All good things…as they say
As listeners of the podcast are aware, I have a certain affinity for the developer Spiders. Themselves a French developer with a panache for action-RPGs, i.e. My Jam. The first game I played of theirs was Bound by Flame, the game quickly gained the moniker of ‘ero-jank’ due to the buggy nature of its release. But for those that persevered, what we found was a great story with some fun combat. While the teams following releases all maintain some level of jank, and I say that lovingly; but the team leveled up their story talents with each successive drop.
With Greedfall the team made their biggest leap yet in terms of quality, itself an 18th century-styled fantasy, action RPG. Players take on the role of a colonizer of the island Teer Fradee on a quest to find a peaceful way forward with the island inhabitants. In Greedfall: The Dying World, players will be transported back three years before the events of the first game and will this time be playing as a native of Teer Fradee, but I promise that isn’t even the biggest change. After players create their characters, they will begin a rite of passage on their way to being a sage. To do this, players must figure out the cause for a number of villagers getting sick. Roughly about 8 hours later players will finally be granted access to the open world, which is one of my major problems with this sequel; pacing is all over the place.
MSRP: $49.99
Platforms: Xbox (reviewed), PlayStation, PC
Price I’d Pay: $29.99
The original game didn’t feel like it padded its opening hours; but this one, I honestly was over the game before I even got into it proper. The combat didn’t help matters any, remember when I promised there was a bigger change; well, the combat went from action-RPG to now a tactical style ala Dragon Age: Origins and no sir I don’t like it. When players create their characters at the onset they can choose their class, and I, thinking this was the same style game as the original went with a mage type, only to be gobsmacked when I was presented with a pulled back camera and pause menu to issues commands.
Maybe I have just outgrown this style of game, but I really think its that I had no warning for this change to combat. I had watched trailers (or at least I thought I had) on the game and was excited to see it coming but nowhere in there do I recall them talking about this huge departure from the first game. The larger issue for me though us that the tactical combat feels so utterly boring. I would have much preferred a refined style from the original, which itself was like Mass Effect in that it was 3rd person combat with companions to give orders to. Hell, even a turn-based option like Expedition 33 would have been better than this. I will give the team credit as there are levels to the tactical combat and players can choose to play full-blown or just focus on their character; leaving the companions actions up to the AI; which isn’t great either.
That’s all due to the many, many bugs in combat; such as one that locks the camera in place, leaving players to command troops blind. Throughout my playtime on Series X I have had an issue with almost every battle I have fought in Teer Fradee. Times where my team wouldn’t auto attack, so they are just getting wailed on until I manually had to input their attacks. Or their refusal to follow me so that when combat would be initiated, I would end up surrounded by enemies because my team was 30 yards behind me. Just when I thought that Spiders was on their way to shedding that ‘euro-jank’ moniker, I mean the number of random bugs I have ran into during my playtime is really inexcusable when you consider the fact that Greedfall: The Dying World has been in early access on PC since September 2024. I have seen placeholder names on items, enemies seeming spawn whenever they feel like it and events that should trigger to further a quest just wouldn’t, making me have to restart the game. The list goes on and on, and this is absolutely ridiculous given the time its spent in Early Access.
Greedfall: The Dying World feels like a giant leap backwards for the developers at Spiders. I was over the moon when I had heard that Greedfall was getting a sequel, and while this game delivers in its writing and narrative in parts, it pretty much fails in everything else. Lackluster combat, glacial pacing at the onset and bugs galore spoil what should have been a triumphant return for the studio, especially after the greatness that was their last game; Steelrising. With a little energon and a lot of luck the team can probably right this ship, but I’d wait for a sale before heading off for this one.
Review copy of game provided by publisher.
