ReCore, an action-adventure game developed by both Armature Studio and Keiji Inafune's Comcept, is now out exclusively for Microsoft Xbox One and Windows PC.
The game revolves around the adventures of Joule Adams and her corebot companions on planet Far Eden. After waking up from centuries of cryosleep, Joule finds that nothing about the utopian Far Eden colony has gone according to plan. And thus her quest to save mankind from imminent doom begins.
ReCore garnered a good amount of attention when it made an unannounced debut during E3 2015 in which a spring 2016 launch date was promised. In January, however, the launch was moved to an unspecified 2016 date. After being quiet for the first half of the year, gamers once again started buzzing about ReCore in June after the game's Sept. 13 launch date was revealed.
ReCore was designed by people who worked on games such as Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, Batman: Arkham Origins Blackgate and Maverick Hunter. Mark Pacini, game director for the Metroid Prime series, directed ReCore while Chad Seiter composed the music.
So now that the game is out, what do people think about it?
Polygon Gave It 6.5 Out Of 10
"On paper, it all seems like a great idea, and at first, the formula yields results. Recore makes a successful, charming first impression," writes Polygon's Arthur Gies. "But there's a very real sense of padding that draws the game out beyond what it's capable of delivering on, and some strong fundamentals and a few clever ideas aren't quite enough to make up the difference."
While Gies praised the game's combat, especially at times that it got frantic, for being fast, colorful, fluid and reminiscent of Japanese action games back in early 2000s, he feels that the game is "thin." According to him, there's only a handful of story missions and optional dungeons in the game, but everything gets stretched out by slow navigation over a vast setting.
"When it's working, Recore is a game that feels evocative of a different era of action games," concludes Gies. "But in its final half, Comcept and Armature let collect-a-thon structure and a poorly realized open world drag the whole thing back down to earth."
PC World Has ReCore At 2.5 Out Of 5
"[F]or whatever reason you are going to play ReCore, I feel confident saying the PC is the definitive version," says PC World's Hayden Dingman. "Talking to friends who played the Xbox One version, I initially complained that ReCore's loads are absurdly long — we're talking [30] seconds or more for some areas, installed on an SSD. Their response? The Xbox One's load times are sometimes upwards of two minutes."
Technical issues aside, Dingman notes of how strong the game starts. However, the games reporter found it that it suffers from "openworlditis" and is confused on what it wants to be.
"[ReCore] has the aesthetic of a lighthearted kid's game paired with an incredibly grim story," adds Dingman. "It has combat so easy you could sleepwalk through it, but matched with a complicated three-tiered upgrade system, and further plagued by a terrible interface."
Metro Rates It 5 Out Of 10
"Every time you die it takes at least two minutes for the game to load back up again. Except weirdly only if you're shot," details Metro that reviewed the game on the Xbox One. "If you fall to your death, or drown in quicksand, you somehow come back instantly. Which when the game hits a difficulty spike toward the end makes the whole experience almost unbearable."
Metro says that the first several hours of the game are quite enjoyable. The game's third-person perspective, corebots, color-coded battle system, the maps' hidden secrets and character movement all received praises. However, similar to Gies' complaint, Metro also finds that the game gets draggy, especially when nearing the ending.
"Although it's possible the loading issue will be fixed in a patch, at which point we might possibly considering increasing the score by one point, there doesn't seem to be anything that can be done for the way ReCore acts like the proverbial house guest, who you initially welcome with open arms but in the end can't wait to get rid of," adds Metro.
Destructoid Gives It 4 Out Of 10
"Almost all progress is walled off by collecting a few of something to move forward," complains Destructoid's Brett Makedonski. "ReCore quickly falls into a repetitive gameplay loop that it never really breaks away from. More importantly, that loop never does the narrative justice."
Makedonski notes that combat in the game is fun, but that fun doesn't last long given how ReCore's encounters never evolve. He also complained about the upgrades not making sense because even if the corebots don't get upgraded, they will still do fine against opponents. Makedonski also thinks that the game gets too draggy near the end.
"Giving the player the option to scour every nook and cranny for collectibles is a viable method of unstructured game design," he adds. "But, requiring them to do this to finish the game (with a near-worthless map, to boot) is unforgivable."
IGN Has ReCore At 7.3 Out Of 10
"ReCore is a new-looking game with a charming, much older-feeling soul. It's less interested in telling a cohesive story than it is in throwing elaborate, well-designed platform challenges and combat scenarios at you," writes Vince Ingenito of IGN. "It's an old-style approach that's executed so soundly I wanted to ignore its technical and structural failings, but ultimately they do take some of the wind out of an experience that could have otherwise been great."
While Ingenito also complained about how draggy the game gets near the end, his biggest issue is that the game's fps dips below 30 on the Xbox One. He notes that the PC version runs smoothly on maximum settings.
It's worth noting that other reviewers such as Games Radar, Game Revolution and GameSpot have the game at 2/5, 3/5 and 6/10, respectively.
Microsoft currently retails ReCore for $39.99. The game will be launched in Japan on Sept. 15, and in Europe on Sept. 16.
Below is a YouTuber's video review of ReCore.
