Ninja Theory, the guys behind the game ‘Heavenly Sword’ (which I must admit I never played), brings us the multiplatform game ‘Enslaved’. Loosely based on the ancient Chinese story ‘Journey to the West’ (key word in there is; “loosely”), it sees our lead character Monkey get kidnapped by a bunch of mysterious slavers. Trip, our female lead, breaks out allowing Monkey the opportunity to bust out of his cell and escape the ship with Trip. When Monkey wakes up after his daring escape that almost kills him he finds he’s fitted with an enslavement band that effectively makes him Trip’s slave (hints in the name). Oh and did I mention that the game takes place in the distant future where humanity is all but extinct and machines roam the world hunting down the remaining people? No! Oh, well it is, and if you enjoyed that TV show ‘The World without Humans’ then you’re visually in for a treat.

 

The game has a rather unique feel; it’s like a Half-Life 2 meets Okami. It’s a destroyed world filled with decaying buildings with only a few contrasting new constructions. It’s a dismal world filled with human ruins but between crumbling walls nature has made a comeback creating a vibrant beautiful looking world. The game’s impressive vistas can mean it becomes victim to dropped frame-rates but generally it’s not an issue.

 

 

Technology throughout the world has been fully upgraded with everything, seemingly, compatible with everything else. So Trip with her magical holographic touch-screen can interact with the environment, hack systems, open doors, scan the area and then feed information to Monkey via his enslavement bandana. Conversely Monkey is a bit naïve to the incredible ailing technology that surrounds him and relies mostly on his impressive strength and humanly impossible acrobatic skills; swinging around the landscape to pull levers, beating up various mechs and literally carrying Trip around on his back.

 

The game plays very much like a ‘Prince of Persia’ game. In-between free climbing around the levels you come across plateaus where Monkey must take part in battles against the various robots that populate the world and I’m sorry to say that neither of them work as well as they should. I mentioned ‘Prince of Persia’ and in 2008 the series had a lot of criticism from reviewers, and myself, because of linear paths that were almost highlighted for the players which required no effort to travel along; removing any pleasure from navigating them, as well as having dull repetitive battles. Well ‘Enslaved’ brings back these problems.

While the game does look fantastic it’s clear that at some point it became too realistic and to hard to find a path through this gorgeous world and so every object that Monkey can climb on is flashing white which does mean you can’t get lost but it also means there is never any worry about “am I going along a dead end?” No, just hold the L-stick in the correct direction and keep pressing A and you’ll get there with no issue.

 

 

Outside the flashing items on the wall the game adds arbitrary limits to what platforms Monkey can jump on and off, often stopping you from jumping up a 5 foot wall, but allowing you to defy gravity while you’re wall climbing. The game does attempt to add some excitement; by giving us a timer, placing us on environments that are falling apart or occasionally attempting to give us a scare by having one of the handholds fall as Monkey desperately hangs on for dear life but in the end all you need to do with hold the L-stick in the right direction and tap A as fast as you can. Later levels do require a bit more timing but by then it’s too little too late. Then there are limits to where you can explore, stray too far from Trip (even if you’re attempting to kill robots shooting at her) and Monkey will start to get a fatal headache.