ELEX
Developer: Piranha Bytes Publisher: THQ Nordic Genre: Action role-playing Platform: PS4, Xbox One [reviewed], PC Release: October 17, 2017
I think we’ve all experienced, or at least heard of the
dreaded difficulty wall in many a video game. It’s
that moment when a game ups the difficulty to an
insane level and can usually found in RPGs in an
attempt to force you to level up to be at the right
level to fight some big boss. Elex has this difficulty
wall, only it comes within the first few minutes of
gameplay.
For quick reference I jotted down some notes about
my first 7 hours of playing the game and came away
with some interesting statistics. In that time I
manged to rise a measly 6 levels, which wasn’t even
enough to allow me to carry a weapon other that a
lead pipe (I found an axe around hour 6), I only killed
10 enemies in total (got an achievement for it and
everything), died multiple times if I even thought
about wandering outside of town too far, and only
felt capable when I had a companion friend join the
party at around hour 5. Yeah, Elex doesn’t just hit
you with a difficulty wall, the whole game is a giant
difficulty wall.
game. This isn’t your modern, inclusive RPG in any
sense of the word, and while the game is a true
open-world experience, it doesn’t level with you like
so many others, instead punishing you for getting
even a little too cocky. This is going to turn people
away in droves, sure, and while I thought about
putting the game down after the first few hours, I
simply couldn’t.
And yet, even that is strange in and of itself because
Elex really isn’t all that good of a game. The graphics
feel almost a generation behind, I like to say it looks
like an online MMORPG that looks good, but is
designed to run on as many systems as possible.
There are glitches all over the place, from minor to
more major. There were times where I would pause
the game to go grab a drink, or use the bathroom,
and the game would freeze up. It wouldn’t require a
restart, but it would take a minute or two before the
game caught up with me telling it to un-pause. It’s a
weird glitch that I’ve never experienced in all my
years of gaming.
Then there’s the combat which even after hours of
And yet, I couldn’t stop coming back again and
again, saving the game like I was playing an old-
school PC adventure where death lurked around
every corner. Hell, it did lurk around every corner as
even a lowly ROUS can one-hit you, ending the
“Battlerite is a bit rough around the
edges; but those that it strikes a cord
with will probably love it.”