sometimes it's just nice to explore the provided world for a while, sadly with this title I have not had the same connection as I have with previous games and at times especially with quests/stories and 'dungeons' there are times where they feel like they have taken steps backward. This is all just my opinion though and I am still playing 70 hours later which is telling that all in all there is fun to be had, you just have to make your own fun with it.
POST 100% UPDATE - Gone up by half a star as while I was finishing up I did find some much better quests which were more like what I was expecting, a shame there wasn't more of that but nonetheless I enjoyed it
I think the weapons in the game are great, I have had a blast using the Magstorm and silenced pistols depending on heavy or stealthy approaches, I have found the weapon play to be one of the strong points of this game.
The factions themselves are pretty cool unfortunately I wish we could have a deeper dive into a few of them such as house varu'un, the ecliptics etc and there were times it seemed like we would get deeper insights to factions only to be misled, one short questline has you join a street gang but just as things start going, they abruptly end and the gang is no more. The space exploration is ok, and as mentioned I do think the hand crafted locations are enjoyable, I very quickly stopped visiting the generated locations however as they repeat very regularly.
While it is true most of the planets are barren, there are more than enough planets if you are wanting to scan flora and fauna like in no mans sky. On that point, there are a couple lifeforms hyped up as super dangerous and unfortunately I was disappointed when I actually met them, however I do think the overall creature designs are pretty neat looking.
Overall there is some of the appeal I find from Fallout 4 and 76 which while not perfect games at all, have fun moments and sometimes it's just nice to explore the provided world for a while, sadly with this title I have not had the same connection as I have with previous games and at times especially with quests/stories and 'dungeons' there are times where they feel like they have taken steps backward. This is all just my opinion though and I am still playing 70 hours later which is telling that all in all there is fun to be had, you just have to make your own fun with it.
POST 100% UPDATE - Gone up by half a star as while I was finishing up I did find some much better quests which were more like what I was expecting, a shame there wasn't more of that but nonetheless I enjoyed it