Full disclosure, I started a playthrough alone and completed it alongside two friends. Don’t play this game alone, it feels like it was made with the purpose of playing with one or two friends. Had I played it alone, I might’ve dropped the score down to a three from a four but we’ll get into that in some of the other sections.
Don’t get me wrong, I like the game, and I stand by my 4 out of 5 rating, but I do think it’s somewhat neutered. Build-crafting feels disparate, you’ll spend a good chunk of your first playthrough using the same items that you’ve gotten accustomed to and poured the most resources into as armor sets are hard to come by, most rings and amulets seem like they need some sort of counterpart to really make them shine. New weapons and weapon mods will come as drops from bosses and mini-bosses, and while I do think this system is engaging and rewarding gameplay wise, I did feel that the majority of weapons and mods went right into the bin with a shrug.
Oh cool, a level five hive cannon, let me try it out for a little while. Ten minutes later I’m switching back to my level ten pistol. It’s a shame because the weapon design, plus the way some mods alter the weapon design is so damn cool! You’ll get slightly more mods than weapons from boss fights and I really can’t say I cared too much for them. After each fight we’d hurriedly run back to the crafter and wait our turn to talk to her (crazy this game has multiplayer but players have to talk to crafters one at a time btw), only to find to find some mediocre mod, shrug, and then toss it over our shoulders. Nice, yet another mod that summons some sort of beast to fight beside us for a period of time, daring today, aren’t we?
And this isn’t ubiquitous, of course, but I struggle to see a reason as to why someone would use a new mod or weapon or armor set unless it’s objectively better or you just seem to have the crafting resources burning a hole through your pocket to level every new item up to a fair level. This all ties in to how slow it is to craft a build as everything is an eclectic mix until you’re nearing endgame, and, let’s be honest here, as long you’re leveling your gear and traits up, and picking items that make sense to use, one build isn’t going to get you any further than another, barring hyper chaotic ones.
The crafting and trait leveling are very “of the times”, they’re so minimal one might wonder what they’re even good for. Crafting is basic, your gun needs x amount of thing to go from level one to two, now it needs x amount of new thing to get from level five to six, repeat. Traits are passive perks you unlock through various tasks, fights, or general level progression; they each start off at level one and each time you level up or find a knowledge tome, you’re given one point to allocate to whichever one you’d like. HELL YEA, my reload speed went from 1% quicker to 1.5% quicker let’s gooooooo.
LOL
Whatever man, it’s paltry, you can max out your stamina all the way to twenty and it still won’t feel like you ever have enough. Most likely, you’re not going to hyper focus on getting one single trait up to twenty, there’s going to be some sort of distribution between two, or, three, or more, so it’s going to take you a little while to get one up to twenty, by that time, will the difference of 1.5% reload speed and 20% reload speed be that notable, or beneficial? Like sure, net number went up, but does it matter? It won’t change the way you play the game at all.
The story is my last negative point, but also where this review will transition to a more positive tone. The story deals with Earth being invaded by a treelike entity known as “The Root”, that’s been slowly assimilating everyone and everything into itself. You find out that Earth isn’t the only place under siege by the Root, and that multiple other universes are being attacked by the same entity.
The original leader of the Ward you’ve found yourself in went out into the Labyrinth that connects these universes together to find a way to destroy the Root once and for all. That’s all I really got for you lol. No, seriously, there’s some context, but Remnant also takes on the rather prudish story telling techniques that Dark Souls popularized. Context? You want context? Idk man, read the description of a ring or something.
Okay, it’s not truly that dire, but this game gives me paragraphs where it should be giving me pages, chapters even, of context. You cannot throw me into the ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ multiverse with a brochure. So, the limited story telling plus the general "hanging out with friends” prevented me from getting the full context of the story so I looked it up and am still somewhat lost. The inclusion of the final DLC, which gives an actual resolution to the game, muddies the waters further.
But hey, I love a good multiverse, especially when it’s as well realized as it is here in Remnant: From the Ashes. There’s only a handful of worlds in the base game, with another included in the final DLC, and they’re distinct and memorable. Functionally they’re the desert planet, the swamp planet, the jungle planet, etc. but it’s the details and locales put into them that bring them to life. Rhom, the irradiated desert world is a wasteland of rudimentary civilizations trying to survive in the ruins of the old ones, all under an eclipsed sun. Yaesha is a lush jungle world currently experiencing a coup, faun-like beings run at you, and each other, with metal spears, mystical arts, and the fury of their ancestors.
So the worlds are cool, sure. It’s what populates those worlds and what you’re doing in them that really make this game peak. Each world comes with its own populations and enemies, enemies vary from world to world, and the movesets and strategies to fight them are all different. This game will consistently keep you on your toes in battle, and outside of battle, maps will be littered with goodies, and mysterious dungeons and puzzles to solve, all of which will net you something that may be worthwhile, or just cool to look at.
Gameplay here is pretty decent, characters move in a somewhat bulky manner but it makes sense, and the third person shooting is done well, you won’t be dissatisfied. Next to the enemies, the bosses of this game are easily the highlight.
No two bosses are the same, some have similar functions, but they’ll have different movesets, different weaknesses, and altered strategies to defeat them. There are only two bosses that I thought were pushing it, the former being the Guardian of Corsus which is genuinely a nonsense fight, and the final boss of the base game, where all you really need is the context of how to defeat them. My personal favorite was the butcher in Corsus because he’s such a big disgusting freak and his bunghole is the weak point.
Once again, I have to bring up the fact that you’re given a craftable item from every single boss, and while I thought the majority were only alright, that never dulled the excitement of getting something new and sprinting home to see what the new toy was. Exceptional reward system.
On top of all of this, the game is a decent length, think 15 hours or so, and it’s made to be played through multiple times as the dungeons in the worlds will change, some bosses will appear in one instance, and be replaced with something completely different the next run. Some bosses even have a secret method of unlocking something different, such as using a gong puzzle to bypass a boss completely, netting you a different item than when you deliberately fight them.
The boss rush mode is only okay though, the currency you get is only for armor cosmetics, and I felt that they could’ve made the experience much more rewarding than that.
Overall, Remnant has some flaws, but it doesn’t take away from the experience, especially when you’re enjoying this with friends. Play it, play it once, then play through it again, ♥♥♥♥ it, pick up the second one too. 4/5, Enjoy!
