I’m a huge Xbox fan, ever since I was 12 years old and I got the original Xbox for a birthday gift I’ve loved that big green brand. Some of my favorite memories in gaming are playing KOTOR, ripping music to my Xbox to use in WWE Raw for a custom superstar, and playing Gears of War 2 online with buddies during the heyday of the 360. But since the 360 ended, it seems that Xbox has been dealing with bad choice after bad choice and it has culminated in Arkane Studios newest game, Redfall.

You play as one of four heroes and your mission is simple, kill vampires and take back the town of Redfall. The idea of this game is fine, good even. The idea of teaming up with up to three friends to go vampire hunting is a solid choice. Ever since Xbox showed this game off, I’ve been interested. I’m a simple man, give me a crazy gun, some friends, and let me kill crazy looking bad guys trying to take over the planet. But somehow Redfall takes this solid premise and makes it worse in every way.

Next-gen exclusive quality graphics

First, let’s talk about the AI. I’ve never played a game that had this bad of enemy AI. At one point, I was fighting 3 vampires and was just walking backwards and shooting them and was able to take down all 3 by myself with minimal damage. You can sneak up on the cultists (the pawns) and start shooting them at point blank range. I enjoy playing games on easy mode and honestly I still found this insulting. The enemies are so bad at fighting you, they might as well not even be there. The hardest enemy in this game is the atrocious aiming on controller. Did nobody test this game out on a controller prior to release?

The narrative before this game released was about the lack of 60fps. I always find that argument disingenuous, if the game is fun and good to look at then it doesn’t matter unless we’re talking about a competitive shooter. Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom both run 30fps and will be called beautiful. Redfall running at 30fps is no problem to me, though they never should have tried tricking people into thinking it was gonna have a 60fps option at launch. That should have been a giant red flag. When has trying to deceive the public about your game ever been a sign of a healthy and solid game.

Honestly, Redfall feels like it started development as a Games as a service (GaaS) type game which was then changed when Microsoft bought Bethesda and tried to turned into a an actual AAA looter-shooter. Reminds me of Gotham Knights without the few things that made Gotham Knights somewhat enjoyable.

This game simply is not good, but what I did enjoy was the atmosphere of the game. The music, the voicework, and the sound effects were great I thought. Having to listen to a vampire feeding in the opening scene was very unsettling. You can also have fun in this game playing with friends. Not so much because of the game but just because it can be fun shooting things with friends while laughing at how bad some of the stuff you encounter is.

I’m not even sure I want Arkane to keep working on Redfall or just go ahead and move on to whatever project is next. They’ve said before the more characters were coming and DLC, but nobody is asking for that at this point. Fix whatever bugs exist and move on, time to cut your losses. PC gamer said after 40 hours of redfall they wished the vampires would win, and I think that hits the nail on the head.

5.5/10