The Pathless |OT| Abzûlutely Wonderful

Reedirect · Nov 23, 2020

Finished it yesterday and genuinely loved it. Got a bit emotional a couple of times due to its sheer beauty, similarly to Journey where the synergy of flawless traversal, visuals and music leads to a perfect symphony of all its parts and everything the medium can offer. As it stands right now, this will probably be my favorite game of the year, unless Cyberpunk pulls something crazy. I ended up collecting all orbs in every area and reached the ending in about 11 hours, with some secrets still left to be uncovered.

ghibli99 · Nov 23, 2020

Done with the third boss, working on 100%-ing that area now. I'm not moving on to new areas until I've completed everything in prior plateaus. At first I was kinda eh on it, but it's put a spell on me and I'm really enjoying this game now. There have been some annoyances: I had the camera break completely during a boss chase, I don't like the stealth parts when you get consumed by the red storms, and coming out of rest mode sometimes results in crackly audio for me that requires closing/relaunching the game (I'm playing on PS4 Pro), but it's an otherwise excellent experience. Feeling like an 8.5/10 so far. If the story beats deliver later and the quality remains consistent, I could see it bumping up closer to a 9/10.

Dan Thunder · Nov 23, 2020

Anyone know how you get the 'A new path awaits' trophy?! It's the last one I need!

Edit: My mistake, wrong trophy!

Dan Thunder · Nov 23, 2020

Woo, that's another platinum for the collection. With Ghost of Tsushima this year that takes me up to...two!

chalonverse · Nov 23, 2020

jb1234 said:
Finished it. Wasn't very fun. Every walkthrough I read mentioned Spirit Vision leading you to puzzles but nothing ever glowed red for me outside of the towers so I ended up having to wander aimlessly until I found something, which was numbing. Beautiful visuals and music though.

Do you maybe have color vision deficiency? I think if you do it'd be difficult to see the red glow for the all the side items.

Abi · Nov 24, 2020

Just beat the second boss, and man that was an awesome fight. So far the boss fights have been really interesting and fun, which I didn't really expect.

I will say I'm not a huge fan of the puzzles, I feel like they are repeating the same ideas over and over, but at least they're not annoying and only take a couple of minutes to complete.

Exploration in the game is such a delight, thanks to it's gorgeous environments, and a unique traversal mechanic that makes navigating the world so fun and effortless.

This game is so relaxing and I don't want rush to through it, I'll try slow down take in the world.

S1kkZ · Nov 24, 2020

finished it after starting frsh on p5. while the ps4 pro version is fine, the ps5 version performance mode ist fucking amazing.
loved the game from start to finish. a shame its not getting much attention here.

and huge kudos to the designers of the open world. it beautiful and you just want to explore it. best looking and "feeling" open world since breath of the wild to me.

Portmanteau · Nov 26, 2020

Starting tomorrow! Super stoked.

TripOpt55 · Nov 26, 2020

Finished the second area. Really love this so far. The way you explore is just so nice. I'm a total sucker for gliding like in Sly Cooper and Zelda. And the movement is really cool once you get the hang of it. Neat boss fights too.

Portmanteau · Nov 27, 2020

Is there an easy way to tell what you have left in an area, besides the spirit vision?

Reedirect · Nov 27, 2020

Portmanteau said:
Is there an easy way to tell what you have left in an area, besides the spirit vision?

There is a monolith of sorts after each boss fight that tells you how many orbs you have left in the area. But the small challenges scattered around the map for "coins"? Don't think there's any way of knowing aside from spirit vision.

CortexVortex · Nov 27, 2020

Purchased it yesterday and finished the second area before it was time to get some sleep.
First of all, my god, this game is absolutely gorgeous and everything feels so fluent in performance mode. The puzzles haven't beenthat hard yet, but they are fun and it's just a joy to explore the world and discover new things and places.
Truly a wonderful game and I hope it sells well.

TheWorthyEdge · Dec 7, 2020

How's the performance on PS4 Pro? Also...what is this game really? Haha looks awesome and I love Abzu.

Jonnykong · Dec 8, 2020

Still haven't had a chance to play this because I was waiting for the physical edition to come out (which I just received in the post today), now I just need to find room in my backlog..

S1kkZ · Dec 8, 2020

TheWorthyEdge said:
How's the performance on PS4 Pro? Also...what is this game really? Haha looks awesome and I love Abzu.

solid 30 fps.

Bushido · Dec 9, 2020

Got the platinum trophy (on PS5) over the weekend and it's definitely among my favorite games of the year, nice mix between Journey/Abzu, Shadow of the Colossus and Zelda. I'm just a sucker for these vast, beautiful landscapes filled with ruins and giant structures, really enjoyed traversing and exploring the various biomes, puzzles were a lot of fun, great atmosphere and soundtrack, some fantastic boss fights (the final boss specifically, holy cow)...just a really great package overall.

If you're a fan of any of the aforementioned games you should give this a look, even more so after a price drop (took me about 12 hours to 100% it with no real reason to go back, so 40€ might be a bit steep for some. I definitely got my money's worth).

LaneDS · Dec 10, 2020

Judging by this thread being barely two pages long, I get the sense this has flown under most folks radar which is very unfortunate as this game is tremendous.

Finished it tonight, but only so much so that I saw credits- there is quite a bit to do beyond that point.

Having finished the game, I understand there is an extended ending that I assume requires you to find all the animal symbols per area, which I'm glad to do. I'm finding how bright and blown out every area is, with the light restored, kind of unpleasant on the eyes which has made me consider starting a new game and clearing each area as I go. That might be my only gripe with the whole game, and I get that it's oddly specific.

It's easily the most "game-y" of anything in the vein of Flower/Journey/Abzu and I think the exploring and puzzle solving is pretty compelling. The way the game handles movement is unique and engaging and generally quite fun. Hope more folks check it out!

ghibli99 · Dec 10, 2020

I had a great time with the game. I do wish there were more challenging things to do with the actual movement mechanics vs. the few timed trials in the game (which are extremely generous with time limits) and sections where you don't have your companion to help, but at the same time, I think if they'd gone too hardcore/difficult with some of that stuff, it would have been too much of a distraction/hindrance to moving things forward.

I really liked that the platinum popped for me right at the end as the credits rolled, since I did all the more specific trophies before heading to the end of the game. 11 hours for me to 100% it, and as I predicted above, I came away from it feeling like it was a 9/10. It's a game I wasn't too excited about in its first hour, but I really got into it and could not stop until I had finished everything.

chronomac · Dec 10, 2020

Have this in my wishlist so I hope I can play around Christmas.

I think I know the answer to this but I'm going to ask anyway: does the game support HDR?

Baybob · Dec 14, 2020

I absolutely loved my time with this game, the soundtrack was amazing, traversal was very fun, I love it when the very act of moving around is fun and the puzzles were just right for me. I am a sucker for this type of game but just wow... Beautiful

Tanston · Dec 14, 2020

Just got my platinum for this only the 7th game Ive ever felt compelled to platinum which should tell you how much I loved it. Dont sleep on this game folks its really fantastic. If your looking for something short to play while waiting for a certain AAA game to get patched you could do a lot worse.

ghostemoji · Dec 14, 2020

I just picked this up as one of my B2G1 Best Buy order games. Just installed and will start tomorrow.

This an easy Platinum to chase? I've got a streak going with the PS5 and would like to keep these unrealistically high standards alive for a few more weeks.

pswii60 · Dec 15, 2020

Is it just me or does anyone else get a weird extra sensory feeling when wiping the eagle? It's difficult to explain lol

Messofanego · Dec 16, 2020

Just beat the first boss, the chase was a lot of fun, when it becomes a typical boss, it's less creative but still the leadup with the storm visuals and then the bucolic clearing up of the land is a visual delight.

Paquete_PT · Dec 16, 2020

This game makes a wonderful first impression.
Just beat the first boss and it's already one of my favourite boss fights in recent years. It's very traditional, in a sense, with similarities to boss fights from the PS2 era and, of course, SOTC, but it's a visual marvel. Never expected that from an indie game like this.
Other highlights:
This game has the best tranversal since Spider-man.
This is the best soundtrack Austin Wintory has done since Journey. The guy deserves (even) more credit.
Looks and sounds great on the PS5. They don't do much with the dualsense features but it feels good to play.

ghostemoji · Dec 16, 2020

This game has really taken me. The music is incredible (especially what I just heard in the first boss encounter), and it's visually stunning.

This game scratches the BOTW itch for me in a real strong way. I keep finding myself sitting in front of this for much longer than I anticipated just digging for every last little puzzle hidden away.

Really glad I am playing this before trying to scratch out a GOTY list.

kyle mechlachlan · Dec 19, 2020

Played through this the last few days.

It makes an incredibly good first impression and the first few areas are a ton of fun. But then it starts to feel a bit samey as it goes on, and never recovers even going into the ending.

One issue I have with this game is that the design feels at odds with itself. You're given an incredibly fun method of traversal and a big open beautiful area explore... but I don't get the incentive to actually do it. Fundamentally the only goal is to get enough glyphs to cleanse the towers and then beat the area boss. And because of the swirling storm that moves around, you're kinda pushed to try and cleanse them as quickly as possible so you don't get caught up in the storm. I really felt that was a weird pressure put on me by the game in every area. Once you do fight the bosses, the area is cleansed and you can ostensibly explore the area further.... but why would you? The glyphs are useless at that point, and the Flap upgrade stuff isn't really THAT useful. I only upgraded my flap twice and the other times were from the bosses. Nowhere in the game seemed that unobtainable that I needed to find all of them. Even if there were... what's there to find exactly? The world is big and empty with just little lore orbs and those are so sparse that I found it impossible to parse anything from them.

So you're essentially just going down the critical path until you beat all the bosses and then into the end of the game. The bosses *are* fun for the most part, despite some weird awkward aspects, and I enjoyed the end boss the most. But by this point I felt the game just felt a little shallow?

It all just felt like the game didn't go far enough with the tools it had. It seems to present as a world to explore and find things, but I never really found that there was anything worth exploring for.

ghostemoji · Dec 19, 2020

Fistfulofmetal said:
Played through this the last few days.

It makes an incredibly good first impression and the first few areas are a ton of fun. But then it starts to feel a bit samey as it goes on, and never recovers even going into the ending.

One issue I have with this game is that the design feels at odds with itself. You're given an incredibly fun method of traversal and a big open beautiful area explore... but I don't get the incentive to actually do it. Fundamentally the only goal is to get enough glyphs to cleanse the towers and then beat the area boss. And because of the swirling storm that moves around, you're kinda pushed to try and cleanse them as quickly as possible so you don't get caught up in the storm. I really felt that was a weird pressure put on me by the game in every area. Once you do fight the bosses, the area is cleansed and you can ostensibly explore the area further.... but why would you? The glyphs are useless at that point, and the Flap upgrade stuff isn't really THAT useful. I only upgraded my flap twice and the other times were from the bosses. Nowhere in the game seemed that unobtainable that I needed to find all of them. Even if there were... what's there to find exactly? The world is big and empty with just little lore orbs and those are so sparse that I found it impossible to parse anything from them.

So you're essentially just going down the critical path until you beat all the bosses and then into the end of the game. The bosses *are* fun for the most part, despite some weird awkward aspects, and I enjoyed the end boss the most. But by this point I felt the game just felt a little shallow?

It all just felt like the game didn't go far enough with the tools it had. It seems to present as a world to explore and find things, but I never really found that there was anything worth exploring for.

I've been playing basically opposite you and I think I feel a lot differently across the board. To me, the attraction is the exploration and finding all of the puzzles in every book and cranny. The lore that comes with that is substantial enough as well IMO. The more you discover and unlock, the more upgrades traversal gets as well.

I do wish there were higher stakes or fail states with the storms and boss fights though. I didn't quite get the trick with the second plateau at first and spent like a minute just getting hit over and over again in what was a very silly display on screen.

I'm not yet finished, but it's quickly climbing my personal GOTY list.

Ahti · Dec 21, 2020

First impression was meh but after playing it some time, I can`t get enough of it. If you`re a fan of Shadow of the Colossus and BOTW, you need to play this.

LaneDS · Dec 21, 2020

Fistfulofmetal said:
Played through this the last few days.

It makes an incredibly good first impression and the first few areas are a ton of fun. But then it starts to feel a bit samey as it goes on, and never recovers even going into the ending.

One issue I have with this game is that the design feels at odds with itself. You're given an incredibly fun method of traversal and a big open beautiful area explore... but I don't get the incentive to actually do it. Fundamentally the only goal is to get enough glyphs to cleanse the towers and then beat the area boss. And because of the swirling storm that moves around, you're kinda pushed to try and cleanse them as quickly as possible so you don't get caught up in the storm. I really felt that was a weird pressure put on me by the game in every area. Once you do fight the bosses, the area is cleansed and you can ostensibly explore the area further.... but why would you? The glyphs are useless at that point, and the Flap upgrade stuff isn't really THAT useful. I only upgraded my flap twice and the other times were from the bosses. Nowhere in the game seemed that unobtainable that I needed to find all of them. Even if there were... what's there to find exactly? The world is big and empty with just little lore orbs and those are so sparse that I found it impossible to parse anything from them.

So you're essentially just going down the critical path until you beat all the bosses and then into the end of the game. The bosses *are* fun for the most part, despite some weird awkward aspects, and I enjoyed the end boss the most. But by this point I felt the game just felt a little shallow?

It all just felt like the game didn't go far enough with the tools it had. It seems to present as a world to explore and find things, but I never really found that there was anything worth exploring for.

I feel like just making your way through the main objective of the game, and seeing the credits, gives you the right amount of time with the game (and that time will be entirely dependent on whether or not a player wants to do just enough or everything to see the end). All the areas have a similar sense of mystery and some nice puzzles, but they're all about the same level of (admittedly high) quality where I feel like playing "just enough" or playing all the way through are both equally valid ways to play through the game.

This falls apart a bit when you see that unless you've fully done a pretty obvious optional objective through the game you won't see the extended ending, kind of forcing players a bit towards a path (the irony!) if they want that content but I think aside from that the game is quite good at letting players engage with as much or as little of it until its conclusion, depending on their level of enjoyment and interest.

kyle mechlachlan · Dec 21, 2020

LaneDS said:
I feel like just making your way through the main objective of the game, and seeing the credits, gives you the right amount of time with the game (and that time will be entirely dependent on whether or not a player wants to do just enough or everything to see the end). All the areas have a similar sense of mystery and some nice puzzles, but they're all about the same level of (admittedly high) quality where I feel like playing "just enough" or playing all the way through are both equally valid ways to play through the game.

This falls apart a bit when you see that unless you've fully done a pretty obvious optional objective through the game you won't see the extended ending, kind of forcing players a bit towards a path (the irony!) if they want that content but I think aside from that the game is quite good at letting players engage with as much or as little of it until its conclusion, depending on their level of enjoyment and interest.

Woulda been nice had the game communicated in some form that there was an alternative ending unlocked for doing something. Some kind of hint, *something*. Because I really didn't pick up that there was an optional secondary objective. Is it to get all the glyphs?

ghibli99 · Dec 21, 2020

pswii60 said:
Is it just me or does anyone else get a weird extra sensory feeling when wiping the eagle? It's difficult to explain lol

Yeah, the animation is really well done with how your hand moves across the eagle's wings and body, and there is a sense of slight resistance too.

Paquete_PT · Dec 21, 2020

Fistfulofmetal said:
Woulda been nice had the game communicated in some form that there was an alternative ending unlocked for doing something. Some kind of hint, *something*. Because I really didn't pick up that there was an optional secondary objective. Is it to get all the glyphs?

I think it's some sort of shells you can pick up. I found one last night but the game didn't tell me anything about it: the purpose, number, etc

Lord Fanny · Dec 21, 2020

Fistfulofmetal said:
Woulda been nice had the game communicated in some form that there was an alternative ending unlocked for doing something. Some kind of hint, *something*. Because I really didn't pick up that there was an optional secondary objective. Is it to get all the glyphs?

To get the extended ending, you mean? It's to get all the light stones and all four gifts

Skatterd · Dec 21, 2020

Planning on picking this up this week. Will see if it happens to be in the sale tomorrow, but happy to support the devs regardless

fanboy · Dec 22, 2020

Oh my fucking god this thing is georgeous. Buy this game people, PLEASE... its beautiful, its play absolutely amazing. I have a few great games that I just have an urge to stop playing and have a pause. But I would play Pathless nonstop. Its way better than Abzu which was already great. Pathless will probably hit my top 10 this year.... Dont sleep on this.

Stoze · Dec 22, 2020

Paquete_PT said:
I think it's some sort of shells you can pick up. I found one last night but the game didn't tell me anything about it: the purpose, number, etc

Naw, the extended ending is for getting all glyphs and powers. The helix shell (pretty sure it's just one) is just an easter egg reference to ABZU.

Falus · Dec 22, 2020

How long is this game ? Will finish fenyx after 70h soon and I need a 6-10h max game

Lord Fanny · Dec 22, 2020

Falus said:
How long is this game ? Will finish fenyx after 70h soon and I need a 6-10h max game

You can easily clear this game in 5-10 hours. It may be a little longer if you want to go for all the trophies and stuff, but it's very much within that range

Falus · Dec 22, 2020

Thanks. I bought it already. But ill play very soon

ghostemoji · Dec 22, 2020

Just rolled credits on this and I'm very happy I took the chance on this one. Definitely will find a place on my GOTY list.

I can't get over how over the top spectacular this game looks at times. The boss encounters mixed with Austin Wintory's soundtrack is next level presentation in a video game IMO. I think that the boss encounters will be a let down for a lot of folks from a challenge perspective, and the lack of stakes was kind of silly when you missed a trick or don't understand what's going on (I can think of one or two spots that it didn't really click for me what I was supposed to be doing and those sections were really odd because of it).

This game was the equivalent of lo-fi hip hop beats for me as a game. It was a really great opportunity to just zone out and explore a beautiful and interesting world. I'd recommend it to anyone who enjoys exploring open worlds.

Skatterd · Dec 23, 2020

jb1234 said:
Finished it. Wasn't very fun. Every walkthrough I read mentioned Spirit Vision leading you to puzzles but nothing ever glowed red for me outside of the towers so I ended up having to wander aimlessly until I found something, which was numbing. Beautiful visuals and music though.

Started this tonight and I feel like I'm having this same experience. Maybe I'm doing something wrong or just not observant. Idk it's a bummer because it really is beautiful.

fanboy · Dec 23, 2020

The only 2 characters are voiced by Troy Baker and Laura Bailey? Lol.

fanboy · Dec 23, 2020

Skatterd said:
Started this tonight and I feel like I'm having this same experience. Maybe I'm doing something wrong or just not observant. Idk it's a bummer because it really is beautiful.

They dont glow at the same time, it would be impossible to player to actually orient themselves. Everything would glow red. But its pretty clear where puzzles and collectibles are. Caves, landmarks, hills, "castles" and so on.

fanboy · Dec 23, 2020

Sorry for DP:

About that true ending

please they are going to do a sequel for this right?

Falus · Dec 23, 2020

Im around one hour in. Got my
Eagle. Game Is beautiful and looks nice. But will I be able to run without shooting arrow ? It kinda break the rhythm

fanboy · Dec 23, 2020

Falus said:
Im around one hour in. Got my
Eagle. Game Is beautiful and looks nice. But will I be able to run without shooting arrow ? It kinda break the rhythm

You need to shoot the crystals to move faster, yeah, no way around that.

I am a bit dissapointed by the final.boss fight. It was surprisingly easy compared to previous 4.

Falus · Dec 23, 2020

fanboy said:
You need to shoot the crystals to move faster, yeah, no way around that.

I am a bit dissapointed by the final.boss fight. It was surprisingly easy compared to previous 4.

Just finished the first one. Cernos. Can't you die in this game ? I'm a bit lost though. It's all about finding these artifact to be able to go in the boss area to fight it ? And what about this tower with some stone I can put a lot artifact within it ? Just had one left and I see around ...8-10 holes ?

Bombless · Dec 23, 2020

Falus said:
Just finished the first one. Cernos. Can't you die in this game ? I'm a bit lost though. It's all about finding these artifact to be able to go in the boss area to fight it ? And what about this tower with some stone I can put a lot artifact within it ? Just had one left and I see around ...8-10 holes ?

It means you haven't found all the artifacts in Cernos' area. You can keep looking and finish the collection.

There's always more of them in a zone than what you need to reach the boss.

Bombless · Dec 23, 2020

Falus said:
Im around one hour in. Got my
Eagle. Game Is beautiful and looks nice. But will I be able to run without shooting arrow ? It kinda break the rhythm

You can shoot while running. And the more you level your eagle (the yellow diamonds) up the more time you can spend floating in the air.

The Pathless |OT| Abzûlutely Wonderful

Senior Game Designer

Unshakable Resolve