izigame.me

If there were a way to have a thumbs sideways, I would.
The graphics are good... when the assets load in properly. It's bizarre seeing pop-ins up close when the base game and included DLCs don't have that. The game play is good... except for when the story actually begins at the end of Act 1, at which point the Chaos Portal slog begins. The audio is good... except for Crownhold's trumpets blaring every time I enter the area, INCLUDING leaving a house (compare the sounds of Rathir, Adessa, Ysa, and Mel Senshir, which all ease into their louder parts). The story of the side quests are good, but the main story of the DLC is so contradictory it would seem intentionally spiteful if the developers hadn't sought out old voice actors for a(n intended bittersweet) final farewell. There's also really bizarre bugs such as summoned minions (Faer Gortas, Boggarts, Ice Wolf) attacking critters--even mobs attack critters, which tells me that there's a coding error that misflags crabs and antelope for every creature within Fatesworn. I even had my auroch in Gravehal Keep -killed- by a summoned ice wolf(!!!).
That being said, the new armor sets are fun despite their bugginess. The way these sets function permanently changed the way I view what an armor set should even do in a single-player RPG. Rather than give big stat boosts, having armor sets that alter the way players approach a Destiny is a great idea. How I play while wearing the Despoiler Armor (which favors longbows) and the Last Breath Armor (which favors daggers and faeblades) is dramatically different, even though both could use roughly the same build. The Chaos weapons having unique buffs besides just the Chaos damage is also a strong point (compare Chaos weapons to Primal ones from Teeth of Naros). When I'm not fighting Chaos monsters, since monsters that are immune to crowd control and damage until an arbitrary bar breaks is annoying, I'm having fun, which leads into the next point: Arena Mode.
I -LOVE- the Arena. It's a simple concept, but it's so much fun finally having a place to do what KoA does best, which is have non-stop combat with high-risk, high-reward game play. Using the Abyss Armor and getting an adrenaline kick seeing my health rapidly fluctuate from both my own health drain and getting hit by a sneak attack from a mob behind me is invigorating. Getting crazy Lopoku's Luck stacks from mastering parrying is fantastic. I can't even begin to tell you how much I've used the Despoiler Armor to just spam arrows, rack up crit chance and damage, and watch even trolls ragdoll with a single arrow to their stupid faces.
However, to get to the Arena, that means completing the main story, and the main story, the Chaos portals, and the final boss are terrible. Going from the Anokatos fight to this was not enjoyable. Even Gadflow and Tirnoch were more enjoyable solely from a spectacle standpoint, even if their respective boss fights were shockingly simple. So, where does that leave this review?
If you like the combat of KoA, and I mean -really- like the combat, then get this. Suffer through the main story, suffer through that -one specific character no one likes- from it, suffer through the Chaos portals, and get to the Arena. You can park your character's save file there and goof off in the Arena whenever you want to, and if you do a yearly playthrough of games, you can make a fresh character under a different save file that -never touches this DLC themselves- to spare youself the agony of going through it a second time. If you don't like the combat of KoA, or you are a loremaster, avoid this. You will only be disappointed.