Ashen

DO NOT BUY THIS GAME! It keeps crashing after startup. I'll change my review if this ever gets fixed.

The game in general is fine, but there are just some concepts that made me drop this game. Visually, this game is really cool and stunning. It adopts the souls-type style and aesthetic really well and adds some vibrancy to it somehow, which is really impressive. But that's unfortunately really where the positives stop. The gameplay is generally fine, but there are so many bugs that appear, especially in multiplayer, where I started this game with a friend. The way to connect to your friends is also just so obscure and weird, while also being buggy. After he dropped it after a few hours (due to the laggy and buggy nature of the game), I went through like 2 areas alone, but then I hit the point in the story where you needed to go through one huge dungeon, which was just impossible. I've tried it so many times, but even as a souls "veteran" who has played pretty much every FromSoft game, this was just way too unforgiving. Never got to the DLC, which I've bought, unfortunately. That looked promising from the trailers tho. But in the state the game is in right now, it's just so much of a mixed bag that I can't recommend it. It's worth a shot tho if you like souls games, since it does some things really well.

The game keeps crashing after a few minutes. I can’t even create a character without it crashing. I spent some time troubleshooting, but none of the fixes worked for me. I refunded it because it is literally unplayable.

DEAD GAME DONT BOTHER!!! it would be great if they FIXED anything, but clearly they have not, multiplayer is a joke, constant desync, bugs, bad design choices, things feel like a mess... To bad to I really wanted like this. A friend and I tried to come back to this a small handful of times and it was always lacking, and bugs or bad design choices always got me to uninstall it not to long after playing it.

I tried for an hour to co-op and not working, how difficult is to put an "invite friend" option?

At the time of this review, it has taken me 18.2 hours to beat the game. All side quests finished, maybe 1h or so of grinding and getting lost. I did not do or buy the DLC. Look, is the game a 10/10? No. But its a 8/10 for me, especially at the pace the game runs. Even if I was on for just 30m, it felt like I got a lot done. Ashen is a solid take on the Souls-like formula with enough of its own identity to be different. I read through a lot of the comments and most complaints were multiplayer which I did not touch or some form of stability issues. I had 0 crashes, bugs, glitches APART from the companion AI randomly disappearing like 2-3 times. Suddenly found myself alone 200 feet undergound surrounded by darkness and demons. Fun. Difficulty - Starts off easy, but ramps up as you go through the campaign. The thing is that the game is built around you going along with an AI companion. You can choose who as you select the quest and the companionship makes for a totally different experience. You play off aggro and many encounters are built around the idea of 2 people. Now. The AI is fine, but they are often insanely strong, soloing a lot of mobs and saving your life. Prepare yourself though for the dungeons as it is rare to find a game where you must venture FAR before the next save point, and once there you cannot return. I see this aspect turning some people off as the difficulty gets pretty high, but I personally really enjoyed that aspect because you had to be ready and you get that tense feeling of "1 potion and a dream" as you are in hell's ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ looking for respite. Also, I have to mention this game has a very different leveling system than other games. You gain life + stamina from completing quests which are woven quite well alongside the story and also from some world items. Thats it. You never level up your own character. World - I loved the art style. It could be both charming and indimidating. Building your own town was cool and I really liked the aspect of always travelling further and further from town. All the zones are compact and for a explore-♥♥♥♥♥ like me, it felt nice that I could sweep a whole zone and it didn't feel too large or tedious. One thing this game got correct is that the dark dungeons are DARK. I personally really enjoyed the claustrophobic nature of the 3 dungeons (looking at you dungeon 2) and 1 really dark zone. Otherwise, a real strength this game has is that as you go through the game the zones get better. They become a touch more linear and structurally varied and visually more stunning. I just beat The Surge before Ashen and the more you advanced in that game the more the zones sucked and it really left a sour taste when you face off against the last boss. Combat & Loot - The combat is fine. Simple, but good enough to carry you through. My main complaint is the lack of loot. There are literally 2 weapon types. Hammers = big bonk with stun chance and high damage. Axe = fast bonk with crit chance and mid damage. Throughout the game you find a bunch of 1 hand and 2 hand variants, which leads to my next complaint - loot. When you reach about 50% of the game, legit all the loot you find is 90% 1 of 2 things: bags of currency or upgrade material. On top of that the in-game currency is pretty sparse and there are no real good/fast grind spots so in the end game you have enough materials to fully level 10 weapons, but you can maybe do 3 unless you grind for hours. Armor too is lacking. You pick up like 8 along the way and you kind of just slowly upgrade. One thing that is cool though for the combat are the different relics and artifacts you can equip. Basically think of it as a major passive bonus and 4 smaller passive bonuses you can swap between in town. They affect things like damage, stamina use, hp %, damage reduction, etc. Bosses - I liked all the bosses. The first 3 were good ones to teach mechanics and to ease you into the game. The fourth one, strap on your boots, the game gets real. Its a great fight, but the boss and dungeon before it are true Souls difficulty. The last boss of the game I really enjoyed (story-wise too). Felt like a toe-to-toe dance. I got her on my second try, but I can see why many would hate her because of 1 thing - the ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ run back. ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ the developers could not have chosen a more asinine way to get back to the hardest boss. There should of been a non-teleport shrine just outside of the arena. Story - There is one. I mean, by the end I kind of understood it all, but they throw a lot of names and ideas and places at you pretty quick with not much to hold on to. Its not so much a "Souls" type story because there is dialogue and a premise and direction, but it kind of all felt like background "stuff". What I did appreciate though is they did a good job at establishing a sense of direction and purpose. Overall I found Ashen to be a solid gaming experience, with a fun fast-paced world to explore. The difficulty has a nice curve that gets quite high. What drags it down is nothing horrible as people are too quick to shove something in a corner if it does 1 thing wrong. Last point. Is it worth the full $40US or $50 CAD? Not sure. I got it on special. I don't think game time = quality, but this one was quite short with no real replay value (for me). Then again, $50 CAD for me is almost the price of a movie ticket and some popcorn for a 2h entertainment night.

Хорошая, хорошая игрулька. Игрулька которая все критики назвали "хорошим соулс лайком". ГЕЙМПЛЕЙ. Управление отзывчивое, бои вязкие и размеренные и есть кооп. Но и есть минусы: где глубина? Разнообразие оружие мизерное. Библиотека билдов нулевая. Половина врагов в эндгейме имеют ненормальный скейл и сносят с пары ударов. Боссов очень мало (только 4), а финальный босс это просто уныние. ОПТИМИЗАЦИЯ. Визуал 10/10. Минималистичный рисованный стиль, который напоминает Journey. Мир красивый. Разрабы постарались. Технически сыро. На ПК куча проблем. Загрузка, баги, а в Steam всего 68% положительных отзывов. Этот позор для 2018 года (игра 18 года) СЮЖЕТ И АТМОСФЕРА. Сюжет банален: борьба света и тьмы, божественная Птица Пепельная. ГГ безликий странник. Атмосфера уникальна. Это не мрачный готический ужас Dark souls. Это светлое, но пустое фэнтези. Мир зовет исследовать. Саунд, визуал завораживает. В этом плане игра шедевр. 6.2/10 Критики на Metacritic дали 78-82 балла. Игроки 5.9. Расхождение огромное. Почему? Потому что твоя мать шлюха