Take too many hits and you could drop your mighty sword, leaving your opponent to pick it up and slice you with it – provided they've got a decent weapon combat deck of their own. It's a great system, in part because there's a risk to using weapons. “Weapons (mainly swords and fist weapons are available at launch) require an entirely separate combat deck that activates when you pick one up or summon one with "shards" earned by taking or dodging enough hits. Further customization comes in the form of the abilities you map to the D-pad, which let you slow down your enemies, heal, or summon weapons that break and disappear after using them for a bit. Lootable gear figures in, too, with lighter gear allowing more speed for styles like Windfall and heavy gear providing resistances for Kahlt. You can still catch your opponent off guard with single alternative attacks for each stance, and you can change stances as needed with a squeeze of the right trigger.
#ABSOVLER OCEAN OF GAME HOW TO#
(It’s not an automatic win – if your enemy's competent, they'll figure how to break through this.) Nor is that the end of it. Set up your deck carefully, letting one stance flow naturally in another, and you can launch into a brutal ballet where you pummel your opponent through all 12 moves by merely tapping a single button. You then mix and match the moves into combat strings of up to three successive moves, with each string being paired to four separate stances based on your position in relation to your foe. Once unlocked, you can arrange these moves in a "combat deck," as Absolver calls it, with the individual moves represented as cards of sorts. Celebrated composer Austin Wintory (best known for his work on Journey) may be responsible for the music, but his powers are used all too sparingly for this saga of fisticuffs and kung fu, with the minutes between fights largely passing in eerie silence.
It's a little dreary at times, and that's not just because of the ruin. It's not a large open world, but it's a varied one with multiple biomes, and it’s big enough that I sometimes got lost in the absence of a minimap. This master/apprentice relationship makes each fight in this action-roleplaying game a learning experience, and the idea meshes well with the surreal martial arts vibe woven throughout Absolver.These punchy battles unfold in the lost province of Adal, a stunning landscape that's long ago fallen into ruin, where a Babel-like tower looms over surrounding plains that look like a watercolor painting come to life. I became the drunken master, and if Jinn had been a player instead of an NPC, I know I could have taught him a few moves myself. I returned to Jinn several times at his perch beneath a large tree until I’d learned all his moves and, in time, could beat him at his own game. Absolver’s "drunken master" warded off my blows and landed his own while swaying like a man fresh off a bender, punching me lightly even when I thought I'd successfully dodged. The second I traded blows with Jinn Mesca, so-called Prime Disciple of the Golden Bottle, I knew I wanted to be like him.