Ashes of Oahu Reviews

Early Access Review TLDR; A great Indie game that while flawed in places but it's a fun ride with a great deal of depth... I have been keeping an eye on Ashes of Oahu since it was going to be called Night Marchers and I was very happy to see it has been released and I am, mostly, not disappointed. First thing to point out is this is an indie game, 5 people made this game, 5! Given the size and scope of the game it is one hell of an achievement and while not perfect it is a really good, fun, large and beautiful 3rd person action RPG. Checking the map, you can see it’s going be a pretty big play area, as you progress opening the map increases that sense of scale as the fog of war clears to reveal where you have been. It truly feels like it has AAA open world size. The graphics are beautifully cell shaded with mostly very detailed textures, the characters have nice models if lacking in some detailed animation, the animals feel good enough and like they belong in the world (until they run into a building and get stuck), the buildings look as you would expect in the post-apocalyptic world the game is set in, it feels a well-defined game world. There is a nice amount of weapon diversity in the form of both conventional (guns, knives) and spirit weapons (spirit bow) and these are further diversified by a good modding and upgrade system. You can also learn to transform into animals, the full list I am not aware of at present but about an hour and a half I got to transform into a chicken which delighted me for no apparent reason, hopefully the Dev’s will so information out and just what else you can transform into. The depth of the skill tree is really impressive, with over 50 skills to choose from across different…let’s call them callings…like sniper, hunter etc, you can choose where to spend points across them as you see fit. What I liked is it’s not just a simple earn points and learn then, you have to learn the base skill from a trainer and then you can upgrade it wherever you are. There are 5 factions in the game, for of 4 of these your actions and the missions you complete will determine how they feel about and the final the Raider will always hate you; these are your main enemy. There are dialog options when talking to certain characters and apparently the choices you make while talking will lead to one of over 100 endings for the game; a small example of this is at the start you come across a guy kicked out of the base you’re heading to, he asks for medical supplies. When you arrive, you find out the Doc in charge of those supplies thinks he’s a douche, you can then choose to do a mission to the help the Doc and get the supplies or just forget it about the guy. This choice will affect your relationship with one or the other. As I played I wasa trying to think of what game or games it felt like and it really reminded me of the original Turok with the original Far Cry thrown in for good measure and neither of these are a bad thing. It has a really good feel to it and drew me into it to want to play more even at this early access stage. As I said it’s not perfect and you should not head into the game expecting a huge AAA budgeted title, it is an indie title but feel like it’s sat between the two camps, the Dev’s have lovingly crafted a large play world with deep skill trees, factions, weapon customisation, character development and a ton of missions to do but it’s they clearly have a limited amount of time and budget to get everything done and this shows in a few areas. It’s not a deal breaker but where the game is let down is the animations, the NPC’s feel wooden and soulless, they could use some polish but given how close the game is to launch it feels like something the Dev’s should try and look at post launch but I would qualify that statement and point out again this is by 5 people! All in all a good game well worth your time.

Missing Mai Tais as elixirs Its a good game, It has a few optimization issues, Likely will cause your gpu to warm up. It isn't for everyone but I do recommend giving it a shot if you are curious. It is a huge map and plays similar to Far Cry but in 3rd person. Combat is OK. I love the setting since they are real places like Hanauma Bay and Koko Head. There is no voice acting and lack of sound variety. It is very colorful though. There is no autosave which can be a deal breaker for some. I enjoy the character design and mana abilities. Overall, if you are curious, try it. This is my first impression and hope the devs are able to make another game or more games set in Hawai'i

Finished and loved this game and enjoyed it so much !! Some unforgettable gaming moments, and surely will replay it someday. It has a structure similar, but so different, to Gothic or Elex. BUT, you must have a *LOT*, and I mean a lot of patience, because : The game is not finished as evidenced by *serious clipping problems*. Examples of clipping, A few quest can not be ended because of things under the ground, none important though. Some caves are walled, hidden by a rock wall you can walk through. Lots and lots of falling through the ground to a lower ground, but you never get thrown out of the game. But, eventually you get to have super velocity with sprint, super jump, and FLY, oh, how I loved flying everywhere. And the weapons get to be super powerful, magic ones and guns. No matter the glaring problems, to me the game is totally finishable, and again, amazing world, and gameplay, beatifully enjoyable. Would not have missed it for anything. Sorry for the developers, that went moneyless, what an extraordinary concept, and implementation they birthed.

The combat is rough, the map is huge but empty, enemies spawn in seemingly at random. It's pretty severely unpolished. Aside, as a born and raised resident of actual Oahu, the butchering of the map is actually pretty funny. Overall, too janky to recommend, but if you're local, maybe you'll get a kick out of the map.

I have pretty much given up on this game as it is now. It crashes every 5-10 min claiming a Unreal error of some sort. The lack of voice acting is an annoyance but what's worse is the time you HAVE a voice actor it's sooooo slooooowwww and has pauses in the dialogue like they had to constantly piece together multiple tries over and over. You can hear it in the game trailer. It auto saves at certain points and you can save at bunkers but you have to go INTO the bunker and wait for a long load screen just to save. Why did I have to go inside? There was NOTHING in there to do but save. I could have clicked the bunker hatch and chose to save without a long load screen. The gameplay slows and speeds up at a constant frequency on any setting above low. Meaning, I had to put the settings on as low as they go and disable some settings all together in order to even play without it constantly stuttering. I think they have a good idea, making a pretty open world game in a place like Hawaii is cool but the technical issues with graphics settings and constant crashes mean I won't play for another few months hoping they have some sort of patch or fix. Wait to buy unless you somehow get it to work better than I did.

I feel like this game wants to be Far Cry so badly, while adding in elements of other games. It's a great attempt, but man does it miss the mark ten fold in my opinion. There is no dialogue, which isn't always a bad thing. But for this game, while I can't quite fully put my finger on why it was a negative, it just was. Something just felt completely off about it. The graphics aren't horrible, but they aren't amazing either. The character controls in a clunky manner however I feel like that's something that could be overlooked once you're used to it. As soon as I got to the first town, "The Village" I believe it was called, the on screen quest giver icons and the quest icons were just jumbled up and very confusing. One quest in The Village had me heal 3 people in the sick hall. However.....there were only 2 people. I looked everywhere, no third to be found. So there's one broken quest. Another thing I had woes with was the FOV. It seemed strange and kind of disoriented me, and there's no slider for it either. Personally I would say steer clear of this game. Maybe once it's had some updates it might be better, but I'll never touch it again.

Bottom line up front: The combat in this game is... just terrible. With the already clunky controls, the glitchy collision and the thousand-yard enemy field of view make combat a hugely frustrating chore. I'm about to say nice things about the game, but realize that they are all overshadowed by this singular game-breaking aspect. It disappoints me to no end, because the environment is beautifully designed and the setting is so interesting to me. The small development team did some admittedly impressive work on this game. The existence of the "Lava Dogs" faction impressed me immensely, and in fact the depiction of the culture, lore and geography of the island are all pleasingly accurate. More than once in my first hour of playing, I would crest a hill and involuntarily grin at my TV at the perfect virtual depiction of a view I'd seen countless times IRL. The developers clearly have substantial experience on the island, whether from living there or otherwise. The only reason I tried as hard as I did to trudge through the enemy encounters and explore the game was to marvel at the accuracy of the geography. I sincerely love this aspect of the game. I find the design aspects of the game so beautiful that the combat had to be truly impressively bad to have ruined the game for me--as it has. That said, it's priced appropriately; I don't regret paying $20 for a cool virtual view of the island.

This is a genre I wish was explored more. Maybe Assassin's Creed or some other franchise/company with the budget to do it right would have a better chance. Pacific Islander lore and mythology is fascinating, so I had a lot of high hopes for this game. What I got was a beautiful disaster. It is not really open world, as there are sometimes baffling invisible walls to keep you on the rails they want to keep you on, the RPG is okay but the controls are bad, the UI is bad, and the story is lacking in most every way. Going post-apocalyptic I think was a mistake too, since it just looks like everything else. I truly hope that someone else will take Hawaiian or Rapa Nui mythology and does something truly interesting with it. This is not what you are looking for. 2/10 at a steep discount; do not buy this at full price.

Dragons and Titans got replaced by THIS??? Janky, unfinished, laggy, barely working game with combat that is so jank, without proper voice acting and sound bites that sound so ridiculously bad i literally feel like its from a copyright free soundboard. This game really sets me off because i was a die hard Dragons and Titans fan and player, heartbroken when i heard the devs would rather shut it down than implement a proper anti cheat. This is what's left in its place? A game so obviously unfinished, feels like an insult to someone who praised these same devs for a long, long time. This game, which i bought only because i wanted to support the devs that made one of my favorite games ever, only brings shame to the Wyrmbyte team and name, as well as serve as a direct insult to all the die hard Dragons and Titans fans.

I really really really wanted to like this game! It checks a lot of my boxes, but I just can't get into it. No autosave, and the map is HUGE, and you can only save a certain locations, so I can easily lose anywhere from 30 minutes to 3 hours of progress by dying. This may be a draw to some people, but I have limited free time to play games, and I cannot stand having to replicate work over and over. It's impressive for a game made by so few people, but very unpolished.