NS Game Review: Immortals Fenyx Rising
Personal review of this newly released game on Nintendo Switch that is currently in hype
Product Information
Immortals Fenyx Rising is an open world, Action RPG game from Ubisoft that was recently released in the beginning of December 2020. It is available on several platforms like Windows PC (Uplay), PS4 and Nintendo Switch (currently reviewing this).
Background Story
You will be playing as “Fenyx” a totally normal mortal human who got involved into the messes that Gods made. By the way you can choose whether Fenyx is actually male or female. I would go for female 😃
Typhon, one of the Titans back then was imprisoned by Zeus for several billion of years, finally escaped and took revenge to all gods: Athena, Ares, Aphrodite, and Hephaistos have been imprisoned, while demi gods have become Typhon’s toys: Herakles (Hercules), Atalanta, Achilles and Odysseus. All the gods’ powers were taken by Typhon. How about Zeus? He flew to Prometheus’s and asking for help to battle Typhon. But Prometheus said, Typhon can be defeated by a mere human. Prometheus with his ability shows the journey of Fenyx to Zeus.
By unlucky fate, Fenyx got stranded on the Golden Island (this is island where many Gods live) only to find her ship crew and the island citizens have turned to stone. She somehow (accidentally) gathers many of godly weapons and armors that help her in fighting Typhon’s underlings. She met Hermes that informs her about how severe the situation is, that Typhon wants to break the boundary between mortal realm and the Tartaros (deep abyss where Titans were imprisoned). Fenyx does not have a choice but to help, if she wants to see her brother again.
Gameplay
If you played Zelda: Breath of the Wild, you will feel similar gameplay, but with more extensive fight scenes. And it is a lot harder than Zelda, believe me. You will be facing enemies much stronger than you are. And because this is open world, if you choose to go to somewhere near final boss is — you will meet very powerful monsters.
Some of Fenyx’ abilities:
- fighting with sword (light attack)
- fighting with axe (heavy attack)
- shooting with bow and arrow
- jump one time
- double jump
- fighting on air
- glide on air
- run
- crouch
- evade (max 5 times continuously)
- climb on wall (and jumping while climbing)
- swim and dive
- recognize secret place containing secret prize
- ride tamed animals
Godly abilities:
- Send Phosphor (phoenix bird) to attack
- Ask Phosphor to make Fenyx invisible (unseen)
- Ask Phosphor to create a statue (you can use it as weight object, or to throw)
- Use Ares’ hundreds of spears that hit from ground
- Use Hepaithos’ giant hammer to create earth quake
- Use Apollo’s arrow to control direction of your arrow (yes you can move it up down left right, even slow motion — as you like) to target the enemy
- Use Athena’s shield to charge attack and send any enemy flying
- Use Heracles’ bracelet to move and lift heavy object and trow it at enemy, to pull yourself towards enemy, or to pull small enemy to yourself.
I did not write all, but in total you have more than 30 skills to combine throughout the game. That’s A LOT!
In Game Items:
- Pomegranate, use it if you are going to die to refill health.
- Health Potion, upgraded version that is made from Pomegranate.
- Blue mushroom, use it to refill stamina. Stamina is needed when you are running, flying, climbing, diving, and use Godly abilities. Stamina can refill itself along time, or by hitting enemies.
- Stamina Potion, upgraded version made from blue mushroom.
- Attack potion — enhance your attack power for limited time, created from Olympian Figs.
- Defense potion — enhance your defense power for limited time, created from flower nectar.
Upgrades:
- health bar by collecting ambrosia
- stamina bar by collecting Zeus’ lightning
- Golden Amber for Potion upgrade
- Charon Coins, for upgrading Godly abilities
- Adamantine shards, for upgrading weapons, armors, arrows and pouch.
The game is getting more difficult every time you advance to new map area. You will need to unlock optional chests and quests to upgrade Fenyx to be more powerful and to wisely use attack/defense potion to defeat greater enemies.
Puzzles
Yup, just like Zelda. You don’t just fight enemies to get reward. You have to solve too, how to get into locked room or how to open a locked chest. Either you have to find hidden switch, shoot arrow on hidden object, make weight on the floor switch, move giant balls to specific location. In some cases you also have to combine with Godly abilities, i.e. use remote arrow or Heracles power to pull object from afar. Big rewards for upgrade coming from mini-dungeons. You have to go down to the abyss and solve the puzzle there.
World Map
No, it is not as small as shown here. During gameplay actually they are very wide.
Sounds and Music
Fenyx actually talks and moans often (but fortunately still less than Genshin Impact Waifus). Also you will hear Prometheus tell tales very often, and how Zeus’ smug through all conversations. I would say the rest of sound effect and music are pretty ok, standard though — nothing too catchy like Zelda games (ocarina of time, twilight princess that I can hardly forget).
Bosses
You will meet all kind of Greek mythology creatures here. From the small one, until the big ones. Fighting one-on-one perhaps is not too difficult. But if they spawn some enemies with shield and big hammer, and they are flying, and you are surrounded by walls or you are at top hill — you are doomed 😄.
Graphics
It actually reminds me to Fortnite and Dauntless. Zelda BOTW still looks slightly better. It does not look like AAA games for sure like Far Cry 5, but the exciting gameplay and the funny dialogs are worth it.
Personal Opinion
Some friends that I asked don’t want to play this game because it looks like Zelda. But I actually play it because it LOOKS LIKE ZELDA 😆 But with lots more of fighting styles, and customizable humorous main character, and actually SHE SPEAKS, not muted like Link. And it has all kind of monsters you would expect to fight.
I had been playing it for 16 hours when I wrote this article and I hardly covered first part of the island (doing completionist mode). Estimated ~100–150 hours to fully complete the game, given that you don’t peek on internet to solve the puzzles 😜
Interested? — tell me what you think 🍺
