#Gaming #IGN
La Quimera's Early Access version reviewed by Justin Koreis on PC.
La Quimera is bad, but it’s also a perfect example of how even something bad can have a bit of charm. The writing is cringey, the acting is embarrassing, and the middling but serviceable action tends to follow the same basic loop on repeat – but if some friends are riding this partially derailed train with you, there is still some fun to be found here. It doesn’t quite hit “so bad, it’s good” levels of jank, but it could still be a decent candidate for an evening of goofs.
#IGN #Gaming
La Quimera's Early Access version reviewed by Justin Koreis on PC.
La Quimera is bad, but it’s also a perfect example of how even something bad can have a bit of charm. The writing is cringey, the acting is embarrassing, and the middling but serviceable action tends to follow the same basic loop on repeat – but if some friends are riding this partially derailed train with you, there is still some fun to be found here. It doesn’t quite hit “so bad, it’s good” levels of jank, but it could still be a decent candidate for an evening of goofs.
#IGN #Gaming
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GamingTranscript
00:00I have to admit I'm a sucker for direct-to-video sequels. There's something about being five
00:09tremorous movies deep where all pretense is abandoned and we all know what we are there
00:13for to watch some ridiculous action and give our brains a break for a bit. La Quimera reminds me
00:19a lot of popcorn flicks like that. This FPS is not particularly good-looking, well-written or
00:24innovative, the action doesn't do anything memorable, and its acting ranges from mediocre to
00:29terrible. There is admittedly a certain charm to be found here, especially if you bring
00:36a friend or two along to share this rocky ride in co-op, but by nearly every metric, La Quimera
00:41is about as good a game as Tremors 5 Bloodlines is a movie. Which is to say, it's not.
00:58Set in the fictional South American city of Nuevo Caracas, the world is going to hell
01:02in a handbasket. Outside the city walls, some sort of robot apocalypse that's never really
01:07explained is taking place. Inside there are warring corporations and extreme poverty. That
01:12setup isn't a social-political commentary so much as a throwback to 80s sci-fi, complete
01:18with these rigs that would look right at home on Ellen Ripley in Aliens.
01:21Get away from her, you bitch!
01:25As a new PMC recruit, you and your squad get stuck in the middle of some non-specific and
01:30uninteresting power struggle between corporations, leaving an equal mix of broken bodies and bots
01:35in your wake.
01:38There is some legitimately cool environmental storytelling here. My favorite by far is this
01:43area, named the Bone Wall for obvious reasons. A voice in your ear describes the desperation that
01:49went into building the wall as all hell was breaking loose, and it's neat to piece together
01:53how there was no time to slow down and help anyone who fell, whether that was due to exhaustion,
01:58injury, or dying from whatever encroaching threat drove the frantic construction. In fact,
02:03La Quimera would have been better off if it let the environments do all the talking. Because
02:07once its characters open their mouths, it is rough. The dialogue is awful, with obscenity-laced
02:13tirades like this.
02:15It sounds like someone watched a Quentin Tarantino movie once and tried to mimic it without knowing
02:24how to make any of the lines land. The acting also ranges from a normal kind of bad to this.
02:30I can't tell if it's purposefully campy, or potentially using some sort of poorly implemented
02:39AI. Characters are very chatty too, and I found myself actively cringing,
02:44The story itself doesn't make much sense either. Apparently saving a billionaire's daughter gets
02:54your PMC conscripted because… you are afraid he will sue? Which naturally means the people
03:00in the PMC all have to get experimental and highly dangerous augmentations too? I wouldn't mind the
03:06nonsense. It's fine enough as a vehicle to make me want to go shoot robots. But the story is so
03:11clearly unfinished, ending abruptly after just a few hours without resolving anything.
03:18Developer ReBurn unexpectedly decided to delay La Quimera on the day it was supposed to launch,
03:23and given development is largely based out of Kiev and Ukraine, the fact that it's still coming
03:28out at all feels like something of an achievement worth applauding. It's theoretically possible the
03:32campaign will have more of a resolution by the time it does finally land, but in the version we
03:37were sent for review, there isn't any semblance of a complete story.
03:44La Quimera isn't exactly shy about the influence crisis has had on it. Early on, you and your crew
03:49gain access to exosuits, complete with energy-powered armor, cloaking, and scanning.
03:53That last bit is especially important. One quick ping allows you and your teammates to see any
03:58nearby enemies, even behind cover. That's huge when your weapons operate like a poor man's version
04:05of the Farsight from Perfect Dark, able to lethally penetrate shockingly thick obstacles. It's extremely
04:11satisfying to drop a bunch of orange silhouettes in rapid succession from sight unseen.
04:15That said, where Crysis tended to be more of an inverted funnel that pushed you toward open areas,
04:23La Quimera is decidedly about straight lines. Its levels are very linear, and your objective is
04:29almost always to clear enemies as you walk from point A to point B. That's not necessarily a bad thing,
04:35as a bit of a throwback like this can be a welcome pilot cleanser in a time when wide open gameplay is
04:41increasingly the norm, but it does all start to become a bland blur. That's because so many areas
04:46repeat the same cycle of kill the enemies, open this door, kill the next enemies, open that door,
04:52and so on. There are a handful of encounters that break that trend, most notably this gunfight on the
04:57slowly rising elevator, but there are few and far between. The gunplay itself is extremely basic,
05:07with the weapons effectively limited to a sidearm, shotgun, or rifle. You can't change guns mid-mission,
05:12nor pick up any temporary options like a limited use power weapon. You're given the choice between
05:17conventional firearms and electromagnetic weapons. The former works better against humans, while the latter
05:22tears through shields and robots more quickly, but you'll be required to bring one of each into your
05:27missions anyway. Which one gets to be the more powerful primary weapon and which is relegated
05:31to your sidearm could have added a small strategic wrinkle, but the conventional arms are so poor
05:37against bots that there's only one right choice, which is too bad. The thing I like best about the
05:45fights themselves is the ammo economy. Bullets can become scarce, especially in later missions, which
05:51means you can't just sit in one spot and pick off every enemy by shooting through walls the whole time.
05:56I had to keep moving to either scavenge rounds off of corpses or find more ammo boxes, which was just
06:02enough to create some badly needed forward momentum during otherwise slow fights.
06:11As a private military contractor, you are of course paid for completing missions,
06:15but while there are things to buy between them, the progression is badly underbaked at this point.
06:20There aren't enough items or upgrades for sale in the first place, and the stuff that is here
06:25isn't very interesting. You could buy one of this very small number of generic guns,
06:30or invest in either of the two alternate versions of your exosuit's head, arms, torso, and legs,
06:35each of which have differences like improved cooldowns or increased medkit capacity,
06:40but those effects are all so small that it's hard to feel the need for any of them.
06:44The way you get money is a little weird too. In addition to completing missions,
06:48cash can also be found in containers mid-level, but you have very shallow pockets for some odd
06:54reason, hitting max money far too quickly, which is a problem I can say with honesty I've never had.
07:02That's too bad, because collecting more would have given me a real incentive to go off the beaten path.
07:08There are some of the obligatory voice memos people seem to leave behind in every video game,
07:12but I can't bring myself to opt into hearing more of this dialogue than I absolutely need to.
07:21For as down as I am on Lockymana, and believe me, I am, I did still have a strangely fun time with it.
07:27That's due primarily to two things. First, you can play the entire campaign, minus the tutorial,
07:33in online co-op with up to two other people. A couple of buddies is the exact thing you need to
07:39transform cringey dialogue from something you'll roll your eyes at into a hilarious shared experience.
07:45Having another gun or two covering your back makes the combat more exciting as well,
07:49and the ability to do things like alternate who is doing scans so that you are never waiting on
07:54the ability's cooldown keeps the fights moving at a faster pace.
07:57The other quality that keeps its many issues from becoming downright infuriating is how short Lockymana is.
08:06It took me right around four hours to complete my first playthrough.
08:10That could certainly be a negative if you put a lot of weight on hours played per dollar spent or whatever,
08:15but it does make a stronger case for going in with some friends, having a ridiculous time,
08:19and then getting out in a way that lets you enjoy the handful of high points while minimizing the impact of the lows.
08:26Of course, one of the reasons for this brief length is that it's outright incomplete in parts,
08:30but it would need to be significantly fleshed out to justify spending any more time in Nuevo Caracas anyway.
08:40La Quimera is bad, but it's also a perfect example of how even something bad can have a bit of charm.
08:46The writing is cringey, the acting is embarrassing, and the middling but serviceable action tends to follow
08:51the same basic loop on repeat, but if some friends are riding this partially derailed train with you,
08:58there's still some fun to be found here. It doesn't quite hit so bad its good levels of jank,
09:03but it could still be a decent candidate for an evening of goofs. That said, even going into it
09:08with the right expectations, I wish there was any story resolution whatsoever, as La Quimera is clearly
09:14unfinished in more ways than one. For more, check out our reviews of Tempest Rising or Claire Obscure
09:22Expedition 33. And for everything else, stick with IGN!