"The Forgotten City" Just Enough to be Passable

 

    When you first hear about The Forgotten City, I don't blame you for being skeptical. Honestly, if it wasn't for the fact that I've heard about the mod for quite some time during my ventures into the Skyrim modding scene I would have never touched it. I mean they call it "an award winning mod turned game", and while a lot of good games started off as mods, this one doesn't exactly look the part to sell you on it. At a first glance I understand why one would be turned off by it, it basically looks like one of those shitty unity asset porn games, and for a game that lasts about eight hours I wouldn't really say it's worth it unless on sale. Nonetheless, I will strive to judge the game on what it is not, but rather what it does, and if you catch it for cheap this game is a small, pleasant bundle of story to sink your teeth into for a day.

    Now, the real joy of this game is the story, which is honestly better written than you'd think. I understand any apprehensions one might have, especially because when writers try to take existing real life mythology and spin it into their own creations the result is usually cringy at best. But other than the ending, which isn't helped by the awful graphics, I would say it really doesn't do that. Though, I would say it's mostly because it doesn't touch upon the source material it's drawing itself from too much. In fact, if I had to describe the atmosphere of this game it'd probably generic Roman. That's about the nicest you're going to get from me, nothing quite stands out and you're able to suspend your disbelief, which I guess is enough for a game that runs about five to six hours at best.

    In terms of gameplay it's about what you'd expect from a Skyrim mod, apparently there are different ways to complete different quests, but frankly, the game is too small for that to really feel like the case. There are exactly two elements of the gameplay that I think are notable, which is the timeloop, and Diana's bow. I did really think that the developers of this game did their best to wring out all of the versatility they could with a bow that turns items into gold, whether it be to defeat enemies, or to solve what little puzzles/challenges did exist. Do I think they gave too many arrows? Yeah. I ended the game with 80+ arrows and I think having arrows be much scarcer, meaning players had to think more about how they were going to transform the world around them would have been the better choice. The same could be said about the timeloop, it allows you to re-ask questions without feeling like it's too goofy that you can ask them it 30 times, and it does allow you to explore different pathways relatively consequence free, giving this game decent replayability, which I think it desperately needs.

    Which I suppose leads me very nicely to the large elephant in the room I've been alluding to throughout this entire room, this game is too short and too limited in scope for me to really recommend at full price. Like I said, the 6 hour runtime is generous at best, and for a mod turned into a full-fledged game it is impressive, especially considering the size of their team. However, this game was not created in a vacuum, it's not some project presented to a professor, it is a game you buy with your hard-earned cash, and in that respect I have to say this game is really short for me to justify buying it full price. There are about 10 (?) characters you talk to, and the setting is also remarkably small, so if you aren't willing to explore all the different paths you can take with characters, I can imagine you'll finish this game even quicker than I did. It's simply too small, there's no other way to put it when it comes to The Forgotten City, the story is short, it feels small in terms of size, there are barely any characters, and so after getting all four endings in a relatively short period of time I have no desire to ever touch this game ever again. Which is where the generic setting really hurts this game in my opinion, because the story is cool, but not good enough to make up for the rest of it's shortcomings.

Final Score: 58/100

    Now, I know I just spent the last five paragraphs basically disparaging the game, but if you don't think about what you're getting for your money, and just play it for the five or so hours it will provide you, it's an alright game. Sure, it feels more proof of concept to try and get better funding to make a much bigger game, but the story alone makes it worth playing for. On a side note are the assets in the game actually from some shop or are they created, because it looks laughably bad. Like this game is basically just one step above your typical unity-based porn game you'll find on Steam, because at the very least you could actually move your character around and it isn't some point and click simulator. Especially the "canon" ending, I mean it's hard not to notice at some point that the throne room you find the "God" in looks like some shitty unity alien fps. I mean I didn't enter this game expecting much so I wouldn't say it underwhelmed me, but I wouldn't say it particularly impressed me either. I suppose it's called The Forgotten City but honestly it's more like a "forgotten neighborhood" if we're going to be realistic.