Ryse: Son of Rome Review

THIS. IS. SPARTA!

 I mean Normandy, no I mean Helms Deep... Gladiator? Ryse: Son of Rome has many problems, the biggest of which seems to be that it takes itself way to seriously for a game that borrows so heavily from other media. However since there is so much that I found wrong with Ryse, I want to start off with the positives first and yes, there are some.

 Ryse is a Crytek game through and through, it is a game built from the graphics up and boy does it show. Ryse isn't just a good looking game, it is perhaps one of, if not the best looking games I have ever played. It is easy to see that every small aspect of the environment and character design has been painstakingly crafted to make it feel authentic. Rome feels like the beacon of civilization it is made out to be and travelling to Britain shows a stark contrast between the powerful roman empire and the barbarian riddled lands. The forests and swamp lands in Britain feel as if you're being taken back in time to a new, yet forgotten land. The visuals are truly spectacular, I just wish the game was longer to enjoy them more. 

Just doesn't do it justice.

 Another aspect that has been done spectacularly well is the voice acting and character animations. The performance from each voice actor is brilliant and I hope more next gen games up the ante in this area. I wanted to hate the antagonist Basilius, but Jamie Ballard's voice acting performance masterfully combined with the character animations made me want to see more of him.

The man you love to hate.

 Now back to the negatives, which there are  a lot of. As I mentioned at the start of the article Ryse is a game that borrows heavily from other media. The first and probably the most glaringly obvious is the landing of Normandy, I mean Britain. The whole opening scene is a complete rip off of the beach landing from Saving Private Ryan. There's even a freaking soldier walking around with half his arm missing. That doesn't even make sense when you only have boulders and arrows being hurled at you. The developers were so concerned with the show and spectacle of their pretty graphics that they put no creative effort what so ever into some of their biggest set pieces. I wish this was just a one off thing, however the entire game just feels as if some people sat around a table saying things like "Ok, what if this happened.. but with romans". Even the combat itself plays out like the slow motion scenes from the movie 300. Except where in 300 they were used sparingly to visually add to what was already happening on screen, in Ryse they are stretched out over the entire six hour campaign; and it grows tired. Quickly. The story itself is lifted from the movie gladiator, except Crytek seemed to of butchered it in the process.

 The story is so badly set out, paced and written that it can lead to some pretty cringe heavy moments. The fact that they started the game near the end of the plot line making it obvious what happens made me sigh. I mean why would you do that? Why would you want to give away your entire plot and twists in the first fifteen minutes to anyway who can rub together two brain cells? The script itself feels like it has been written by a twelve year old trying to sound cool and philosophical; but it is far from either. I lost count of the times the word "rise" and the phrase "Son of rome" were used, and when they were used they felt ham-fisted and not quite right. There is a scene where Marius is talking with Basilius in which the dialogue was so incredibly bad that I cringed non-stop and face palmed as a result.

 The script isn't to be outdone though by the gameplay, which is probably the most uninspired I've seen in a long time. At first it seems interesting with a Arkham City cross 300 type feel. Though that fades quickly when it comes apparent how repetitive the combat actually is. There are only three types of enemies, normal, shielded and brute and even though their character models may change they are still the exact same enemies through the entire game. The executions seem cool at first in all their gory splendor, however they grow old as you soon realise you'll be dispatching 95% of your enemies with them. They are quick time events that don't even matter. Seriously, if it tells you to press X and you press Y the action will still happen! The devs seemed to want to preserve their nice animations so badly that they try and limit your ability to stuff them up as much as they can. It's hand holding taken to the next level.

X, X, X, X, X

 Thankfully the repetitiveness is sometimes broken up by various battle scenes. Creating a shield wall with your legion as you slowly advance towards your enemy under a hail of arrows never gets old and I wish they implemented more of it. It is something good and fun too far and inbetween the usual hack n' slash. There are also moments where you have to defend a certain point, These are fun at first but feel as if they are drawn out for too long just to pad the length of the game. I will say this though, the kinect voice commands work great in these sections.

 In the end though, Ryse is a beautiful looking game that has been masterfully crafted by the kings of graphics. However Crytek took the easy and lazy way out when it came to just about everything else. It's worth a play, just maybe not a buy. Part of me hopes this didn't sell well enough to become a full franchise.