Platform Played On: PS4
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| Don't tell me you can't do something PS4! |
Rating: 7.5/10
Verdict: Road Not Taken is a good puzzle game with a simple idea that mostly works. The visuals are gorgeous, the story a bit lacking, but all-in-all it's a good experience.
The Roguelike is an insanely popular genre in the indie community, along with platformers. You don't see many large studios dipping into their genre, but some may say that the indie scene is flooded with them. I agree, somewhat, but the beauty is that you don't have to play them. I know, it's a crazy concept.
When I first saw Road Not Taken, I thought it looked like a charming take on the genre, and it was one of the few Roguelikes that caught my attention. With that said, I was still a little cautious going in because I wasn't sure if the pendulum would swing towards the positive or the negative in how it plays.
It has a novel concept; you are a Ranger and you go into the forest to save children. It has a cartoonish/fairy tale art style, you walk around on an isometric grid and it avoids a lot of the conventions of Roguelike by not being turn-based and not actually allowing you to fight... or at least in the way that we've grown accustomed to. It also is a puzzle game first and foremost.
In Road Not Taken, your only "weapon" is your ability to pick up objects (up to four around you) and toss them in a straight line. You can also pick them up and walk around them but it subtracts from your energy (your life) when you do so, so it's a more feasible option just to chuck things around. Which applies to real life too. It's a game mechanic that indie games can get away with since they're generally smaller in scope and aren't full-price -- it's free for PS Plus members this month -- and it does put an interesting spin on the typical Roguelike proceedings.
The game takes place over fifteen years, which each level being a year. Your energy that remains carries over to the next year so it pays to plan your moves accordingly and intelligently so you don't gimp yourself. The levels are procedurally generated which means when you die you won't have to repeat the same puzzles over and over, but I don't find that they change enough to warrant me replaying the game repeatedly. The situations do change, and at first there is a lot to explore and figure out, but when you die and have to do the early years it's a bit tedious. When things get tedious I tend to zone out and my lack of concentration due to that only hurt me later on.
The developers promise a lot to uncover, and they're right. There are a lot of things going on in this deceptively simple-looking game. There are a lot of different items that you can create by combining different objects on the map (by throwing objects into each other). Enemies and objects react in interesting ways and your book keeps track of how to create things. For example, throw an axe at a tree and it creates wood. Put together two pieces of wood and you make a fire. Throw a kid into the fire and it will follow you. The last one makes sense because if you abuse your child it loses its self-esteem and becomes dependent on you. Other reviews have knocked and made fun of that little tidbit, but I chose to rationalize it.
Even though when you die you have to start fresh, you don't lose the secrets that you've discovered, so subsequent playthroughs give you a bit of an advantage because you have all the knowledge of what you've learned before documented. That's great because my memory is terrible. What blog am I writing for again?
Some of the things don't make a lot of sense, but I guess the game has its own logic. It doesn't matter because once you bump into things it'll write down how to make it, if you can, so you don't really have to think. It is fun seeing what the world has to offer, and the first few times I had to restart I discovered some neat areas, such as the Yeti early on:
The problem is that due to the limitations of energy that you will no doubt face, it doesn't really pay to take the risk and explore some of these areas. Say you're seven years in and there's an area you want to check out, but you know you're getting low on energy and have a lot of years to go, will you really take that chance? I didn't.
Unfortunately the game does reveal itself to be a little more shallow than it would lead you to believe rather quickly, so as much fun as it is to discover things the first little while, it becomes pretty routine and less interesting. Doesn't change the fact though that at first I loved the game. Had I written the review over the first couple hours, I would have given it an 8.5 at least.
The visuals are a high point for me. Like I said above, they have a fairy tale quality to them and it's beautiful to look at. The evil spirits look intimidating, the animals look cute. Even the blocks that don't move have character. It's a world that is designed well and expertly brought to life with gorgeous artwork, and it proves that you don't need complex graphics to unleash a rich world on gamers.
Being able to throw things actually makes for some interesting puzzles. Over the last few years I've been fascinated more by puzzle games with simplistic hooks but compelling gameplay. Catherine, for example, was an incredible game and all you had to do was move blocks. Road Not Taken has that affect on me, though to a lesser extent. The gameplay is easy to pick up, but due to energy, you have to really think about all your moves, especially when you have spirits following you.
There are a couple annoyances, namely the fact that once you pick up an object you can't just put it down which I deem artificial difficulty... meaning it's a bullshit way to make the game harder like the computer literally just cheating in older games. There is also a problem of having to backtrack because a specific area requires something that isn't on this screen. This means that you will have to try not to block yourself off when proceeding to the next area because heaven forbid you have to return later. I get what they're trying to do, but this just reeks of poor design.
Outside of being in the woods looking for kids, you can walk around the very small village and make friendships by giving gifts to the people you talk to. In Road Not Taken, you can also do this, because the developers know that the only good friendships are superficial friendships based on presents. When you give them gifts, they will go from Acquaintance to Friend to even possibly Marriage.
You can also go into your house and equip a few items to make your experience easier, or ban up to two things from the map... but there are so many possible obstacles in this game that two doesn't really seem like very many. It's still a nice feature to have, because some areas can get really frustrating.
There's a story here but it's pretty mild. Like I said above, you are a Ranger and you save kids. There's potential here for a pretty touching plot but that's not really the point of the game. In fact, it's pretty disposable, except for the ending which actually does a good job of portraying emotion despite the fact that the rest of the game lacks it. I can criticize a game for not doing something but a good scene is a good scene and the ending, though incredibly short, is a good scene.
I quite like Road Not Taken, and I think it's a worthwhile entry into the Roguelike canon because it is a little bit different and ambitious, while keeping some of the mechanics that fans of the genre enjoy. It has a few drawbacks, but it's a fun, thought-provoking puzzle game that plays well for the most part.
