The forest game review. Review of The Forest: Uncle developer, I'm not scared! Do not be afraid of the spoon, be afraid of the fork! One hit - four holes

« Realistic Minecraft"- this tagline looms on the radars of game journalists for more than one year, almost from the very release of the original Minecraft. It would seem that it is enough to replace retrographics with a modern picture, and part of the giant audience of this game will be interested in your project. In fact, everything is somewhat more difficult.
Minecraft fans accept it for what it is, graphics alone fail to distract them - and now, one after another, numerous Minecraft clones perish, despite their realistic lighting, violent firefights or a solid number of polygons in the frame.

Mysterious Island:
If you haven't seen the trailer yet The forest, take a look. Right now - on YouTube it can be found under the query "forest game". A short video is designed according to the highest quality standard - with such a trailer it would not be a shame to fit into the E3 conference program and flaunt somewhere in the starting line Xbox one... The hero's plane crashes in the sultry jungle; the disaster itself and the rainforest landscapes look like they were rendered on the latest CryENGINE, the setting level is appropriate.

The plot of the game is in the style of the Lost TV series. You come to your senses after the crash, you begin to explore the island. It looks uninhabited: no roads, just one impenetrable thicket, mountains and the ocean. There is nothing. First of all, you need to go to the dying out skeleton of the airliner and take everything you need from there - food and tools. Over time, the provisions will run out and you will have to get the food yourself. This is where realistic Minecraft begins.

The game has a change of time of day. During the day you collect supplies and rebuild a shelter, at night you warm yourself by the fire and hide from enemies. If the shelter is strong enough, you may even be able to get some sleep by just waiting out the night. If the fortress is not yet completed or the enemies have inflicted damage on the walls, you will have to fight or hide in the darkness of the night.

Collecting items, building a base and battles with opponents is the basis of the balance in the game, all of this is paid no less attention to economics and battles, for example, in StarCraft 2. The subtlety is that the author is going to preserve the atmosphere of horror, and this makes him experiment with the interface.

What will you sow:
Despite its impressive feature set, The Forest has virtually no traditional UI elements. So, let's say there is no inventory, you yourself see all the items being carried. Most of the actions are contextual. If you combine a long stick and a sharp stone, you will sharpen the tip, creating a primitive spear. If you combine a short stick, a stone and a rope, you get a kind of silicon ax. With them you will break through the skulls of your enemies, and most importantly - cut down trees.

The original element of the gameplay of such games has been worked out with due diligence - you will have to collect firewood often, so the developers are trying their best. Firstly, the felling itself is framed almost photorealistically: under the blows of an ax, chips fly from the trunk, the incision gradually deepens, until the tree, crunching with a savory crunch, does not break, and the chopped trunk does not fall on the damp foliage, leaving only one stump. Secondly, trees are restored gradually, and the forest is not randomly generated, but quite specific, once and for all set. By the familiar stumps at the edge of the forest, you can always determine where you have been before.

Seemingly - nice bonus... In fact, another layer of gameplay is hidden here. The game features a complex ecosystem that dynamically reacts to your actions. So, if you cut down all the trees in some area, take out all the berries and edible plants from there, you will simply deplete it. Animals will disappear there (and they can also be eaten), and the fact of the disappearance of plants is already unpleasant in itself: having cleared a clearing near the base, you will have to go in search of supplies in a dense thicket, and who knows what awaits you there ...

This problem is solved simply - you just need to know when to stop. Having come to a familiar edge, you do not need to clean it to the ground. Collect some of the fruits, leave the trees, and after a while the site will fully recover. What's more, in The Forest you can plant and harvest crops yourself. Competent intervention in environment- one of the main elements of the gameplay.

Run Forest!
But extensive agriculture, unfortunately for the hero, is by no means the only kind of island "entertainment". The authors themselves insist that their game is primarily survival horror... Yes, you have to fight the natives of the island, fight them with an ax, set traps on them ... but, as alpha tests show, the authors are best at stealth.

Let's say you want rare berries from the top of the hill by all means. Carried away by the search, you did not notice how dark it was. Creepy cannibals go out hunting, and you won't be able to reach the base. The jungle-covered island is dotted with a network of underground caves that have long been home to savage islanders. Once in the thicket at night, you will have to hide in the shadows so as not to accidentally betray yourself and attract the raging tribe.
There is a catch here again. At first, the massacre of the aborigines does not cause you unnecessary emotions, but as curiosity takes the hero deep into the underground catacombs ("And there is so much else ..." - the developers mysteriously hint), it turns out that the natives are not so crazy. They have their own tribe, they have families ... According to the authors, at some point you should feel like an invader invading someone else's territory.

The Forest is yet another survival horror in Early Access and this moment it is in second place in the top sales of Steam.

If you only knew, little Timmy, how many trials The Forest is preparing for you in the very near future

The game starts with ... and I'm even surprised that it has a meaningful beginning ... that the main character flies on a plane with his son. Little Timmy gently clung to his hand and snore peacefully. However, such an idyll will not last long: after a few seconds, the plane literally begins to fall apart in pieces and crashes on a mysterious island. A dark screen ... GG opens his eyes and sees how his beloved son, who is not clear whether he is alive or dead, is kidnapped by a strange-looking creature - one of the cannibals with which the local forest is teeming with! Dark screen again.

Cannibal kidnaps YG's son. What a plot ... it's just a pity that instead of saving the child, we have to cut down trees

From this moment it begins game process... In fact, you are free to do whatever you please. Another thing is that the survival of the GG can only be ensured in one way - to strictly follow the intended game scenario... So we immediately eat up all the food items in the wreckage of the plane, and take the ax out of the flight attendant's body - with this weapon we will have to spend great amount“Fun” playing time.

The first step, of course, is to build a place to sleep ... although wait, the surviving tail of the plane is perfect for that. Well, since the developers have already said that you have to build a wooden hut, then it will be so and there is no getting away from it. After that, we break a cozy fire, at which you can warm up and fry the caught beast! This is enough to restore the three main parameters of the hero: health, hunger and strength.

We are slowly settling down on an inhospitable island - building a fire!

As a result, it all comes down not to saving the son of the protagonist, but to prepare for this very salvation and, along the way, not to give God his soul.

An excellent lumberjack simulator would have learned from The Forest. However, who knows, maybe the guys from Endnight Games will give birth to a new offshoot in the future.

However, not everything is as simple as it seems at first glance. For construction, you will need a lot of supplies, which are generously scattered around the island. The main materials are sticks, stones, logs and leaves. This is where the ax we got in advance will come in handy! With its help, we begin to cut down trees ... cut down ... chop down again and chop down again. The felling of trees is replaced by no less “exciting” dragging and dropping of logs. At this moment you start to feel like a real Schwarzenegger from the movie "Commando"! It seems that this process will never end: is it a joke, the construction of a hut alone will require as many as 82 logs! Needless to say, this kind of gameplay is exhausting not only mentally, but also physically!

We chop a tree ...

... dragging the logs to the camp. And so on until you turn blue

Advice! Take your time to leave the crash site right away: there are many useful items to be found around the wreckage of the plane, such as food, a flashlight, medical supplies, and so on.

In this forest, only one thing surprised me - there are many tourist camps with tents and other belongings around, and there is even someone's yacht on the shore. This means that other representatives of the civilized community know about the island, but why then are bloodthirsty savages running everything here? Most likely, it will be somehow beaten in full version games ... well, I really hope so!

Hello tourist! Sell ​​an ax ?!

Now let's talk in more detail about the locals, who hold almost the entire horror component of the game. Absolutely nothing is known about them at the moment. Yes, they live on this island and feel like full-fledged owners here. We will not learn anything else about them in the alpha version of the game, but how we would like a strong and deep story describing the difficult life of the islanders, who, in fact, simply defend their home from a terrible invader who flew in on a “fire bird” and purposefully destroys them population.

From time to time, unfortunate savage people come for you and I must say it's really creepy, because their actions are completely unpredictable ... well, at least it seems so at first. It is especially scary when you, while performing your routine work of collecting logs, accidentally notice one of them sitting in a tree and watching you.

The problem is also that the locals are extremely tenacious and will not give their souls to God until they receive a dozen or so blows with an ax! So there is a great chance that the first acquaintance with them will end in defeat for you.

However, they are much more humane than the main character, and will not kill him, but will drag him into their creepy (in the eyes of a civilized person) lair, where fresh and not very corpses of homo sapiens hang from the ceiling. No, they didn't even think to tie his hands and hang him by his legs, but simply left him safe and sound to enjoy the local beauty. By the way, here we can get hold of a bunch of supplies, and all the other belongings obtained by the hard way, the islanders prudently put in front of us!

After that, the GG goes on the warpath and begins to set deadly traps for the cannibals, in the hope that they will fall into them. What does it mean? This means that the time has come once again to take up the ax and start a full-scale deforestation of the local forest, collecting stones in between, which hardly brings any variety to the gameplay.

Around this point, the game ends for all normal people, because there is practically no content in the alpha version of The Forest. In truth, there is nothing to do here at all! Build a camp, build traps, try to fend off the cannibals at night - that's the whole scenario of the gameplay. Now there are critically few buildings in the game, there is no need to search for food, because animals, which, by the way, are incredibly beautiful and there are a lot of them in the local forest, literally climb under your ax themselves, only have time to fry at the stake. So, The Forest fully justifies the Early Access category.

Verdict

This game definitely has potential, which can and will begin to unfold in a year and a half, and it is absolutely unclear to me who is paying money for this craft. At the end of the day, developers can just pick up the cream and give the project a go, as some teams already do.

At the moment, I can only put the game 6 points out of 10.

The Forest is a spooky survival game in which players will have to survive in a forest with cannibals.

The plot begins with a plane crash on an island inhabited by cannibals. All of them are not fools and decide to feast on the most delicious piece - the son of the protagonist, so they kidnap him to their den for frying. Then, the events unfold like a horror movie scenario.

At first, The Forest was designed for a single playthrough, but more recently, the developers have added co-op. And if earlier the plot was based on saving the son, then what to do here for the second player remains not entirely clear. In general, if we discard the motives of the heroes (since they did not play a special role), then surviving together turned out to be much easier and more interesting. After all, the second player can always be used as bait or cheap labor to build a hut.

Survival elements in The Forest are made in a standard style: searching for resources, making fires, building a shelter and fighting the natives. However, the main difference between the game and other survival games is that all this is presented as a horror, and for each new game you can write a separate script for the film. The gameplay is tied to stealth, so any head-on collision with cannibals can end for the hero with soup with liver or steamed cutlets.

The Forest is a game that I personally had too high hopes for. All trailers, announcements and interviews with the developers looked very exciting and delicious. What did we get in practice? Let's find out!

Uncle is a developer, but I'm not afraid!

As I wrote in the preface, I was really looking forward to this game. But what can I say, at one time I even made a pre-order for it, so much I liked the idea itself. What happened in the end? Quite a fearless survivor that boasts a pretty interesting plot(although at the very beginning there was only survival in a buggy world). The first hours of the game, which took place three years ago, did not bring anything good. The game was boring, monotonous, fearless and painfully buggy. It was almost impossible to play in the state in which the developers rolled it out to Early Access. In those days, everyone who could criticize her. For stupid physics, for the main character without a head (in the literal sense of the word), for extremely small content. The developers denied themselves, saying: "Guys, everything will be, just you wait a little." And we really waited. The most dedicated fans shouted out loud that they saw the sketches and plans of the developers, and this new level horror survival. Yeah, twice.

Almost all of the horror was pumped out of the game. If at first the careless appearance of ordinary cannibals and mutants of the island frightened, then about two hours later it became a kind of mainstream. Monsters have absolutely ceased to scare, and fundraising for survival ... In general, your pockets are already bursting with supplies, and survival goes to the natives. After five hours without death, you turn into an analogue of John Matrix and crumble these people-people left and right.

Special thanks to the guys at Endnight Games Ltd for frequent and fairly global updates. Time passed, updates made the gameplay more fun, craft more varied, and the story was overgrown with good muscle cover on the skeleton of the release three years ago.

What about horror? The cooperative successfully lost it. The game has become more like all survival games, however, so far without an MMO element (and thank God). Instead of the promised horror, a pretty good survival game was obtained with a voluminous living world and physics sent for beer (EA is still going on). The arsenal of weapons is replenished with each new update, like crafting items or shelters, and it really pleases. The plot, whatever one may say, is good even by the standards of excellent AAA projects. I will not spoil, but the whole confusion will begin due to the fact that the natives took your son. Then there is such an unexpected plot twist that it will make every person say something like: “Come on !!! They couldn't wrap it up like that! Seriously?". The ending also made me happy with an unexpected twist and a start for a future project. Although some clichéd moments are not fully understood in it, the overall picture is pleasing.

- Dude, I have an ax! - So what? But I have a cannibal leg! - Take it easy, bro! Put your foot where you took it!

Only those who have played the game from the very beginning will understand what this is about. Do you have an ax? Not a bad weapon. Do you have flares? Good too. Do you have a bonfire? You are a pyromaniac. Do you have the hand of a native? Weapons of mass destruction. The gameplay of the game is no different from standard survival games. As before, we will have to look for loot and craft new weapons. You can also build a dwelling and create a security system (of some sort). The game has a rich system of cave labyrinths, and this is really one of the main advantages of the game.

Initially, the game was focused on a single player, but, apparently, the developers realized in time that the horror did not work out, and an urgent need to change the game concept. After these reflections, it was decided to devote the lion's share to crafting, co-op and storyline. And if everything is clear with the plot, and it really is worth going through, then something went wrong with the cooperative. Yes, it's pretty good and can accommodate several people (I don't know the exact number), but why is it here? The game is not so big that there was a need to build entire castles or something like that. The number of cannibals is not so great that they are afraid to play the game alone.

Then why is there a cooperative? There is one theory - the possibility of creating separate settlements. Yes, by and large you will still live there alone, but compete with friends in buildings and craft ... Why not?

What else can be said about the gameplay and game mechanics"The woods"? Overall, it is really good. For example, with friends you can laugh enough at the stupid and cardboard physics of objects and the main character. You can also laugh at the clumsy monsters of this world and the stupidity of AI cannibals, who are prone to spontaneous combustion at the stake. If you play alone, then you can happily go through the main story, while having a lot of fun with the ending. But the gameplay itself, unfortunately, can bore you in a single. Are the developers thus giving a hint that the game is better played in co-op? This is most likely the way it is, and this makes the main idea of ​​the project a failure. After all, the developers praised the atmospheric horror about cannibals and mutants so much, and at the end we get a good cooperative survival game.

Do not be afraid of the spoon, be afraid of the fork! One hit - four holes!

Artificial intelligence in the game is very artificial, because all cannibals behave like ... Yes, actually, like stupid natives, which they are. Did the developers intend this initially? I think not, but after discussions we decided to leave the mediocre intellect, because ATMOSPHERE! The same feeling when, after one blow with an ax, the bodies of cannibals scattered like Christmas confetti ...

The Forest itself is really colorful and rich in flora and fauna (yeah, the forest game really does have a forest, brilliant). The only moment when you can get scared is waiting for you in the caves. What can I say, they are drawn really well and even slightly frightening. In general, the whole picture is pleasing to the eye, and even by the standards of 2014 it looks cool.

The soundtrack in The Forest is average and more similar to the standard set of sounds of chopping wood and collecting minerals from other survivors. It seems to me that the developers made the soundtrack purely for show, because I never heard anything supernatural. Although in combination with the graphic component, the sound looks rather neutral and fully emphasizes the environment. This is especially true for caves.

The Forest looks and feels pretty good, although not at all what we expected. The developers promised new experience in horror games, and in the end we got a fairly standard survival with beautiful graphics and a really good plot.

Overall, the game is really good. BUT! THIS IS NOT WHAT I WAIT SO LONG. The Forest looks like another survival game, and as development progresses, it has lost all horror. Do I recommend her? Well yes. After all, as a survivalist, the game is really good, and it has a great storyline.

I expected less than others, I found out about it almost a day before the release. This turned out to be great as I spent the next day anticipating this video game and was one of the first customers to purchase this game. I didn't expect almost everything from a video game: a small company of creators, a lot of innovations that few people had tried to implement before them. However, Endnight games coped with their own task! At the moment we have an early alpha, which crashes for some when loading, and for some crashes. The version in which saves do not work, and there are holes in the textures. Do you understand what? What we have at the moment is already worth our own money! I'm not joking. This is a great video game. This is a creation!

I had different feelings about the gameplay. On the day of writing, I have played 48 hours of the game. But even that was 48 hours of pain, abuse and anguish. In a video game, as I said, there are no saves. The pain that you feel when a lot of cannibals hammer you with cobblestones when you carried the last log to finish your home, and more than 100 logs are needed, whoever played realizes that after all, this cannot be experienced as in Dark souls 2 and in other games. At one point, I got a bug in the code with the bird, the one shown in the video, when she sits on your hand, she sat down, sat down, sat down. I lost my nerves and committed suicide.

The AI ​​is amazingly crafted in the video game. Cannibals walk in groups, paying attention to any of your influences. They trade in their own affairs and “kill” a stranger if they see him. They have their own settlements and they live their own lives. An emotion is formed that they are not minor heroes, and, as it is customary for us to say "game meat, which needs to be patched up." NO! One day I needed to meet a single cannibal. This was my first meeting with a single cannibal, I was terribly curious. He looked after me and did not come close. As I approached, he climbed a tree and looked from there. When I tried to cut down a tree, he jumped over to the adjacent one and tried to disappear. I overtook him and cut him down. Then his partner came, and at first she stuck in the distance, but as she approached the place of her friend's death, she began to behave harshly and storm me. I could not cope with it. This is strange!

Also in this video game, a chance for survival is given. Subsequently, such as you were overtaken and defeated by cannibals, you do not die, but "wake up" in their cave, where people similar to you are suspended, most likely these are passengers who flew with you in the same plane. And when I found a way out of this cave, I thought that it would be better if they finished me off on the spot. Terrible four-legged monsters, many dead, ceremonial things and a large number of other terrible things. When you get out of this cave, you will hide and defend yourself better. Since there, you are unlikely to try to return! The video game shows 2 worlds. Nature, living creatures, the sea ... What else is needed for happiness? A beautiful forest that breathes life. And ... Several tribes of cannibals, ready to destroy and eat you. A terrible forest breathing death. The video game serves it to us in one bottle, but even that's weird!

For me, the developers managed to do what they were supposed to. The monsters are not scary at all, although some instill a nightmare, the general atmosphere of a video game frightens. A video game keeps you in suspense at any moment, one oversight and you have the opportunity to lose your home, warmth and comfort. And for you it will be necessary either to design and trade everything anew, or to die! The question is asked: who is the real enemy? You are located in their forest, use their resources and destroy them. Endnight games gives you a chance to think about it. If you desire.