THQ Nordic and Experiment 101 were awesome enough to show me what life would be like after humans in their post-apocalyptic Action game, Biomutant.
Biomutant takes place on Earth but things look really different, humanity pretty much messed the planet up so much with pollution and other man-made catastrophes that they just up and left the planet. Over the years life has changed and new races of creatures have taken over. Players take control of a One-eyed Ronin who will help save the world by saving the tree of life from the monstrous creatures called the Worldeaters.
Now onto the game itself! The game’s controls can be a bit tricky as each style of weapon as well as special power-ups use different button patterns. I have played for a few hours and am still having some issue with the more advanced buttons and abilities BUT thankfully, in the character’s menu on the pause screen, you can see all the moves and abilities, a nice refresher whenever you need it, and the prompts on-screen during combat help too!
The sound design of Biomutant is quite unique as the world it takes place in. The only spoken dialogue is through a storyteller who translates what the characters are saying as they speak their own little languages.
The art of the game is bright and colorful, one aspect I like is there is character creation, and you can make your own creature as each species has its own attributes, and when you pick your skills it will alter the character’s appearance, for example: if you want the character to have high intelligence, their head will be…bigger. In the end, I chose to have my character be between strong and agile.
Not only can you customize the character, you can customize their clothing with what you find out in the world! You can also craft weapons, armor, and attachments to your weapons. You can also customize the Automaton, a robotic grasshopper (that makes R2D2 sounds) that helps you out along your journey. You also get to pilot different machines that help you travel across dangerous parts of the world which are also customizable.
There are puzzles in the game. The puzzles are based on the number of moves you are allowed to use to complete them, the higher your character’s intelligence, the more moves you can get. If you run out of moves before completing a puzzle, you get a punishment, in the case of the puzzle in the picture provided, my character got shocked.
The story is unique as your choices in dialogue as well as actions in the world affect your character’s inner light, there are two little light characters representing the Light and Dark in yourself. The more points you earn towards the light, the more people around you seem to like you and NPC’s will be more likely to tell you about secrets.
Overall, when I was about to play Biomutant I thought it might be a miss due to delays in release as well as some misses from THQ. I will say I’m pleasantly surprised by this one. What struck me immediately is how some of the elements of the story, the missions, and the main character reminded me of something you would see out of a Kurosawa film!
a bit of photoshop magic, and a couple of Taiko drum beats, and our hero is ready to fight Edo era bandits.
With the outstanding animation and bright colors along with the fluffy characters it would leave people thinking this is a children’s game, I’m mentioning that because when I wrote a previous article about the game, someone commented that it was a children’s game, to that I say… it’s not but a long shot.
Biomutant is a visually stunning game with a message about being true to yourself, being kind to others, and respectful of the planet. If that’s a message you don’t like, well… Being visually stunning, unique character design, voiceover talent, music, replayability, and fresh take on the life after humanity stories, Biomutant is something worth checking out. On my scale of 1-10, Biomutant is a 10.
Biomutant comes out May 25th, 2021 for Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and PC.
