Video Game Review: Immortal Fenyx Rising

 

I had a love-hate relationship with this game.

In a lot of ways, it's a lot like Breath of the Wild, and in others... it's just annoying. During my review, I will compare and contrast to Breath of the Wild a lot.

The story follows Fenyx (who can be man or woman with customizable looks), who arrives on an island where everyone has been turned to stone. In the center of the island is the bad guy, Typhon, who hates the gods. Everything that happens is narrated by Prometheus, who is chained to the mountain for giving men fire, while Zeus listens and offers "funny" commentary.

Your job is basically to free the gods, beat Typhon, and restore the humans that have been turned to stone.

In order to do that, you need upgrades.

Fenyx has a sword, ax, bow and arrow, helmet, and armor. All of which you can find and upgrade in different ways and can make combos with (or upgrade to make combos). Additionally, she gets a set of wings that serve as the "glider" from Breath of the Wild. 

There are chests all over the world in which to find swords, axes, bows, helmets, and armor. Some chests are guarded, some you can only access after solving some puzzle, and some are just lying around. Inside the chests, there are also fruits, which you use to create potions.

There are four potions. One restores health, another stamina, another strength, and another defense. By collecting fruits and flowers, you get what you need to create these potions.

With the crystals that you get from killing bad guy minions and chests, you can upgrade the strength of your weapons, armor, the number of arrows you can carry, and the number of potions you can make at a time.

Needless to say, collecting all of these is important.

While you are exploring the world, you will find chests and bad guy minions, but there are also small quests that give you goodies.

Vaults: My hate from this game comes from the vaults. Some vaults are necessary and some are optional. Vaults can get annoying. Maybe it's because I'm old, but I don't have time to attempt a jump 50 times. If I don't make it in about ten jumps, I just give up. Then there are vaults you can't complete if you don't have some ability. They don't tell you you need it, you just wonder about trying to solve a puzzle that is basically unsolvable. Annoying, I know. 

Like Breath of the Wild, you get a version of the stamina wheel. You increase your stamina by collecting thunderbolts. Guess where the thunderbolts are? You got it. The vaults. I don't have to tell you I did not upgrade my stamina that much. 

There are also a few chests with armor and such inside the vaults. I also didn't get them all. 

Lyre: The world of Fenyx is divided into areas. Each area has a big lyre. In that area there are small lyres hiding with chests that you find. Once you listen to that song, you go over to the big lyre, play it, and get coins. Coins are useful to improve your attacks.

Ambrosia: Yes, like the ambrosia of the gods. These are crystals usually complicated places that you collect to improve your life (like the hearts on Breath of the Wild).

Bow and Arrow Challenges: These are challenges you find where you stand on a specific podium, some axes are activated and you have to send an arrow flying through all of the hoops to light a fire at the end. Oh, yes. You also have the ability to guide arrows. Most arrow challenges are annoying until you get the ability to slow down arrows. I would wait until you get this to do most of the bow and arrow challenges.

Hermes' Challenges: There are challenges where you have to step on a podium and then reach a marked destination in limited time. Again, don't even try it until you have a lot of stamina. It can get annoying trying them over and over to find you are too slow to win them.

Quests: Most of the quests are given to you when you reach new areas. Each area has a god trapped in some form that you have to free. You follow the quest to free the god (and earn goodies in the process).

Hidden Side Quests: There are a few hidden side quests. You find them like in Breath of the Wild, you walk around and they activate. (I have to say that there are also a few extra quests you can take in the Hall of the Gods, these are about finding loot or killing things, and they will give you a reward if you do)

Mount: Again, just like in Breath of the Wild, you can tame horses that are wandering fields. There are special mounts, some with more stamina than others. In the beginning of the game I was lucky enough to find a purple unicorn. I later found out it was a special mount with the 3 stamina bars. Neat! Much later in the game, I found a rainbow reindeer. It was pretty cool. It glowed colors and it also had 3 stamina bars.

Overall it was a fun game. I like open world games like this one where you explore and do challenges and quests. Also, I love games with swords and bow/arrow. My only complaint were those vault challenges where I had to do certain things a certain way or I would die many many times. Those were very annoying. They created that love-hate relationship with this game. I wish it had been better.

If you like Breath of the Wild, you will really enjoy this game as you wait for the sequel to come out.

Cheers!

As an Amazon Affiliate, I earn from qualifying purchases.