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+--- Thread: RWBY: Grimm Eclipse Review (/thread-3747.html)
RWBY: Grimm Eclipse Review - RepentantSky - 01-20-2017
Normally I wouldn't review a game like this, but it's the first new game I've played all year, and there's a couple of things in it I think that are worth mentioning.
For those who don't know, RWBY is an anime style TV show headed it's fourth season now I believe, which was created by Rooster Teeth, as was this game, along with an Indie team. The game for it's priced at, which if you buy the extra characters comes out at around 27USD, is a lot of fun though, at least most of the time. As a brief history lesson, this game started out as a fan title, was then made into a more complete game and re-released in 2016, and then hit PS4 and Xbox One on January 17th of this year.
The Story of the game is very simple and at times kind of repetitive to play through, but you want to get all the trophies for it, you'd better be ready, because you'll have to beat it with each character. The problem with the story mode in this game though, it that it only consists of 10 chapters that last about an hour and a half, and it's given to you entirely through people talking to you via an unseen device that sounds like a radio, and the only interaction the playable characters have to the story, is spouting some one-liners in reaction to certain things being said, and sometimes the characters never react at all.
If I had to rate the game just based on the story, it would be 1/5, but thankfully the game has Multiplayer wherein you can either play a Horde match where you protect nodes for 8 to 10 rounds in slightly varying ways based on location and number of people in your party which ranges from 2 to 4 players, or you can Multiplayer the story. That's one thing I like about this game, as most action RPG games just ask you to deal with the lack of numbers, while this one changes how many and what kinds of enemies show up in combat. This makes the game vary quite a bit despite it's fair repetitive gameplay. Thankfully, the cast of characters themselves do feel different almost entirely from one character to another. Ruby for example, the main character and a Scythe wielder has more range than say Yang who is a fisticuff sort of fighter. Character's speeds also change and they do have different moves from on another. It's not the most in-depth game ever in terms of combat, but it is consistently fun. Sadly the online mode does have some issue, like kicking you off the server which closes the game, or not loading in right between matches. This is a real shame because playing with others is the best way to enjoy this game but the servers just need to work better so you don't have to leave a party or match due to the game not working properly.
The visuals of the game are actually pretty well done, but I'm not sure if that has anything to do with the PC version or not. Either way, it looks pretty good. The sound, needs some better direction though, as it seems most levels in the story mode and horde mode just play for a short period of time before fading out and then fading back in. It's a trick that's easy to pull off if the music restarts during combat, as during those moments it's more of a background noise to make things seem more epic, but when it happens pretty much all you hear is the music, it's pretty obvious and makes it seem fairly weak.
One thing that's interesting about the game, is that it sort of has a prestige system in it where you have certain objective you have to complete in order to increase your rank which will re-set all of your characters but give you a badge that other players can see. These objectives can vary from leveling up a certain number of characters to a certain level, beating a certain amount of a kind of foe, or defeating enemies with Ultimate attacks. What's more, you can do this up to 10 times, and each it's a little bit different, so it give you a reason to come back and play the game in a way you may not have the first time.
There are obviously some issues with this game, but honestly, once those get fixed, I could see myself spending a lot of time on it in-between some the releases I'm most excited for. That's why my overall rating for this game, is 3.5/5. The network issues and the most so great story are the biggest issues with the game, but perhaps with some cheap DLC expanding the story, or having a completely different one, like it were a season of the show, the game would be that much better, and I have a hard time being too harsh on a game that costs less with it's current DLC than half the price of average triple A console game. If they ever fix the issues, I could see myself re-rating the game and giving it an extra point. Either way, if you are a fan of this series, I suggest you get the game, because it is worth it.