Slashing through these corrupted foes with Tanta Sila's melee abilities was a particularly satisfying highlight. Defeating a Tanta grants new ability sets that you can quickly swap between mid-battle, and spells are upgradeable through their respective skill trees. Here's Digital Foundry running the technical rule over Forspoken's PS5 demo.Īrmed with magical spells, Frey's moveset mostly sticks to ranged attacks, backed up by support magic like binding enemies with weeds to slow them. With the wildlife and corrupted humans ready to kill on sight, each region presents its own challenges, and Frey doesn't need conventional weaponry.

It's a refuge safe from an ever-spreading corruption long called the Break, which affects everything it touches except Frey. Once benevolent sorceresses, they've each succumbed to madness and terrorise this land, leaving us to hunt them down.įollowing a rather simplistic stealth mission, Frey's soon free to explore Cipal, a central medieval city that serves as your hub and humanity's last hope. Forspoken doesn't open up for several chapters, but once it does, you'll confront the four Tantas, a powerful group of matriarchs that rule each of Athia's regions. Soon enough, she's transported into a strange fantasy land called Athia with no way home, paired with a wisecracking bracelet called Cuff. Playing as Frey Holland, Forspoken begins with a depressing opening chapter that makes her rough upbringing immediately evident.

Availability: Out January 24 on PS5 and PC.Once things did click, I couldn't turn away, and since Forspoken isn't a long action-RPG it is at least one worth sticking with once you start - this is the type of game where you won't always find the smoothest journey, but the build-up eventually pays off. I might've stopped sooner on a casual playthrough - but I'm glad I saw it through. The restrictive opening chapters, poor pacing, and that PS5 demo do it no favours, and things didn't click until the campaign was nearly over. Forspoken takes it time to get over a wobbly start, but there's something worthwhile here amongst the noise.įorspoken doesn't leave a great first impression.

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