Away Game Review
3 Step Game Review
About the Game
Released
September 28, 2021
Developer
Breaking Walls
Price
US$ 29.99
(MAY VARY PER LOCATION)
Game Description
AWAY: The Survival Series is a 3rd-person adventure game that takes you on a sugar glider’s journey to save its family. Step into your own personal nature documentary as you sneak past predators, hunt down your prey, and glide among the trees, all while a narrator describes your every move. Every step of your story will take you deeper into the wild, where you will face new environments, new enemies, and new challenges. But beware of the dangers that lie ahead…
Step 1: Playing Conditions
Read below the game basic characteristics. If it is something you see yourself playing, move on to Step 2: Graphics & Sound.
Gameplay Overview
You are a 6 months old sugar glider living an adventure in a post-apocalyptic world. Run, climb, hide, fight, glide… You will have to do everything to survive being mid of the food chain. AWAY has 2 game modes: STORY and EXPLORATION. While on Story mode there is a chain of quests to complete, on Exploration mode, you fly around possessing different creatures and exploring the map.
There is a clear effort to make players feel they are in a National Geographic nature documentary. The music, narrator, and written script resemble something you would watch on the TV. But, the CONSTANT BUGS, glitches, and performances issues won’t let you “transcend” from the state of “this is just a game”.
Step 2: Graphics & Sound
Watch 5 to 10 minutes of any video below. If you like what you see and hear, move on to Step 3: Game Evaluation.
Step 3: Game Evaluation
Build your expectations about the game by learning what it offers and how was The Partisan Spy’s experience.
USER INTERFACE
The UI can be seen by some players as limited and aesthetically disconnected from all the rest. The game menu doesn’t offer much, from a simple feature as keybindings configuration to graphics settings narrowed down to the basics. Graphics being such a crucial element to a game like AWAY MORE SHOULD BE EXPECTED.
On a similar approach, the HUD and in-game menu are generic and don’t help build players’ imagination to a nature documentary.
STORY
Regardless of the Exploration mode, the story is the CENTERPIECE of the game. The entire game is narrated by a voice, and collectibles scattered around the map reveal more details about this post-apocalyptic world.
Besides the main questline, there are some side quests to be done, but as the collectibles, MOST OF THEM ARE BUGGED. It appears to have different bugs, but the most common is that it doesn’t register that something was collected or that a side quest was completed.
COMMUNITY POTENTIAL
PVE games usually don’t get the same attention from the gaming community as PVP games.
Content generation is LIMITED to the completion of the game, which results in a short awareness life span. Beyond that fact, AWAY has gameplay issues that can raise negative reviews and push new players away.
A couple of years ago, it was a public plan of the developers to release new episodes with different animals, which leaves an “open door” to sequels and to build a community in long term.
GAMEPLAY MOOD TRACKER
MOOD ANALYSIS
Bugs, glitches, and graphic performance issues dictated the mood tracker and affected negatively the gameplay experience. In the 7 hours of gameplay, my mood varied from HOPEFUL to EAGER ending in an average of NORMAL. If not for the constant “hiccups”, AWAY had full potential to keep my mood at high levels for the entire gameplay.
GRIND FEELING
AWAY IS TOO SHORT to feel any kind of grind feeling, useless if played dozen hours on Exploration mode.
The story has a quick and linear narrative that can be complete in approx. 5 hours. The side quests bring a bit of variation to the gameplay and collectibles have audio cues making them easy to find.
LIKED THE MOST
The narrator and music soundtracks are the game highlights.
HATED THE MOST
From all bugs, the fast travel system and gameplay reset bugs were the most annoying ones. On some occasions, the sugar glider respawned in the water, dying over and over again.
EVALUATION SUMMARY
Any gamer that reads or understands a bit about the industry, knows that gaming discovery and innovation most of the time come from bold indie developers. Today’s popular genres would never exist if not for them. MOBA, Battle Royale, Auto Battler…
2 years ago, AWAY WAS 100% FUNDED IN ONE DAY on a Kickstarter campaign and ended with more than double of the pledged amount. Every year the support to indie developers seems to grow stronger and because of that some of them don’t have to take the entire risks alone anymore.
It is a tough job to review indie games because I want all of them to succeed. It’s not just a game you’re playing, it’s the life dream of a small group of people or sometimes of one solo developer.
AWAY IS FULL OF GOOD INTENTIONS and it is clear where they wanted to reach, but it falls short for many reasons to be listed.
AWAY is not ready.
AWAY is not worth US$ 29.99.
AWAY is not being released as an early access game.
AWAY is not asking for community cooperation to polish the game.
AWAY IS NOT A GAME I CAN ADVISE YOU TO BUY, but I hope you do.
I also hope developers keep committed to the game.
And in some years from now, a new chapter of The Survival Series is released, but this time, perfectly done.
Choices & Advice
DON’T BUY IT
IF YOU DON’T WANT TO PLAY A GAME FULL OF BUGS.
WAIT TO BUY
IF YOU BELIEVE THE GAME WILL BE POLISHED AND READY TO PLAY IN THE NEXT MONTHS.
BUY NOW
IF YOU WANT TO SUPPORT THE GAME DEVELOPERS, BREAKING WALLS.
GAME LIFETIME
THE GAME CAN BE FULLY COMPLETED IN 5 TO 8 HOURS.
SUPPORT THIS GAME REVIEW
There are 4 easy ways to show support to this content. Thanks for doing that and for reading my review.
Found this review (and site for the first time) while searching as a backer of the game. Just wanted to say that I really love the format!
Thanks for the appreciation, Mort! If you have any extra questions about Away, I will be happy to chat about it.