Whoa boy it's been awhile. Hello there, welcome. For those who is new to this seeing as you've heard me mention it on some podcasts I've done, welcome to my blog! I once said I would never review things, and that's not what this post is. Frankly, I'm making this seeing as I've heard a lot of the same things about the game I've been playing/what I am going to talk about. I either get 'It looks too generic' or 'Godfall didn't get good reviews, so I'm not going to buy it.'
Well, buddy, I'm here to give my own two-cents on what I've played so far (and seeing I am one boss away from the final one, I figure I have a good enough say in this matter) on how I am enjoying Godfall, my little nit-picks with me, and what I was iffy about.
Let's start.
For those who are not aware/have been living under a rock during this shit year, Godfall was announced at the Game Awards last year as the first ever confirmed PS5 exclusive. Developed by Counterplay games (an Indie studio comprised of veterans who have worked on Gears 5, Destiny and Diablo) and published by Gearbox. The game is a 'first of it's kind' looter-slasher. What does that mean? Imagine Destiny, but they took away all the guns and you only had your class special and a sword. That's Godfall. Now, I'm not saying that's a bad thing. To be honest, my favorite part of Destiny is when I'm cutting people in half in the Crucible using a sword.
Instead of classes as Destiny has, you have Valorplates, very extravagantly designed armor sets that can use the same weapons as every other plate, but comes with their own specials. Anywhere from setting enemies on fire, to summoning little beam turrets, to poisoning. The designs are beautiful, light bouncing off the armor sets and the glow-y bits lighting up as your main character, Orin, speaks. A design choice in the game, never showing character's faces, seemingly adds in the mystery of the game and it's world. Multiple Youtubers have gone out of their way to make videos that explain the lore of Godfall (and holy wow theres a lot) but the game tends to step back from it, drip feeding you with bits and pieces of lore and data pads you can pick up throughout the open world and missions.
While I personally haven't taken a look at any of the lore pads, I have watched a few of the videos online, and I can best describe Godfall's overarching narrative as a mix of medieval epics and the start of a space opera. So, with that, let's talk a bit about Godfall's story before I get into my thoughts on the combat.
Taking place on a planet created by the body of a dead dragon (yeah, you uh, heard that right) Godfall is the story of two warriors named Orin and their (more on this later) brother Macros. The latter trying to stop their power-hungry sibling of battle from starting something called the 'Rites of Ascension', which would allow him to become a god, something the two fought side-by-side with to kill before. Obviously, power corrupts, and you play as Orin as they kill Macros' most-trusted soldiers one by one to make it to him. Along the way, you team up with a construct called The Seventh Sanctum and a weaponsmith named Zenun, and you work your way up the three plates of the planet (Earth, Water and Air) to face your brother.
And...that's honestly it. While there is background lore, as to how Orin and Macros met, it's not flat out laid to the player in the man game. That stuff you have to read up, baby, and with the data plates hidden throughout the worlds, you slow uncover it via in game texts. That's right, Destiny 1 style. Obviously, this isn't an ideal way to throw out a story, especially as it looks like Counterplay is hoping to turn this into a franchise. Youtube videos are great and give you a way to engage people outside of your story, but it isn't the same. Also, the generals of Macros' army you fight seemingly get no characterization either. All being there via the trope of 'oh they followed your brother, hence they need to be killed' type of situation. I am not sure if they too are expanded on in the data pads, and would have to read to figure them out.
One more thing before I go into combat thoughts. When this game was first revealed, it made it seem like you were making your own character that fought for Orin. Obviously, that is not the case, and you are playing as Orin. When you boot up Godfall and make it to the hub area, you realize there is female-designed armor types. You unlock one from the start and can switch between missions. Obviously, being me, I switched into the female-type armor and continued my playthrough. When Orin spoke, their voice had gone from a male-oriented to a feminine tone, to match the armor. It was incredibly interesting to me, as this sets a precedents to the lore in this universe that gender itself is based solely on armor type, and not the being behind it. That gender is something that can easily be switched around, which can lead to so many implications in this universe.
Now, I highly doubt they will be doing anything more on this matter, which personally, sucks, but I am incredibly interested to see if this is ever fully discussed and brought up in any capacity. A note to this, as Orin is still perceived with male-pronouns throughout the story, Macros is still your 'brother' (which obviously could be meant as a 'brother in war' or 'brother in arms' situation) which honestly could stay, as it makes sense either way.
The final thing I will be discussing about Godfall is the game's combat. Multiple times have I described it to people as 'Babies first souls-like' and I stick by that. The game teaches you early on that parrying with your shield (L1) is the most important weapon/defense in your arsenal, and also parrying with your weapon as well. Speaking of weapon, you have everything from normal sword, long swords, hammers, duel wielding etc. All have a light attack (R1) and a heavy attack (R2), and the heavy attack takes full use of the haptic triggers on the Duelsense. My favorite instance was that I used a heavy hammer for awhile, and every heavy attack I made seemingly made pressing the trigger harder, making it feel like every time I swung the hammer, I was using all the strength Orin had to swing it again. Obviously, it's not for everyone, but I loved it.
For the boss fights, you need to go through the world and collect sigils to unlock them. This is fine, as it allows you to level up and get more weapons, but it's also tedious, forcing the player to replay missions over and over to unlock bosses across the three realms. When you fight those bosses, they are immensely powerful and vary in difficulty as you rise up through the game. All of them, though, have 'checkpoint' markers, little arrows above their health bars that are used to show you how far they are from death and when new attack patterns start. A feature I like is, when you die in Godfall, enemies don't regain health. In boss battles, if you die, enemies regain health up to when the last checkpoint marker was. It's a nice feature I can appreciate, as someone who struggled through a lot of the bosses.
On a side note from the missions and bosses (missions have set time limits and extra objectives, something I never could complain about as the time limits were very generous) I will say this games huge fault is that there is no in-game map when your own the ground. You must follow on instinct, and if you remember where things are from areas you were already at. Many times just exploring I would get lost and lose my direction, or turn down a wrong path and need to take the long way to an objective. While not a deal breaker, it is rather annoying and makes traversing the open world (not in missions) a chore and something I rarely did.
As I finish this piece, I actually just beat Godfall a few hours ago. The ending, sadly, crashed on me during the final cutscene, which broke the immersion a lot. Do I recommend the game? Kind of. If your into looters and combat heavy 'soul's like', of course. Now if your not into any of those, I would still kind of recommend it due to the fact it's one of the only PS5 exclusive titles, and damn it's pretty. I do believe the $70 price point is incredibly steep, but I don't blame the developers for that. If the game ever goes on sale (which I imagine it will soon) swipe it up, and let's play together.
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