Top positive review
5.0 out of 5 starsAn honest, thorough, unbiased review
Reviewed in the United States on May 15, 2014
First, I preface this by stating that I only gave this game a five out of five stars to help counterbalance the dubious negative reviews by persons who clearly made no attempt to learn the combat system before whining about how difficult the game is. Personally, I would rate it at something closer to a four out of five stars, as it is by no means perfect, but it is unquestionably deserving of a higher score than the plethora of one- to two-star reviews that seem to have flooded Amazon since its release. I was able to beat this game on the hardest difficulty (captain) without much trouble, so I'm proof that the game, when played as intended by its developer, is suitably challenging and properly balanced. Now, on to the review.
Bound by Flame is a fantasy-genre action RPG developed by Spiders, a French video game studio. It is their first major RPG to be released for retail, and hopefully not their last. While Bound by Flame doesn't do anything to reinvent the genre, what it does offer is a very unique morality-based theme and an intricate combat system that rewards strategy and endurance over button mashing and speedrunning.
The plot of Bound by Flame is that Vulcan, the hero of the story and a member of a band of mercenaries known as the Freeborn Blades, finds himself possessed by a flame demon after falling victim to a botched magic ritual that was intended to weaken the Ice Lords, a cabal of evil necromancers who have gained control of Vertiel, the world in which the game takes place. While the demon initially appears morally ambiguous-- perhaps even malevolent-- Vulcan soon discovers that the magical powers of fire that the demon offers may outweigh the negative side effects caused by allowing it to have more influence over his mind and body. From this plot stems the general morality system that permeates and defines the entire game. Whether or not the demon gains more control, resulting in a radical change of physical appearance as the story progresses, will be determined by the decisions that you make regarding specific events that take place throughout the game.
Before beginning a new game, Vulcan's name, gender, and physical appearance may be customized to suit your tastes. While entering a unique name will change the character's name in dialogue text, non-player characters will still refer to you as Vulcan during audio segments, effectively rendering the change of name meaningless. Your choice of gender is male or female, and you can further customize the character by choosing from a limited selection of hair styles and ethnicities. However, the customization ends there. You cannot personalize minute details, such as facial hair and eye color, so you're restricted to whatever the already-created character model offers (only one ethnicity has a full beard, for example). While this may be disappointing to some, you will soon find that, regardless of how you decide to make Vulcan look, he has a very distinct personality all his own. In other words, the hero of this game has a defined identity, rather than a blank slate upon which to superimpose your own personality.
This fact notwithstanding, how Vulcan decides to interact with other characters is determined by the player through dialogue boxes. What choices you make may have a radical impact upon Vulcan's relationship with certain characters down the road. For example, being rude to somebody may offend them and cause you to be unable to complete a quest that they offer, while being nice may form a lasting alliance that turns to your favor at a later point in the game. What influence each decision has upon the progression of the story varies by situation. Some decisions will be practically meaningless, while others will have a significant impact upon the moral disposition of Vulcan himself.
Aside from the protagonist Vulcan, there are five deuteragonists, called companions, who will aid Vulcan throughout his journey. These characters are Sybil, a white mage; Rhelmar, an archer; Randval, a warrior; Edwen, a sorceress; and Mathras, an undead. Vulcan's relationship with these characters are, like all others, subject to your decisions as you interact with them. Unlike minor characters, however, the decisions that you make as regards your companions are particularly important. You can romance companions of the opposite sex, for instance, or you can become their most hated enemy by opposing their wishes. These decisions are left up to the player, but the outcome of a given choice cannot always be predicted.
Your companions, as is implied by the name itself, will tag along with you on quests and assist you in battles. Not all companions are equal, however, and you will quickly find that some are infinitely more useful than others. Sybil is primarily restricted to healing magic, which is helpful in between fights, but during, she functions as little more than a meat shield. In contrast, Edwen can curse enemies and turn them against one another, or even paralyze single enemies, which, from my experience, proved to be most useful during difficult fights (her spells even work on bosses!). The companion AI isn't as good as it could have been, but it isn't completely useless, either, as some have claimed. How your companions react in battle is up to you. They can behave autonomously, act defensively, act offensively, or focus exclusively on their special abilities. The last option is the best, in my opinion, as all of the companions seem to have one particular thing that they excel at, while being subpar at pretty much everything else. Likewise, restricting your companions to playing defense is a waste of their unique talents, and will only prove to make things more difficult in the long run. Your companions are there for a reason, and you should make use of each one's abilities as the environment demands. You are expected to defend them, however, and it is in your best interest to do so, because a dead companion is a useless companion.
The combat system consists of three separate classes, called fighter, ranger, and pyromancer. You aren't restricted to a single class, however. Rather, you are given skill points as you level, which can be spent on each class whichever way that you like. The abilities that each class offers are divided up into what are called skill trees, and each particular skill can receive a total of three points. You only gain two skill points per level, however, so be judicious in the way that you choose to spend them. You are also given one point per level for what are called feats. The feat bonuses aren't as significant as the skill tree bonuses, but you can purchase minor stat boosts, such as health buffs, experience buffs, weapon buffs, and crafting buffs (we'll get to crafting in a moment).
The fighter class uses two-handed weapons and has the unique ability to block and parry attacks. It does the most damage in a single blow, but has limited mobility. The ranger class, on the other hand, uses daggers and can dodge or riposte attacks, thus rendering you slightly weaker and more vulnerable, but quicker and deadlier. The pyromancer class works in conjunction with the other two and can be used to set weapons on fire, to throw fireballs, to protect your body with flames, and to knock enemies back. Because both of the melee classes can avoid taking physical damage-- the fighter by blocking or parrying, the ranger by dodging-- the combat system expects you to master the individual fighting style of these two classes. Enemies in Bound by Flame have very high defense and health, so if you attempt to approach an enemy while button mashing, you will die within seconds. This may appear difficult at first, but with a little bit of practice, you will get used to routinely avoiding physical attacks by utilizing your chosen melee class' unique defensive capabilities.
Besides the three classes, you will also have access to crossbows and traps. Although not part of the classes themselves, these will prove decisive in whether or not you are victorious in a number of battles. Crossbows can be used as a non-magic-based alternative for projectile attacks, and if you're having difficulty with an unruly mob of enemies, you can lay traps on the ground to chip away at multiple enemies simultaneously.
There is no level cap, so far as I know, but by the time that you reach end game, you will more than likely be somewhere close to level 25 (I was level 26), depending on how many quests were completed and how much time was spent leveling up your character. What this means is that you will only be able to complete one of your skill trees, so if you expect to master a particular class-- and there is a reward for doing so-- you should ideally predetermine how all of your points will be spent. My suggestion is not to spread your points across all three skill trees, but rather to choose two skill trees, one as a primary and one as a secondary. Calculate how many points are required to master your primary class by level 25, and use whatever remaining points that you have for your secondary class. Unlike the fighter and ranger classes, the pyromancer class can be used simultaneously with fighter or ranger. Because of this, if you choose fighter or ranger as your primary class, I do not suggest that you choose the other melee class for your secondary. Rather, you should always choose pyromancer as your secondary, and pick one of the two melee classes as your primary. If you choose to master pyromancer, however, you should do the opposite: pyromancer as your primary and either of the two melee classes as your secondary. You should never spread your points across all three classes, because you'll effectively handicap all of your classes and prevent yourself from maxing out any of your skill trees.
Bound by Flame also includes a crafting system that can be used to create potions, crossbow bolts, and traps, or to buttress your weapons and armor with stat boosts. This can be done on the fly, at any point in the game, by accessing your character menu. You collect ingredients throughout the game by raiding chests or by defeating mobs, so you will always have access to an abundance of ingredients from which to craft whatever it is that you need. The game expects you to utilize this feature to improve your equipment, and it can be the deciding factor between life and death. If you're engaging enemies who utilize ice magic, you should modify your armor to increase resistance to ice. If you're fighting enemies who utilize dark magic, you should increase your resistance to dark magic, and if fighting enemies who poison, increase your resistance to poison, and so on and so forth. You should always carry a respectable amount of health and magic potions with you to replenish your stats in the middle of battle, but in the event that you happen to run out, do not fret. You can access your items list at any time and craft them as needed, so long as you're carrying the required ingredients.
The most captivating feature of Bound by Flame is, not surprisingly, the sequential evolution of Vulcan's demonic possession. Watching Vulcan slowly transform into a demon humanoid is one of the most exciting, yet disturbing, things that I have ever had the pleasure of witnessing in a video game. You truly get a foreboding sense that Vulcan has given up an essential part of his humanity by relinquishing part of his soul to the demon, and you do notice a gradual shift in his personality as the story progresses. By choosing to follow the demon's path, you will have a gradual alteration in physical appearance, which not only reflects the demonic characteristics to which you have succumbed, but your stats will also change to reflect your new elemental attributes. The more demonic you become, the weaker you are to ice magic. This is particularly pertinent in the second and third acts of the game (there are three acts in total), which are dominated by ice elemental enemies, and I honestly felt like the game became harder once I chose to embrace the demon. On top of this, once you grow horns, which will happen at about halfway through the second act, you can no longer wear helmets, which cuts back on your defense. To counter these weaknesses, you are granted greater immunity to fire magic (which makes sense, but doesn't really help at all), and your magic increases substantially and replenishes faster-- so fast, in fact, that once I went demonic, I no longer needed to use magic potions. This makes the demonic path ideal for players who plan to become master pyromancers, while the human path is perhaps better suited for fighters and rangers.
The one disappointing part of this process, though, is what ultimately determines whether or not you become demonic. You would think that your morality-based decisions as regards your companions, or that by adding points to the pyromancer skill tree, would influence whether or not, and to what degree, you turn demonic; but no, the majority of your actions in Bound by Flame have absolutely nothing to do with Vulcan's demonic transformation. Quite the contrary, whether or not you embrace the demon boils down to two decisions that you make within the first act of the game. On top of this, the second decision can negate the first one, if you choose not to side with the demon a second time, and the implications of this decision aren't entirely clear. Some players have complained that they accidentally chose not to go demonic, or vice versa, due to the ambiguity of these crucial two questions, and I can certainly understand why. It's never made clear that these two decisions are the sole deciding factor as to your demonic possession, and if you make the wrong one, you're stuck with it for the rest of the game.
The story is good, although not particularly original, but it serves its purpose. I've seen better and worse. Nevertheless, I did become attached to my companions (Edwen and Mathras were my favorites), and their contrasting perspectives on the role of the demon are really the most engaging part of the narrative. To fully understand what's going on, who the demon is, how the Ice Lords became ice lords, what the worldheart's purpose is (I won't spoil that), how humanity was almost annihilated, and why your companions think and behave the way that they do, you really have to exhaust your dialogue options with every single character in the game. This does take a while, but the story's most compelling part is the storytelling itself, which means that you're missing out on quite a lot of context if you skip this.
Many people have complained about the graphics being too "last gen," but in my opinion, they were very pretty for what they are. The first act was easily the most scenic part of the game. The swamps and bayous were particularly well designed, and I thoroughly enjoyed exploring them. Once I finished the introduction and reached the first act, I immediately felt like the graphics were a cross between Borderlands and Morrowind-- which is my favorite RPG, so the similarities were welcomed. The majority of character and enemy models are very detailed, but they often appear stilted during dialogue sequences due to the lack of motion capture. This isn't a problem for me, as I don't expect character models to have motion capture when designed by such a small developer, but it seemed to bother some people. The character models also don't reflect injuries, so when a weapon goes through a character (and this happens in a couple of cutscenes), it literally goes through the character. Again, not a big deal when considering the size of the developer, but it's best that vain gamers know this before buying.
The soundtrack was great, but since it's hard to describe in words, I won't. The voice acting was good, but not what people have generally come to expect for a fantasy-genre RPG. What I mean is that most of the characters speak in contemporary English vernacular and have a propensity to indulge in adult humor. This is by no means a bad thing, and I found it quite refreshing to play an RPG that had characters speak like regular people. Victorian English is overused in these sorts of games, and Bound by Flame should be commended for daring to do something different. Once you get over the shock of RPG characters speaking in modern English, you should be fine.
By the end of the game, I totaled approximately 27 hours of game time (that calculation doesn't factor in the unknown number of times that I died), which is a respectable duration for an RPG of this size and scope. Don't expect more than 30 hours, though, and that includes completing every quest possible. The game offers four difficulty options, which should placate the needs of most gamers. Despite this, without repeating myself too much, you have to learn the combat and crafting systems to have any chance at surviving this game-- and that applies to every difficulty. For anyone who claims that this game is too hard, I rebut that I was able to complete it on the hardest difficulty mode (captain) with little trouble, and that includes defeating the majority of bosses in one try on my first attempt (and yes, that includes the final boss as well). If you follow my strategies described above, you should have no problem beating this game.
In summation, Bound by Flame is a fun, exhilarating, enjoyable action RPG with a lot of potential for future installments. I would like to see a return of these characters, and I hope that Spiders decides to go forward with a sequel. The combat system caters to people who like to be challenged, so if mindless button mashing is your thing, this game is not for you. Many will disagree, but in my opinion, Bound by Flame is currently the best retail game available for the PS4. That will likely change as more games become available, but at a time of video game drought, this game was sorely needed. It isn't perfect, but as of writing this review, I can't think of a single big-budget PS4 game that is. I often see biased reviewers make exceptions for so-called AAA games that they don't normally grant to indie games, and sadly, Bound by Flame is one of those games that has come under assault for simply being a more discreet title from a small studio. If it weren't for the little guys, we wouldn't have franchises like Doom and Wolfenstein today. Spiders looks to be a very promising team, and I look forward to seeing more from them in the future.
