Bound by Flame

Today I will evaluate the work of art - the game and immerse you in this wonderful world of exclusives, PCs and consoles. I read a lot about the recently released game and even saw the gameplay trailer. It caught my attention with its style, design and combat system.

This is not exclusive or even a new generation project. Bound by Flame is released on PC, Xbox 360 and PS3. Like Dark Souls, it is a third-person fantasy adventure RPG, which I think is a great combination. The creator of this masterpiece was the Spiders campaign, which was completely unknown to me, which developed Mars: War Logs and Of Orcs and Men, which received good ratings from the press and players.

Bound by Flame is a fairly adequate project, if only because the picture here is not bad. The medieval style allowed the developers to bring to life many interesting ideas in terms of the appearance of the characters, but not the environment; it just doesn’t shine with variety. The main thing is that the medieval style is felt, the developers did a good job here. The game was created on the Silk Engine, about which I have heard not very good reviews, but despite this, the animation, models of weapons and heroes turned out well, even the landscapes are sometimes surprising. Cut scenes are almost no different from the gameplay itself. Basically, all the levels are straightforward, corridor ones, there is no particular choice of path, but even on such maps there are a large number of chests, stumps with interesting things, in general, different goodies. And the main character is so brutal that he opens chests with his foot, like almost everything else. And, since I started talking about the main character, I’ll tell you about the plot.

I don’t have much to tell you here. The main character's name is Vulcan and, although you can choose a female gender for the character, the nickname is attached to him forever. The name, of course, can be changed, but the hero will still be called Vulcan. He is a demolitionist, a mercenary who walks with a group of swordsmen, saving civilians and killing evil spirits. The plot develops as follows: the world has been attacked by the undead, and they are trying to freeze the entire world and destroy all living things. There are only two surviving factions left: free swordsmen, united with scribes, and pointy-eared, pompous forest dwellers - elves. So the scribes, performing some kind of ritual, freed a demon who possessed Vulcan and gave him enormous power of fire. The goal of the swordsmen was to win the war and drive the demon out of their comrade.

And now it’s time to talk about the main thing – the gameplay. Well, let's start at the beginning of the game: character settings. Yes, she is here, but the choice is not very large, five faces and six hairstyles, and the name can be changed, but, as I already said, this change will go almost unnoticed. Non-playable characters (NPCs) are quite strong; most send Vulcan to the next world with a couple of hits. And to prevent this from happening, you must be able to use an arsenal of weapons: mines, blades, crossbows and swords. By the way, weapons can be modified, and all you need to do is collect or make the necessary materials, you will also need a little money. There are a lot of weapons in the game, you can find them, or you can buy them. There are also three modes for combat: warrior, where damage and blocking are better, scout, which is faster and more maneuverable, and stealth, but it is not particularly interesting, consisting of sneaking up and striking with daggers from the back. All small movements are performed with one button, which makes the gameplay much easier, but I don't think anyone will pay attention to this.

I didn’t see any problems in terms of the interface. The character can be pumped up; the level is traditionally obtained by killing a certain number of opponents and by completing missions. You can upgrade the hero’s abilities, or you can improve his characteristics and the like. In addition, you can improve its smaller qualities, such as damage from traps, number of lives, and so on. Sometimes you manage to take part in the conversation, but very rarely. The locations cannot boast of much variety; from a distance the picture may be beautiful, but up close the textures look so-so. Missions are also often similar, either you need to kill someone, or save someone (and for this you also have to kill a lot), etc. The battles are quite difficult even at an average level, so you have to work hard.

So, Bound by Flame is a good game. With good graphics, predictable plot and excellent gameplay. The game is a little overpriced.