Game Review of Enslaved: Odyssey to The West

Enslaved: Odyssey to The West

Enslaved: Odyssey To The West is a re-imagining of the ancient Chinese tale Journey to the west which takes places in a future where nature has reclaimed all the wonders than mankind has built, menacing man killing "Mechs" are around every corner, and slavers threaten the last bastions of humanity. In the game you play as Monkey , and ultra buff loner who has great fighting and climbing skills. The tutorial part of the game has us playing Monkey as he is escaping from a slave ship. During this escape he constantly runs into Trip although she always refuses to be of any help to him. Eventually they escape together, no thanks to Trip, and Monkey wakes up with a Slave mind control headband on. Turns out that Trip hacked the headband and put it on him so that he would have to obey all her commands. She informs Monkey that she will only take it off of him when he gets her back to her home and if anything happens to her the headband will kill him.

Cons

Camera Zoom: The Camera is zoomed in far too much sometimes which can make Boss Battles particularly difficult. Constantly having to readjust the camera because it is zoomed in too much on Monkey is a huge annoyance, especially for somebody like me who is terrible at boss battles.

Saving: I am one of those people who likes to save a game whenever I accomplish anything that I don't want to do again. However this game doesn't let you choose when to save but instead auto saves at certain checkpoints. If for some reason you have to turn off the game then you will be forced to start again at your last checkpoint. The game of course does tell you when you have reached checkpoints where it will save your game, however, it can be frustrating scrambling around trying to get to another save point.

Glitches: There were a few annoying points where there were glitches in the game. I think I had a few separate instances during boss battles where the Mechs got stuck in a corner and I for the life of me could not get them out. This made me need to go back to the last checkpoint and start the battle over again.

Cutscenes: I love to sit back and watch cutscenes when I am doing well in a game but when I have just died for the fifth time and have to do a fight or chase all over again I would prefer to not have to watch the cutscene again. Unfortunately that happened a lot and I found myself wishing I could skip the cutscenes.

Trip: I really don't like her character. The phrase "worse than useless" comes to mind when I think of her. The crap she pulled on the slave ship and the cruel move with the slave headband already made me dislike her. I can appreciate that she is smart but she is basically a Damsel in Distress for the entire game and is constantly getting monkey and herself into trouble. The parts of the game where you have to carry her around on Monkey's back are especially annoying to me. I am curious what other people think of her though, if people found her as insufferable as I did or if they thought she was endearing.

Pros

Combat: What I liked about the combat was that there were upgrades available and that the staff was a multi tool which you could shoot with of fight up close with. The controls for combat were generally pretty easy but the zoom did take away from the joy of the fight a bit.

Platforming: Platforming is pretty easy to figure out although there are times where you may get a bit lost due to looking for energy orbs while platforming.  Occasionally, I did have a few problems with the controls but that also might just be user error.

Cutscenes and Background: The cut scenes are beautifully scripted as well as beautiful looking. Each scene gives you a little more insight into the world and characters. The exchanges between Monkey and Trip did feel wonderfully subtle and not like I was being hit over the head by Captain Obvious.

Story & Character Growth: The story is really interesting which makes me actually want to play this game more than once. It even got me looking for Trip and Monkey fan fiction because I just wanted to know how things would really turn out in the Enslaved universe after the end of the game. There is character growth although I feel Monkey grows more as a person than Trip does. While the story focuses on Trip and Monkey it also introduces Pigsy. Pigsy is a funny character with complex motives and really brings a little much needed lightheartedness to some of the game. I think it is cool that this game is bases off of Journey to the West and love how the characters and theirs names are worked in to the plot.

Monkey: Monkey is a far better character than Trip is. He has a sense of humor and a brusque sort of wit that I really enjoyed. While I felt that Trip was mostly a useless Woman-child.  In contrast, I felt Monkey was ripped out of his "Jungle Book" existence and really embraced the role of protector. He seems really deep and is understanding towards Trip even though she enslaved him and then breaks her promise to release him. He really is one of the highlights of the game for me.

               Overall I liked the game and I might even play through it again on some lazy afternoon. There are little things that frustrate me about the game but the combat, platforming, and story make up for it. I have played through it more than once at different levels of difficulty and really enjoyed it each time. The game doesn't take long to play through but it is enjoyable. I would really recommend this to anybody looking for a few hours of satisfying gaming.

GUEST BLOGGER INFO

Contributing writer: Rainbow S. Coan

Rainbow Coan is a Sci-fi and fantasy movie/T.V enthusiast and all around nerd. Her hobbies include playing StarCraft II (mainly as Terran), reading Sci-fi & fantasy books, and playing games on Xbox. She has a Zombie Apocalypse survival plan and identifies strongly with Hobbits. Her favorite game of all time is King's Quest 6.