Phantom Fury
by Dan Lenois
reviewed on PC
Past meets Present...
Phantom Fury, as with many other recent retro-inspired games, markets itself as striving for competency in both past and present. Following up as something between both a spiritual successor and direct sequel to 2019's Iron Fury, developed by Voidpoint, Phantom Fury continues the thread-bare narrative and action-packed combat formula of its predecessor, except this time through the lens of more modern graphics and a slightly more exaggerated cartoony art style.
Technical difficulties inbound...
It's worth noting that before even playing the game, there were a few prominent technical hiccups, only a few of which could be readily overcame. One such recurring issue was the game bizarrely repeatedly defaulting to 720p resolution upon initial startup on both my 1080p desktop monitor, and later on my 1440p laptop monitor.
A logical reason for this could, in some cases, be because the computer in question did not possess a sufficient GPU, CPU, or RAM to play at a higher resolution. Yet this argument falls apart when one considers the fact that the desktop being used ran off a Nvidia 2070 GTX gpu, 16 GBs RAM, and an intel i7 processor, while the laptop utilized a Nvidia 3070 RTX in addition to the aforementioned RAM and processor varieties.
The idea that the game felt the need to downscale despite performing off relatively high-end specs and updated drivers was, and is, laughable.
Combating the combat system...
As Phantom Fury is, at its core, a first-person shooter, one would think that the one area it shines above all the rest would be its shooting mechanics and general combat system. One would think...right?
Yeah, suffice it to say that the reality doesn't ever come close to matching up to the aspiration. Hitboxes are wildly unreliable, especially in regards to moving enemies. Meleeing enemies especially often feels like the world's most horrible match of Wii Boxing, where you spend most of your time punching blank air even when the blow in question should have connected.
Wait, he's not dead?
Guns are somewhat better in this regard. However, they suffer from a worse, more fundamental problem. No matter which difficulty you played at, (and for this review, I played them all,) most of the weapons feel about as fatal as a potato gun. Even heavier-impact weapons like the revolver or the shotgun often require multiple consecutive shots to finish off a single basic enemy.
It's hard to convince the player that you're providing a power fantasy when you're arming them with guns barely more useful in combat than a wet pool noodle.
When you combine this with the frankly unnecessarily limited weapon ammo availability, the player can often feel powerless in situations they are clearly not designed to feel powerless in.
Leveling the field...
Level navigation is often vague, sometimes to the point of even feeling directionless. Each level has a tendency to throw new mechanics and varying platforming and environmental puzzles at the player without first establishing any context to allow the player to slowly build up the necessary skills to seamlessly overcome them.
A comparison here would be how, in 2006's Portal, Valve began the player off with the easiest possible puzzle to overcome. Pick up the companion cube, and drag it across the room. Once the player does this, the door opens and the player is led into a new puzzle room. From there, they slowly expand their knowledge of what they can do with the companion cube, the portal gun, and other more sophisticated game mechanics.
Slipgate Ironworks' idea of the ideal Portal level, based off their handling of Phantom Fury, would be to start the player out in Chamber 18, bypassing all prior 17 levels, and just expect the player to know everything without ever having been taught.
Players should be expected to find their own solutions. But they should also be provided sufficient information in order to come to said correct solution. This is something that Phantom Fury miserably fails to do throughout its unbearably insufferable campaign.
Overall:
Phantom Fury is, at its core, a very confused game that doesn't seem to know exactly what it wants to do, but what it does do, it doesn't do particularly well. What could have been a superb throwback to the classic FPS games it so obviously is influenced by, ends up coming across instead as a poorly-executed mishmash of mechanics from each of said inspirations, thrown together without any clear underlining rhyme or reason.
Adding to that its bizarre technical shortcomings and hiccups, and Phantom Fury becomes a ridiculously difficult sell. Even for players looking for retro-inspired games, there are already so many better alternatives on the market, letting Phantom Fury dissipate like the disturbed lingering spirit it is may be entirely for the best.
4.0
fun score
Pros
Eye-appealing visual aesthetic, seamless gameplay/cutscene transitions.
Cons
Poorly-communicated level design, inconsistent hitboxes, weapons aren't powerful enough to embrace the aesthetic FPS fantasy, technical issues.