Fallen, Fallen is Babylon the great
There is an incredibly shortlist of developers that I trust implicitly, these are developers and publishers who have produced some of my very favorite gaming experiences over the years. But just as Money Mike says in the comedic hit ‘Friday After Next’ “…even playas mess up…” and so it is with Platinum Games and Square Enix’s (both on my short list) latest Games as a Service hot mess, Babylon’s Fall.
Like at this point I am starting to really be concerned about Platnium Games; I mean its not like they haven’t made a bad game before (talking about you TMNT: Mutants in Manhattan) but for the most part they have a good record; especially with making the combat in their game’s fun and exciting. However, the combat in Babylon’s Fall can be fun initially but grows repetitive and stale quickly. Players are equipped with a weird device called a ‘Gideon Coffin’ which holds the players weapons and allows them to equip 4 at a time. The use of 4 weapons at once is fun in practice and allows for some cool damage setups but little else. Anyone expecting to be able to pull off fantastic moves like Bayonetta might as well just turn around and go home.
MSRP: $59.99
Platforms: PlayStation
Price I’d Pay: Nothing because it should be Free to Play
The combat in Babylon’s Fall is extremely limited with most combos happening just by simply holding the appropriate button. While I don’t think that these games require pages upon pages of special moves liked traditional fighting games; I do think it would be nice to allow the player to do more than just hold a button for an entire fight. Not to mention how heavy the overall combat feels; while players can knock enemies into the air; its not possible to juggle enemies as in past Platinum action games. Oh, sure you can get a few hits in with the spectral weapons but nothing like punishing a helpless airborne enemy like players can do in say Astral Chain or Metal Gear Rising. Speaking of enemies, the designs of most of them are boring a repetitive. Players will spend their time running down mostly empty hallways that lead to bigger open area where a gaggle of enemies will spawn to be killed…wash, rinse, repeat.
Everything about this game is just so puzzling that I am starting to think that maybe its some sort of meta deal. It’s clearly a ‘Game as a Service’ because before you even get in the game proper players are being told about battle passes and upcoming events. There is a cash shop, because of course there is and its very prominently displayed and explained. Yet this game is being sold as a full price $59.99 or ($99.99 for the deluxe edition) because I am assuming literally NO lessons were learned from Marvel’s The Avengers. Avengers at least looks freaking fantastic AND has a great single player story; Babylon’s Fall unfortunately can’t say it has either.
This is hands down the ugliest game that has been released for this and last generation. The fact that this is even considered to be a ‘Next-Gen’ title is just a slap in the face to ALL the next gen titles out there. The developers were going for an artistic look graphically, trying to invoke a feeling of a moving oil painting. Well, what they ended up with is bland, dull overly animated mess. There is a weird ‘brush stroke’ effect that appears in the background texture of everything to emphasize this and it’s just plain ugly. So as players move the camera around the world you can see the oddly repeating strokes. While the effect was downright nauseating in the demo, I can at least confirm they toned it down in the final release. It doesn’t help the game look any better, but at least you won’t get sick from looking at it in motion… (small wins I guess).
You may have noticed that I haven’t talked about the story… Yea that’s not a bug, it’s a feature; because the story is pretty all over the place. If anyone has seen Rick and Morty (and if you haven’t I urge you to do so, its great in these troubled times) and remembers the ‘Jan Michael Vincent/Jan Quadrant Vincent 16’ bit from the second interdimensional cable episode…yea that makes more sense than this story. Players will create a Sentential with a limited character creator in order to ascend the tower of Babylon. It’s all very ‘FromSoftware’ in its approach to the story reveal but its not done ANYWHERE near as well as Elden Ring.
The biggest problem with this game is everything really interesting about it takes place late in the game; by which point the average person will be turned off by the sheer monotony of the early game. Everything unfolds at a snail’s pace, you can’t craft weapons or even utilize the true power of the ‘Gideon Coffin’ until later in the game. I truly do not understand what the developer and publisher were hoping for with this game. Everything about it just feels basic, but then they want you to spend money to buy all these various cosmetics and things. Even the co-op is boring, there aren’t cool team up combos…the only thing having people with you will do is allow you to get through each awful level faster. It just feels like its supposed to be a free to play game, nothing about it screams it’s asking price. Babylon’s Fall is not an awful game, its just not a very good one and while I would never tell anyone what to do with their money, I will strongly suggest you avoid this one as it’s fate will surely be the same as the tower for which its named.
Review copy of game provided by publisher.
