Review

Extinction

There is always a place in my gaming library for an anime inspired title. High speed action, big villains, over-the-top…everything – they just seem ideal for video games. That said, most of them fall short of delivering an engaging experience. They’ll offer some excitement of course; just being able to play as your favorite characters is enough for some fans. Unfortunately for Iron Galaxy, Extinction doesn’t have that base to build upon…

In Extinction you play as Avil, the last Sentinel. Sworn to protect the world from the evil Ravenii – giant ogre-like monsters that are hell bent on humanity’s destruction – Avil’s the only one capable of dispatching these brutes. And…that’s pretty much it, premise wise. Don’t get me wrong, there’s a story here that apes Attack on Titan (right down to the Ravenii’s weak points being the back of their necks) but it isn’t as inspired. There aren’t any memorable characters or noteworthy dilemmas beyond the approaching giants. What remains an overly repetitive hack and slash romp around a city full of squishable humans.

Levels play out in a few different ways. Sometimes you’ll need to rescue citizen using large crystal teleporters before smaller Ravenii kill them. Other times you’ll have to kill a certain number of enemies to clear a stage. Most of the time, you’ll be dealing with the giants. Failure comes via death (either yours or a set number of humans) or the destruction of property. The action is fast. You’ll dart for place to place, going toe to giant toe as you try to save the city. When things are working well, this sort of thing can be fun. And tackling each giant presents a unique challenge. Some can be killed quite easily (once you’ve climbed onto their backs). Others must have their armor removed or limbs cut off before you can move in for the kill. Again, that’s when things are working as they should.

There are times when Extinction won’t recognize your attacks; it can take a while to remove a Ravenii’s armor when it’s “sweet spot” floats in and out of a desired hit box for instance. The only way to fix the issue was to wait until the armor restored itself so the game could…I don’t know, recalibrate the area that needed to be attacked. Fighting the giants was made more difficult by an unruly camera. Thanks to the Ravenii’s size and the how tight the camera pulls in when darting around their bodies, it’s easy for an arm or a leg to obstruct your view. With one hit kills and an overzealous targeting system, not being able to see often resulted in a quick death.

That’s not to say that Extinction is void of value. Like I said, there were moments where I really enjoyed all of the slashing and such. Toppling a giant after a frustrating fight always made me feel great. Like I just bodied a titan in an anime – I still scream obscenities every time I kill a Ravenii. Things never elevated beyond these brief moments of triumph though. Levels blend together after a while, there’s no sense of discovery or exploration (the world is rather dull, despite the premise) and the fighting grows tiresome. Ultimately, Extinction is a forgettable experience. When I completed the final horde, I legit looked at my screen and was like “Oh, well I guess that’s over”. Which is a shame given what (I assume) Iron Galaxy was trying to do…