Immortals Fenyx Rising
PC, PS4, PS5, Stadia, Switch, Xbox One, Xbox Series
Zelda meets Hades? Not quite. Yet while it owes plenty to Nintendo’s astonishing sandbox, Ubisoft Quebec’s game of gods and monsters is as much breath of fresh air as Breath Of The Wild. Between that title, its magpie spirit, some odd control quirks and oldfashioned puzzle design, Immortals Fenyx Rising often feels like a scrappy but likeable throwback to the PS2 era. Its world is overstuffed and its systems occasionally undercooked, but it’s thrown together in a way that gives it a plucky underdog vibe (inasmuch as an openworld game made by hundreds of staff from one of the industry’s biggest publishers can be described as such).
Still, in a genre dominated by long-running series with extensive backstory, it’s a treat to play an adventure that demands no prior knowledge. You could brush up on your Greek mythology – though if you’ve played a certain Roguelike lately, that’s all the required reading you’ll need. Yet Hades proves a thorn in Immortals’ side: their proximity makes comparisons inevitable, and the latter is competing with a game whose gods are betterwritten (and better-looking). It’s not that Immortals’ script is bad, its irreverent humour landing plenty of hits among the swings and misses – which is entirely in keeping with the eager-to-please approach of everything else. But goodness, does it love the sound of its own voice. Wherever you travel, your journey is soundtracked by the booming tones of narrator Prometheus – the straight man of its central comedy double-act – with Zeus interjecting, if only to snicker at something vaguely suggestive. The decision to have everyone speak in cod-Greek accents, meanwhile, saps the humour from some exchanges, while others could use a trim. That said, we’ll take single entendres about Hephaistos’s hammer over po-faced sermonising about honour any day.
Whether you choose a male or female hero, Fenyx is similarly light on their feet. Combat has a zip that’s often lacking in sandbox adventures, without ever feeling weightless. Though dodge and run being mapped to the X button (on Series X, at least) is certainly a choice, you’ll soon be dancing rings around the rank and file, leaping up to swing a long-handled axe at winged opponents, while dicing up guards and beasts with quick jabs of your sword. The heavier weapon, in truth, seems a bit too useful, dealing extra damage per hit while filling up a stun gauge that leaves your target seeing stars, letting you get in plenty of free jabs while they recover. Throw in a ground-shaking mythical hammer attack and the ability to call your pet phoenix Phosphor to dive-attack enemies, and you’ll be tempted to wade into skirmishes en route to your next objective rather than avoid them. Flight is, however, useful when you’re short of health-giving pomegranates to scoff or blend into potion form: a pair of wings functions like Link’s paraglider, with a stamina meter eventually forcing you earthward (unless you’ve pocketed enough blue mushrooms or bought the right upgrades to keep you airborne for longer).
Talking of which, between the blessings bestowed upon you by the likes of Aphrodite, Ares and Athena for completing their quests, you’ll have enough boons to make Zagreus jealous. Meanwhile, Ubisoft Quebec has kept its loot game pleasantly uncomplicated. By openworld standards, the volume of gear and weapons here is small. But each discovery feels meaningful, and even the most basic kit can be upgraded; within the first few hours we have an axe that lasts us for the next 20 or so. And if a mighty but ugly helmet would spoil your ensemble but you like the combo boost it offers, you can transfer its ability to one that suits your aesthetic. Its flexibility extends to the openness of its world: after a short time you’re given free rein to proceed as you like, with pop-ups warning when you’re in the vicinity of legendary creatures you’re likely to struggle against, and difficulty settings attributed to the underground Vaults.
These challenges – the equivalent of Zelda’s shrines – are where Immortals comes unstuck. The change of pace is initially welcome, but in many cases these puzzles are more time-consuming than ingenious. They’re often well-worn ideas, too. Brazier-lighting sequences might well be refreshed by having you manually steer with the right stick (and, later, adjusting its speed with the left) but we’re still shooting arrows through flames to burn away obstructions. Telekinesis doesn’t make stacking boxes to reach platforms any more enjoyable. Manoeuvring giant bronze orbs into place is tedious, even without spotty targeting; they’re far better used as wrecking balls, as we yank levers to blast them into stone walls to reveal the path forward. The puzzles above ground aren’t up to much, either – fetching cabbages from nearby roof gardens isn’t the normal way of things, true, but placing three of them on plinths to open a door feels awfully familiar.
Yet you’re soon onto the next task, and then the next, without too much time to focus on those rough edges. Sure, Hephaistos’s part of the kingdom is aggressively brown; the motion blur when you’re sprinting or galloping turns Aphrodite’s idyllic springs into an unattractive smear; updraughts inexplicably carry you just short of a platform; several upgrades are handed to you without explanation. And yet when we’re not checking our phone during its unskippable cutscenes, we’re swept along by its sheer exuberance. Above all, there is something about the way it refuses to take itself seriously that makes its shortcomings a little easier to forgive. There is, seemingly, no grand plan here; no desire to turn this into a decades-spanning franchise. It’s just an old-fashioned videogame in contemporary trappings that wants you to enjoy yourself. Play it with a forgiving eye, and you probably will.
In a genre dominated by long-running series, it’s a treat to play an adventure that demands no prior knowledge