Enslaved - A loose grip on a provocative storyline
posted by ifirit (LEXINGTON, KY) Dec 3, 2010
Member since Dec 2010
If you're looking at playing Enslaved, do so for the first half of the game. Up to the mid-point, the game is interesting, varied and stunning. After that point, the game becomes trite, falling into some of the traditional pitfalls of story-driven adventure-platformers.
The story and the subsequent voice-acting are fantastic up to the mid-point, it's after this point that the game falls apart. The addition of a third character to the main story takes away from the emotional bond between the two main protagonists. It relies heavily on humor to carry the emotional appeal of the previously-established story with some incredibly juvenile humor and poor delivery.
The environments are somewhat linear, usually having only one entry point and exit point. However, there is enough room to explore said environments. The detail and overall look of these environments are beautiful giving you plenty of reason to want to explore each area. However, the last half of the game pulls away from exploration as the demands of combat become more intense and event-oriented. This is especially true in the last two levels of the game, which are so frenetic that exploration is removed in favor of linear platforming. Though this is also hindered by the repeated use of similar environmental features. You can only take swinging past the same triple-flamethrower-pipe combo for so long before you begin to realize the creativity in the level design has gone out.
The combat is excellent, utilizing a free-flowing move system that makes attacking multiple enemies somewhat easy and varied. The first half of the game also includes sections that give you the ability to sneak past enemies and/or surprise attack them using Monkey's agility or Trip's commands. However, like most of the elements previously mentioned, these options become limited in the latter portions of the game as the enemy encounters begin to become mandatory and they begin to block your more commonly-used attack methods more often.
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