Voodoo by Brain in the Box is a great example of a title that could be something amazing in time. Currently in Early Access, this open world sandbox that takes inspiration from Shadows of the Colossus. That is a loft goal, and Voodoo still has a long way to go in order to reach those aspirations.
Each reviewer is different and we tend to score or view titles in different ways. I personally like to judge a title upon its own merits and how it works in regards to what it set out to do. Voodoo is one title that as much as I want to judge it on its personal merits I also have to judge it against another in the style. Being judged up against Ark: Survival Evolved as well as what it currently has in stock, there’s work to be done.
One of my first issues which is perhaps the largest is the servers. Currently there are a few available but there’s no option to simply create a “single player” server in order to get yourself established and work out exactly how to do things. Instead, unless you work through the many steps in order to be able to run your own private one, you’re stuck playing with others. This wouldn't be a bad thing but when Marc and I took it for a spin the first day we had so many issues when one person in particular would join the server and it would then promptly crash or lag us right out. It’s not even a case of being PKed or seeing the foul language being thrown around it’s simply not being able to really play because someone's bad connection lags the rest of us out. Yes we could have swapped servers but the pings were all too high that connecting to them was long enough on its own.
Gameplay itself is still a bit rough and because of the lack of private servers, having to go into one that have had people in them recently can be hard to start off in. It’s rough because in order to start off you have to pick up the materials off the ground in order to build your first tools. Nothing on the ground? Nothing can be crafted and you’re stuck wandering a beautiful but empty landscape as you look for enough in order to make a pickaxe and a hatchet to break apart boulders and trees. Once you have these then the rest will slowly come into play but before that it can be a long time in coming.
Building and setting up your first camp is fun and all but compared to others there’s not that much else to do. In hours I’ve seen maybe a few gazelle and a couple of this other beast that once it saw me, I was dead. With everything that I had on me because I didn’t have a chest to put things in yet. That’s fine, I’ll just make my way back to where I died… except when I did there was nothing there. I also happened to be alone in the server at the time so I know it wasn’t just someone else. Whelp back to the gathering materials up off the ground game in order to even just get my basic tools back. Also how do I know it was gone in a vast landscape with no minimap or compass? Because I had just gone toe to toe with the best part of what Voodoo offers. Giants.
These beings are freaking massive and basic weapons do absolutely nothing to it! I couldn’t even dent the thing and one almost good step on my head is the reason that the other beast managed to take me out so easily, I had no health left. These Giants are impressive though and can be seen over large distances. I had wondered the first time how big these would really be but damn. You can’t miss them and all while running up I could only think to myself that I was going to die. I did. Just not to it. It was all the reason to head back in order to start gathering over again in order to try it again but hopefully with others because it’s so damned big that by the time you’ve moved from one of its feet the other one is coming down on you.
So all in all Voodoo has some ways in order to go but if they fix the servers and the lag at the very least things will already be in much better shape. Perhaps even adding the ability to punch your first materials out at the cost of health would be worth it especially if there’s nothing on the ground to pick up. I guess we’ll wait and see how things shape up as Voodoo is currently only within a pre-alpha stage.
Game Information
PC
Developer(s):
Brain in the Box
Publisher(s):
Indie Gala
Genre(s):
Sandbox
Open World
Adventure
Mode(s):
Multiplayer
Other Platform(s):
N/A
Source:
Provided by Publisher
Article by Pierre-Yves
Opinion by Marc L.
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