BENGALURU: I am far from a fan of Fortnite. Fortnite itself is far from being a simple Battle Royale that should have been adapted to the small-screen format. Its Android/iOS version and its continued popularity is perplexing to me. The ongoing drama involving Google-Apple-Epic is an interesting ethical topic of discussion on platforms and in-game purchases. But I shall comment no more on this, since I am sure that the readers, like me, consider Fortnite to be the appendix of videogames and wouldn’t want its mention to cast a blight on a column like this.
While Epic Games created the ugly Battle Royale game that shall not be mentioned, they more than redeem themselves by releasing a popular game for free every week on their store. Remnant: From the Ashes is one such third-person survival action shooter that was revived recently on the store. The beginning of Remnant offers little to no explanation on the status of the world.
Based on the visual imagery that involved no sunlight, a lot of fog, and random monsters – we can infer that civilisation as we know it ceased to exist in Remnant. The game is very dark. So dark, that when you exit the game, your eyes may take some time to adjust to reality. As my co-op teammate Nandhini quips, “It doesn’t help how the monsters have no manners, they just sneak up on you”.
In Remnant, we first choose from three different combat specialties. Once that is done, we touch crystals, enter portals to different realms, and squeeze “dragon hearts” for some longevity. We also must find scrap metals and upgrade weapons and skills to really get ahead of the rest of humanity.
Oh, and this must all be done while battling with monsters that lurk in the shadows. While the main missions look appealing on their own, Remnant is way more fun to play with friends. The game has a co-op mode that allows you to explore a variety of maps.
The variety of maps offer different disgusting creatures which each have a variety of their own powers and difficulties. After playing the game for some time, I can proudly say that I spent more time customizing my character’s face than consecutive minutes alive. Just for the dizzying and non-fluid game movements, I rate the game only four partially burnt stars from the ashes.
Anusha Ganapathi
(This economics graduate spends her leisure time preparing for the zombie apocalypse)