Immortals Fenyx Rising - A charming Greek mythological adventure!

By Sam Coles:  

Ubisoft tend to get a lot of flak, and when their name is mentioned in current conversation you would think they broke into your house and kicked you in the stomach. Anyway, specific analogies aside they tend to do questionable things in the gaming industry, but I love most of their games regardless. However, there was one game that floated under the radar back in 2020, not because it was a bad game, quite the opposite as it is fantastic!  

That game is Immortals Fenyx Rising, a game that was announced a long time ago under a different name, originally code-named Gods and Monsters in 2019, it was a project that went very quiet which is always worrying when publishers do that, but it was great, nevertheless. Then it was just released in 2020 when everyone was in a low part of their lives, but I could never get into it at the time for obvious reasons. Fast forward four years later and I am enjoying it, and I am playing it on Switch because of course I am! I just want to talk about the game for a few paragraphs, as it is a wonderful experience that everyone should play!  

Immortals sees you play as the titular Fenyx who you can customise, anyway the world has been destroyed and taken over by Typhon who has imprisoned the gods. You are tasked with setting the gods free, so they can help you battle Typhon. It is a simple save the world story, but what makes it so fun, and amusing are the characters, for one it is narrated by Prometheus who is being held captive by Zeus and what makes it fun is that the story changes when Zeus gets bored or when he makes a funny joke. The dialogue is funny and well written, and I can’t help but have a smile on my face throughout, especially Hermes’ wisecracks. It is dialogue that I often see people bemoan about online, but some people just need to lighten as it is fun.  

In terms of the gameplay, people often drew parallels to Zelda: Breath of the Wild. However, that is a rather shallow assessment because outside the colourful art style, the stamina meter for climbing as well as the vaults (which are basically shrines). It does draw inspiration from that game with its open-ended design, but on the other hand you don’t have to contend with weapon degradation as your weapons stay with you throughout the game and can be upgraded with gems you collect. Not only that, but the Greek mythological setting also makes it more unique with combat encounters, plus the vaults are enjoyable to conquer as they have good puzzles to solve.  

The game’s world is just a joy to explore, you can start the main quest or just faff about for a bit collecting upgrades for stamina, health and much more. In typical Ubisoft fashion, you must climb an elevated position and scout each region for main and side objectives. I find that I spend about 5 minutes looking for every side objective to unlock from the top of a statue, so I can be as powerful as I can for boss encounters, as it is fun to unlock upgrades when I don’t usually bother in most open world games. You are rewarded in this game for going off the beaten path, and it is not one-use items you will get it will contribute to your overall goal to beat the final boss of the game as well as other more powerful foes. 

That is another aspect that I enjoyed about this game, are the boss fights as they are varied as they have an entire melting pot of Greek mythology to take from. You will be fighting cyclopes, Gorgons and other creators and corrupt demi-gods. The combat isn’t in-depth by any means, but the enemy variety alone stops it getting boring.

 

Visually this game looks incredible, it doesn’t go for a realistic look but instead it uses a cartoonish and vibrant aesthetic. The use of colour in this game is beautiful, especially in Aphrodite’s region, with the blue hues of the rivers and the red sunset warming the green grass. The character models are exaggerated, they look like something out of a Pixar film, and it fits given the lighthearted nature of this game’s narrative and world. Plus, considering what is going on in this game, it runs very well on the Nintendo Switch.  

Overall, I feel that Immortals Fenyx Rising is a very underappreciated game and if you haven’t played it, I highly recommend it. It understands what makes an open world game fun, freedom of exploration. This game is insanely cheap, and I would say grab a copy if you see as you get more than your money's worth these days.   

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