A cursed crusade

The first time I saw Asterigos I immediately thought, this is my kind of game. It has a look of a classic adventure game mixed with melee combat and an interesting locale and characters. Upon digging in the game feels good at first glance with a nice mixture of fantasy worlds and interesting enemy design. The more I played the game though I came to realize that this is a game that never seems to decide what it wants to be. It is a little bit of a classic adventure game mixed with some light Souls mechanics and a combat system that wants to be everything while accomplishing nothing at the same time. It has some unique ideas, but ultimately falls flat on most of them before the credits roll.

The game follows HIlda, a warrior from the Northwind Legion who sets out on a journey to save her lost father. The game borrows from Greek and Roman mythology which, accompanied with its muted cartoon style, lends itself to comparisons to Ubisoft’s Immortals. The world of Asterigos is filled with tons of mythical bosses and enemies as Hilda makes her way to the cursed city. While things may seem rich in lore the game actually suffers from some stale writing. It feels more akin to simplistic storytelling as opposed to an interesting and sweeping narrative. Still there is enough here to keep things interesting throughout.

MSRP: $34.99
Platforms: Xbox (reviewed), PlayStation, PC
Price I’d Pay: $29.99

What I did really appreciate about the narrative though are the choices. The game offers scenarios where Hilda can make choices or go off the linear story to change the outcome of the game later on. These choices change the perspective of the character and world and are truly ambitious. This is one idea that I wish was more fleshed out as far as seeing how things could be different. A timeline feature akin to something like Detroit comes to mind. Being able to see how a different choice led to a different outcome would go a long way.

Asterigos wastes no time getting players up to speed on combat. The game kicks off with Hilda losing her weapons only to turn the corner and realize they are right here. Weird mechanic, but alright. The way the game works is Hilda has multiple weapons and can equip any two at the same time. These are then assigned to the triggers ala any Souls game. There are also special attacks on the other triggers for each weapon. Players can equip and swap at any time, but have to go into a menu to do so. This is clunky at first as I didn’t know what I wanted to use. Then after I discovered what I liked, I pretty much just stuck with those the entire game. The combat doesn’t lend itself to much diversion outside of range so finding one of each style will work for most.

Combat feels familiar to just about any third-person action game. I can lock onto enemies with a click of the right stick and attack with the right bumper and trigger. There is a dodge roll that has invincibility frames and some weapons even offer up a parry mechanic. It feels clunky. Hits don’t always feel impactful and sometimes the lock-on doesn’t shift the camera to the next enemy or even lock onto them at all. This caused several instances where I was taking damage without it being a fault of my own. This can be frustrating on higher difficulties. I suggest just avoiding the highest one altogether as it is just a test of patience and frustration.

Hilda levels up as she progresses and can equip skill points into four categories. These are the standard fare of attack, health, etc. There is also a skill tree that opens up new abilities and weapon skills. Sadly the tree is quite linear and I had to work through some weapons I didn’t use to earn skills I wanted for other things. It is not intuitive at all. There are also bonfire-style checkpoints that I cannot figure out their purpose other than to be like that other game. These will reset enemies and restore health, but I can save and level up anywhere outside of these points so they feel arbitrary on multiple levels. Again this is a prime example of this game wanting to be everything and really not excelling at anything.

Visually the game looks good in screenshots and even at times during game play. There is a weird animation issue with enemies that make them look like they are stop motion at times. I think it is a poor frame pacing issue or animation issue that could be ironed out. The world is also beautiful at times, but feels incomplete. Some areas are dense with enemies and NPCs while other areas are barren and feel like the game needed a few more months. Similar to the end of Kingdoms of Amalur.

Asterigos is a weird game in that it feels like it was so close to being excellent. The weird mix of mechanics do not gel well and parts of the game simply feel unfinished. Still it is a fun romp that could get much better with some patches and tweaks. I think the team behind it did a great job for their first game and hope they continue to get chances to make more. There are good ideas and characters here, it just feels like it needed more time or a bigger budget to reach their vision.

Review copy of game provided by publisher.