Remnant: From the Ashes Review (Heath)
A One-of-a-Kind Gem in Need of a Little More Polish
If nothing else, Remnant: From the Ashes is undoubtedly something you've never seen before: no one would correct you if you named it a souls-like, a third-person shooter, or even a roguelite or RPG to some extent, as elements of all are present to differing capacity. Naturally, there can be issues in treading new ground: these borrowed aspects don't always work, and I think, for me, most of them didn't, at least not to the potential they could have, but supporting the entire experience is a combat model that is so exceptional in every respect, that it's hard to envision a world where Remnant could even come close to failing.
Procedural Generation and Exploration
Remnant's use of procedural generation is a novel idea: each player's campaign will follow the same structure, but the precise layout of the world can see some considerable variation, along with the scenarios and bosses that inhabit it. Level design and exploration, however, are miserable as a result: in the name of making the experience malleable, to feel 'different' every time, the building blocks that make up the playable space are tragically basic and lifeless: there's almost nothing of interest to see or find, no hidden, enticing side routes, no intention behind enemy placement and, although they're built this way to aid in creating unique campaigns, they're so simple that they have the opposite effect; the procedural generation degrades Remnant to a corridor simulator with a semi-random boss at the end of each one.
Furthermore, as almost everything is up to RNG, there's very little in the way of guaranteed loot and your build, for the most part, comes down to simply using what you find, regardless of whether or not you want to; there's every chance that you'll never find a weapon that suits you, or create a build that fits your desired playstyle. With Adventure Mode, separate from your campaign progress, you can freely make new instances of worlds already conquered to see new scenarios and the loot they offer; however, there's no guarantee you'll roll anything different from the first time you explored that world, there's often an unpleasant grind involved should you be looking for a particular item, and, the real issue, as I've already discussed, the procedural generation simply isn't robust enough to allow these replays to feel unique, interesting, or worth the time invested.
Finally, many optional questlines aren't entirely present. For example, early on, there's a chance you can meet with Mud Tooth, an elderly fellow living in a downed helicopter who'll offer you a pocket watch after listening to his stories, all the while informing you that he had intended to pass it along to his son Brabus one day. A less obvious quest there never was; however, it's all too common for a world seed to, despite including Mud Tooth, never house the boss encounter against Brabus, in which you can give him the watch to de-escalate the situation, skipping the fight while earning unique rewards. Worse yet, your seed could include Brabus but have the battle occur before meeting his father, resulting in obtaining the watch after having already fought and killed the intended recipient. Adventure mode allows you to eventually roll the remainder of your incomplete quests should you wish, although this approach suffers all the same pitfalls outlined earlier.
Combat
Very damning so far, I know, but in truth, Remnant's phenomenal combat mitigates many of these issues, at least enough for them to be tolerable: they're still there and very much noticeable; however, it's easy to forget how bland and lifeless the playable space is when you're so eager to get to the next fight, and failing to find the particular weapon you're looking for stings considerably less when every gun shoots like a dream.
So why is this combat model as brilliant as it is? I could go on and on about the superb sound design, the hefty, powerful weapons or the precise and dextrous controls, though as good as they are, it's the finer details that really shine: it's the thoughtfully designed enemy variants that compliment each other impeccably, keeping every encounter intense, it's the perfectly tuned stagger in each bullet that allows even the precision weapons to feel viable controlling the crowds at close range, it's the elegant consumable economy that offers the satisfaction of thoughtful preparation, yet keeps itself slim, not overwhelming with dozens of highly specific and hardly usable concoctions; every facet of battle feels meticulously scrutinised and subsequently optimised.
All except one, however. Remnant's boss battles are not at all consistent: on the one hand, you have original, multi-phase fights that deliver a fair and rewarding challenge; on the other, you have essentially reskinned elite enemies with two attacks that rely on sending a continuous, overwhelming stream of adds to mask the inadequacy of the boss itself, all the while making the encounter a nightmare for a solo player. Once again, we have another victim of the procedural generation; there are far more bosses than you'll ever see in one playthrough, and, unfortunately, there's an obvious case of quantity over quality here.
Character Progression
I love what Gunfire Games went for here: there's a trait system offering quality-of-life improvements and increases to core stats after allocating points earned as you kill enemies and complete quests. Fairly standard so far, but not all of these traits are available to a new character: some will unlock after specific boss encounters, but more interesting are the ones that unlock based on the way you play or how your character has progressed; the 'climber' trait, for example, becomes available after vaulting obstacles fifty times and, as you might expect, increases your vault speed with each point allocated into it.
It's a great system on paper, moulding your character based on their experiences and one of the better aspects of the procedural generation; however, trait points feel slow to accumulate, and each one allocated provides little to no value. Take that 'climber' trait from earlier: you get a point roughly every ten minutes, and what can you do with it? +1% vaulting speed. Other examples (per point) include: +2.5 health, +0.75% ranged damage, +1% weak spot damage, +0.5% elemental damage resistance; you get my point. Sure, these upgrades add up, but they're so useless on their own and feel like a waste of time to allocate; this is something I should be looking forward to doing, but I so often found myself letting points build up to spend in bulk in the hope that I could feel any sense of improvement within my character outside of the relatively standard gear upgrades.
Final Thoughts
Despite my criticism, I've generally started each section on a positive note, and with good reason: Remnant's innovation is a breath of fresh air within the souls-like genre that, at this point, is infamous for its formulaic and static mechanics found in every title trying to emulate Fromsoft's masterpieces. However, outside of the brilliant combat, I'm not yet convinced whether these new ideas are the next big thing for the genre or whether they should have never seen the light of day; the potential is certainly there, however, and, as a game I already recommend, I'm very keen to see how Remnant improves in the sequel later this month.