Ryse and fall of the Xbox One’s glorified tech demo

Ryse: Son of Rome has launched alongside the Xbox One console, and the reviews are out.

Ryse: Son of Rome is an immersive action-adventure story of struggle, brutality, and heroism. It follows a fearless Roman soldier named Marius Titus who joins the army to avenge the slaying of his family and emerges as a hero who must fight to save the Roman Empire.

Ryse was in development at Crytek for quite some time. Originally intended to be an Xbox 360 title, it was first revealed at E3 2011 as a game to showcase Kinect. To that end, players can use motion gestures to shield, attack and execute enemies.

Ryse runs on the 4th generation CryEngine, so it’s definitely got the technical pedigree to put the Xbox One through its paces – and it shows.

The general consensus among critics is that as far as an Xbox One launch title goes, it’s barely more than an impressive graphical tech demo. The gameplay itself is being reported as shallow, repetitive, and boring. Reports generally peg that campaign length at 6 hours long – at a stretch.

Black Friday sales get crazier every year.

So the good takeaway from this is that the Xbox One is perfectly capable of delivering eye-watering graphics when put in the hands of capable developers – you might just want to skip Ryse though.

The aggregated scores below for Ryse: Son of Rome we gather on 22 November 2013:

Metacritic: 61%
Gamerankings: 61.91%

Check out what some respected review websites are saying.

The Escapist – 3.5./5

Ryse: Son of Rome tells its story well. It has amazingly enjoyable and ruthlessly violent combat, which pairs incredibly well with the stellar graphics quality. Sadly, the experience is over all too quickly, and you’ll be left wondering where the rest of your game is. You might find that in the arena, if your focus is on multiplayer and/or challenge modes, but if you were hoping for an epic tale of heroism, you’ll have to settle yourself for a short story.

GamesRadar – 3.5./5

Ryse: Son of Rome is the definitive Xbox One launch title–for better or worse. It’s an incredibly pretty game with some impressive ideas, and it’s going to surprise you with its engaging story and weighty combat. The short campaign and repetitive battles hold it back from greatness, but it’s a journey through Rome absolutely worth experiencing, if just to see exactly what the console is capable of.

Edge – 6/10

Ryse evinces no care for history, innovation of design, photorealism or a great many other things, but Crytek cares dearly about art and the technology powering it. For all the simplicity of its mechanics, Ryse’s artistry is second to none.

Game Informer – 60%

When I show my friends what Xbox One is capable of graphically, I’m going to pop in Ryse. The visuals are breathtaking, but the gameplay flips on a dime between being legitimately fun and downright bad. There is no middle ground. It’s very much the extreme of both.

Polygon – 60%

It’s a gorgeous, dark and bloody tableau. But all that visual beauty and dramatic gravitas goes to waste with an aimless plot and a monotonous combat system. Ryse has all the guts of next-gen — often quite literally — but none of the glory.

Joystiq – 2.5/5

Ryse: Son of Rome falls into the trap of your typical launch game: it does well to show off the power of the system, but it’s slim on substance. Production value aside, Ryse is short, easy and lacks the punch of other action games. For all of its pomp and flash, Ryse: Son of Rome is a shallow bore.

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Destructoid – 5/10

In fact, the promising arena mode is the only saving grace of Ryse. The campaign may as well not even be there, and having to fight the same handful of enemies over and over on top of a trite, stereotypical narrative is not an example of a good time. Ryse looks great and has a lot of great ideas, but it falls flat in nearly every respect in regards to its core story. If you’re a hardcore action fan you may get some satisfaction on the highest difficulty setting, but even then I’d wait for an equally hardcore price drop.

Eurogamer.net – 5/10

There’s no brains, no muscle, no fibre beneath Ryse’s extravagantly engineered good looks – this game rings loud but hollow. Crytek likes to contrast Marius’ moral strength with the vanity and cruelty of Nero and his made-up sons, but Ryse feels like a product of their dying empire. It’s just empty decadence.