Biomutant Review
Author: FuzionByte.
Genres: Reviews, Action Adventure, Open World, RPG.
Here is our Biomutant Review giving you a subjective, unbiased review helping you make a more educated decision on whether or not the game is for you.
Release Date: 25-May-2021.
Platforms: PS4, Xbox One, PC.
Price At Launch: £54.99.
Developer: Experiment 101.
Publisher: THQ Nordic.
Genre(s): Open World, Action RPG.
The game
Biomutant is a futuristic open world hack and slash RPG that has you pick a breed, class, look and skill set then go off into the world to save the tree of life if you choose to as you progress through a large open world taking down world eaters in an earth that has long forgotten humanity.
You then get to choose whether or not you want to side with the Myriad tribe, a peaceful tribe on the side of light and life who want to preserve the world and make it whole again or the Jagni tribe who are essentially the other side of that coin in that they couldn’t care less if the world is saved they just want power.
Either way, you are going to be taking down outposts and forts as you make your way through the game taking down the four World-Eaters who are intent on destroying the tree of life thus extinguishing all life as you know it.
The good
Biomutant has this quaint charm about it which is endearing in a way. Silly little things that happen throughout the world such as your character urinating on a fast travel point or having a character who is very old called Out Of Date can’t help but make you chuckle when playing through.
The combat is good enough with a good feeling for the majority of the weaponry you have available. There’s cool comic book text that pops up on screen when you perform certain abilities which help the lacklustre audio along by giving you another dimension of relatable narrative.
You get a very large open world game to play through which is fairly in depth. There’s different skills to upgrade when you level up and a lot of customisation options both for your character and for what it wears.
Graphically the game looks good overall, there’s a few pop-ins and some wafty textures but not to often given a game of of this size. There’s been plenty of smaller games that haven’t managed the sort of smooth gameplay Biomutant has pulled off.
You get a good amount of gadgets including a mech to use as you traverse certain areas. Your Biomutant can’t survive for very long in water so go off and complete a quest where you’re given a jet ski.
If you’re struggling to progress through a devastated area, jump in a mech and bash your way through your enemies, there’s a decent glider that helps cover a good amount of distance when you’re up high.
The not so good
One of the worst things about the game for me and I’m not hating on Biomutant is the speech or lack of in the game as it’s jarring and just impossible to relate to.
For example, you find an old guy called Out Of Date (that’s a brilliant name as he’s so old). He’ll sit there in his wheelchair and say to you “bluegyy blah blah blinkoblinko blah bleh“. The narrator then comes on and says “he thinks you should go and look at that rope” and that’s how the audio goes for every character.
They must’ve had someone make those noises into a microphone and then render the audio into the game. Why not just use some of the development team as the voices for the characters if they couldn’t afford voice actors, which is fair enough if they couldn’t games are extremely expensive to make I get that.
Just something other than a constant dull toned narrator who never sounds excited, urgent, upset it’s just one flat tone and honestly it makes me want to have a sleep rather than go and save the world.
The whole game just feels more like a beta than a finished, ready to go £54.99 game.
I feel at a £34.99 price point Biomutant will be much better received but in it’s current state at launch it’s just not worth paying the full price which is such a shame as Biomutant was one of my most anticipated games of 2021.
Online
There are no online elements to Biomutant.
Audio
The audio leaves a LOT to be desired and it’s where the game falls apart. For being such a heavy voice based story, the only voice we get is the narrator and it’s just not good.
You hear a lot of gibberish from the various NPCs throughout the world which is then translated by the narrator and personally I do not like this approach as it just gives no relatability to the characters you meet.
They sit there going “flurky perky poo pah bling bloo” the narrator then comes on saying “he remembers you and hopes you are well“. Just have a character say that to me instead of essentially, for me at least, skipping the majority of the dialogue so I don’t have to sit there listening to the gibberish being translated by the narrator.
The sounds of the weapons are OK but nothing special and the general world music does nothing to inspire, overall I’d rather play Biomutant with the sound off as it becomes a better experience then.
Trophies
There is plenty to do on the trophy list including levelling up enough to unlock every skill, combat based ones as well as traversal, discovery and progression trophies.
Overall
I can summarise Biomutant as a beta at best, it just feels unfinished. The worst sin, however, is the dialogue or lack there of for the NPCs you come across throughout the world, it just breaks the immersion of the game far to much for me.
The combat is OK and the open world looks good when you’re running / gliding around, however, I think Biomutant, which is a game that has been delayed several times, should of been delayed further allowing more development time resulting in a better product than what we received, especially for full AAA price as it just doesn’t stand toe to toe with the big boys at the same price point.
Here at Griffins Gaming Guides we award Biomutant a hard earned 6 / 10.
That said, I hope that Biomutant can take what they’ve learnt here and then Biomutant 2 really go buck-wild and get some voice actors to bring the NPCs to life.
Final Score: 6/10
That’s our Biomutant review, I hope it helps you make an informed decision on whether or not the game is worth your time and money.