As the launch of Square Enix’s long-awaited Forspoken nears, the Japanese publisher is beginning to peel back the curtain on the PS5 console exclusive. This latest in its ongoing Deep Dive trailer series centres on the open world of Athia, and the various activities that it contains. TL;DW: it’s a modern open world game.
No, but seriously, you’ll find all sorts of activities to engage with: combat trials, collectibles, even wild animals you can tame. There are some neat ideas here: if you discover and complete various photography challenges, for example, then you’ll unlock new features in the game’s Photo Mode. Everything looks like it has a reward attached, which is of course welcome.

Whether any of this is truly worth interacting with will, of course, hinge on the overall loop of the game. If it’s fun to traverse the sandbox, and the combat is entertaining to engage with, then clearing out all of these open world objectives should be a fun time. The jury’s still out for now, but it’s clear this is going to be a fairly meaty experience when it arrives on 24th January.
[source youtube.com]
Comments 31
Looks pretty good to me, this and fire emblem engage will keep me busy in January and hopefully this game does quite well sales wise.
The narrator for these Forespoken videos greatly reminds me of the woman who does the voiceover in the trance classic: Aqualords - Witches (Club Mix.)
If traversing is as fun as Spider-Man I'm in!
This is the next and only big PlayStation exclusive with a release date I hope it’s good.
You can pet the kitties? I'll take your entire stock!
“did I just pet that cat with my freaking hand!?“
@DylanP this got me 😂. Why aren’t there more memes like this??
A lot of people are sleeping on this game....
Guess I should post something on topic…
I think they’ve finally sold me. Assuming I have time to play it at release I’ll probably pick this up. Really hoping the writing ends up being better than what we’ve seen so far, and yeah, it’s another open world rpg, but it actually seems to have some quality to it.
Do you mean "modern open world" or "for a modern audience"?
Really looking forward to this.
"It's a modern empty world game"
Fixed it for ya. This game makes BotW's empty fields seem like a bustling metropolis.
Immortals Fenyx Rising was chuck full of content compared to this, and it had that non-stop chatter. This, well this looks like a tech demo so far.🤷
4K HDR and 60 fps the game looks really cool imo not playing the game unless it looks next gen
I'm cautiously watching this one. This is by the new Square Enix, so I'm watching out for Micro-Transactions and NFTs.
oh-oh... do those battle sequences look sub-30fps or is it just me?
@tofuman86
Its hard to tell if its 30 or if all the flashy animations makes it look that way. But in general certain parts of that trailer really looks like 30 FPS. Not just the fights.
But I believe it has 3 different options? Quality, Performance etc, so that could be a factor as well?
@rjejr My thoughts exactly:
"Look at the shiny-ness!"
"But what about the gameplay?"
"Never mind that, look at the shiny-ness!"
@Yoop ps6 ain't coming any time soon.
@sanderson72 we've seen plenty of gameplay, though.
Uh. I was looking forward to this game but the trailers and gameplay videos we’ve seen so far looks pretty …mediocre? An empty and lifeless world with super awkward NPCs.
On the plus side traversal and general gameplay/combat looks amazing!
So, it's Square. How poorly will the microtransactions be implemented this time?
Because it will have them, right? It's Square, after all.
I really misread that title at first. 😄
I'm liking what I'm seeing. The game is robust in activities for what they are showing. One of the sure games to play in 2023 for me.
Its a pass for me just due to the strong language. It's old fashioned, I know, but I've skipped MANY a good looking game because of that. It's one of my biggest pet peeves and sadly is just a normal part of game culture now.
@sanderson72 Thanks for taking the hit for me from Narubal. 😂
Right now it kind of reminds me of "Shadow of the Colossus", which I know is a cult it and I did enjoy some of the battles but the world was so big and empty I had no idea why it existed. Some bad guys show up at the end but I still don't know why.🤷♂️
I think this game will be fun w/ the traversal and magic but after The Witcher 3 I need more. Guess I'm more of a Horizon guy, still need to play FW, waiting on the DLC to get announced. Elden Ring was a bit empty as well but all of the fighting and dying kept me busy, and the best horse riding in any video game ever, past, present or future. I'm kind of afraid of how Zelda KotT is going to feel, hopefully the flying on Green Goblins glider will make up for it.
Yeah, this can wait for PS+.
@Darude84 if its even close then I'm in. Spiderman was the only game I've never used fast travel to get places. It was far too much fun to swing about lol
Photos give me Gravity Rush 2 vibes so as a mechanic for it's online than just a mode which could be cool. So for quests or something else hopefully is nice. Give me open space and flashy particles. Sure 1400p mode whether performance or graphics but I don't mind (don't care it isn't 4K if it's doing more with the particles and grass or other environment objects, gaps to jump across. Takes me to the fifth/sixth gen of old with linear or smaller open spaces give me that momentum and platforming than running up stairs and talking and bad mounts any day), it was made for this game besides monitors. The movement is fast like Sonic and combat being Bayonetta flashy and fast so count me in. This and Sonic Frontiers are interesting to me. I want them to do well or otherwise goodbye movement and combat crazy open worlds for more generic ones with talking, typical lands and so on quests in my opinion will keep going and linear I'll stay then.
Wanted an open world in this style since Gravity Rush and Sunset Overdrive became my standard for 'challenges' as the main focus and else boring quests in open worlds of the typical sort. It may be rough it may be empty but look at the amount of gras objects and the particles. Sure they could cut it out but it's a Japanese game they push particles and otherwise I don't mind the object focus over resolution. More lived in with objects than grass texture is fine by me. The dialogue I can get by it didn't bother me. Isekais are eh. If they make it Naria like sure. If they make it a Japanese Isekai welcome to the snooze for sure I'm sick of them. For a western audience game by Square compared to Mindjack or Front Mission Evolved a decade ago it seems fine.
I prefer more movement focused challenges than boring typical open worlds with quests. Sure some can be there but not too much of the game or lacking use for the abilities to justify the combat/quests use of them in the world. Mechanics sell me.
Spiderman was fine but it's challenges had issues that made even Spyro 2 orb challenges look better made (and due to how Spyro controls) because of the placement of rings and how Spidey moves it was just sad at times those taskmaster challenges. Some were fun like the radar positions and laser grid above and below (better than Ratchet 2016 stealth use of it as an instant death if you got caught at least the Spidey team used it better) but not enough for me to enjoy the other generic outposts, towers to see the map and the whatever other stuff. The challenges and puzzles in doc's lab were the game for me the rest was Ubisoft standard while Sunset Overdrive had parts of that I could easily ignore the collectibles and so the grinding to reach collectibles and tower defence sections over the bosses in Spider-Man or outposts.
I want more fast mechanics focused open worlds else it's linear design for me all the way and better mechanics focus as I hate open worlds in the typical RPG sense.
@Clusterjim In that case you’ve missed the “take the subway five times” trophy though Such a fun game, just finished it last night.
Man does this look like crap!
I love when trailers spell out basic mechanics like they’re unique and need explaining. “She will collect coins, which she can then use to purchase items from vendors.” Cutting edge stuff, guys.
But seriously, I hope this turns out. A big magical world combat game is exactly what I want, but the aforementioned “fire out of my freaking hands” trailer has me worried the story and script are going to hold it back.
Impressive trailer! Hoping they do a deep dive on the story eventually.
Leave A Comment
Hold on there, you need to login to post a comment...