[ TGS 2022 ] Forspoken Preview – Your Friendly Neighbourhood Elden Ring

Forspoken getting delayed aside, attendees at Tokyo Game Show 2022 could give a slice of the game a try. If you haven’t heard about the game before, it features Frey Holland, getting transported into another world, a once thriving land now corrupted by a devastating blight. She becomes a reluctant hero to save the last remnants of the people, and get some answers in the process.

FREY’S THIRTY MINUTES

Compared to the trailers you might have seen, the action gameplay feels incredibly fast-paced. Even so, the dodge mechanic in the game seems quite forgiving, so long you time it right to avoid those attacks. The demo offered up to a boss battle which despite the aforementioned leniency and selecting Easy difficulty, it still was a challenging slice.

When it comes to finding a playstyle, the demo showcased around 25 or more spells split into two different schools, which basically are either melee- or range-focus. Handily enough, unlearning and relearning other spells is free. Upgrading these spells require you to clear relevant spell quests.

Wonderfully enough, the exploration can also be done at a quick pace as you have the ability to speed up and hop around to travel fast. For a demo, the map was surprisingly large, which would imply even more areas to zip around for the full game. Besides your personal speed boosts, you get a grappling hook in the form of a spell; to start, the range is pretty short, but I would assume that this can be upgraded eventually.

AND THE ADVENTURE PAUSES

They didn’t try to cram in any story in a 30 minute demo, so if you didn’t already know anything about Forspoken, this wouldn’t shed any more light. However, it does intrigue, and has a learning curve. Learning how to switch your spells around and fully utilizing either school’s offensive spells can make for incredibly high skill play. The options would potentially grow depending on what the myriad side quests around offer in terms of spells, items, and resources. Crafting and upgrading opens up the possibility of highly customization and flexibility, too. The fast pace is helped by attacks not consuming a typical stamina or mana resource, and you don’t necessarily have to charge them up to have them be effective.

As it stands, Forspoken just feels like it needs to be given a proper chance to show its stuff, so we’ll see where that road takes us.

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