From winning awards at PAX 2015 and SXSW Gaming, raising a kickstarter amount of $64.000, getting Greenlit on Steam within one week, the game finally hits Alpha and is now available for Kickstarter backers and press to preview what is to come.
The preview consists of just one region, the winter region, a lonely wasteland covered in ice and snow, with very strong snow drifts, that when not you are not protected, will do considerable damage. The region itself is called Nine Rivers and is the home to the legendary serpent Jörmungandr *(often written as Jormungand, or Jörmungand and also known as the Midgard Serpent (Old Norse: Miðgarðsormr), or World Serpent, is a sea serpent, the middle child of the giantess Angrboða and Loki), which is your main challenge to complete on the frozen lake. But that’s not all, welcome the first Jotun a huge god or old fart as I like to call him, which has a health bar that goes on forever, reminds me of Dark Souls, damn stupid long hard fights… AHHHHHHHHHHHH give me a break.
When you first start the stage it seems rather empty, then this is what you would expect, when this is simply the player hub, moving forward to what looks like arrows leading into a thick cloud, and into a new area called Nine Rivers Region. I have my reservations, straight away, where is the challenge, if there is any challenge at all. I instantly reached out to the developers asking exactly what I am to expect,enemies wise. I was told, simply, the enemy is the environment, ok as I closed the message and back to the game. The environment mmm interesting, how bad can it be, then a storm arrives, looks stunning as it gains force and covers the screen as it sweeps across the land, I noticed my character took some damage, Ahhh, that’s the environment enemy, and I guess those rocks sticking out of the ice, must be a way to protect yourself from its devastation.
The Cartoon drawn world and environmental effects look truly amazing, beyond what I would expect, and the snow storms, looks well impressive. Climbing some steps the camera drew back, WOW, you were able to see everything in this region, where to go and what you should expect. So off I go and guide my Viking character across a barren yet dangerous region.
We are off to see the gods, the wonderful gods of ours
I found the environment, to be not such of an arse, if you take your time, prepare and wait, sometimes it’s better to wait behind a rock, before moving to the next area, or you will just need to dash and hope and pray you make it. There are health pools around the zone, where a godly looking face rises from a pool and tops up your life force, not such a bad idea, better than damn health pots.
As I do not wish to spoil your first play through, I will not tell you what you have to do in the first region, within this Alpha, it’s only fair, but expect to think a little.
There is not much to the control system, WASD are the standard movement keys, or you can use an Xbox Controller, and right mouse click is Hard Melee Attack, and left mouse click is a Normal Melee Attack, one final action is the roll/evade which is the Space Bar. The controls are not too bad when using a keyboard and mouse, but I found using the controller was far superior.
The main boss for you to fight is the legendary serpent ‘Jörmungandr’ an underwater, huge snake like creature, with teeth, think prehistoric conger eel, and back then everything was huge, had teeth and wanted to rip you a new butthole. You meet this bitch, when you need to cross a frozen late, the evil shit swims past you first, the out of know where slams through the ice, not only is the ice slippery, moving out of the shits attach is even harder, even the roll does not work too great. Advice as soon as you see the shadow MOVE your arse as fast as you can.
Then after you have completed the goal set, you can open the door to the Jotun, and I said before, he’s an old grumpy fat shit, with a beard to suit, this guy needs to go on a diet and lose some weight, damn dude, you BIG. Moving in, you see the old git stuck in ice, LOL guess, that last pie was too much and he got stuck, slamming a chunk of ice at him, awakes the sleeping giant and the battle begins.
The battle takes some time to complete, with a number of impressive moves that the old dude can pull off, from slamming into the ground and blowing out wind, not from his ass thankfully. Your hits do not do much damage to him, so this is where the thought comes from, when I said it reminds me of Dark Souls or Lord of the Fallen, both games have bosses that can and will take some time to take down, with only a few hits before you see your head going through your ass, as the last thing you get to see.
Overall I can not wait to see more of the game, maybe even add enemies to this zone, just to add a little more challenge as I did find it a little boring, if I am honest. The Artistic style used to create this game is amazing and rendered wonderfully, it’s not that often a can praise a cartoon style game and say,
‘Jotun has achieved something truly wonderful, glorious, a wonder to be seen and played’.
*Taken from Wiki
