The Ascent - isometric, co-op cyberpunk action RPG

[Jenkem]

The level design is good, the weapons feel nice but the game is retarded (backtracking galore).

It's not worth 20 potatoes. People should wait for a big discount.

seems like a game that will be worth playing once it's in a fanatical bundle

 

[Oracsbox]

My thoughts..

It's already been said but the graphics are nice, the world setting and attention to detail are great.. which might be a problem, it's so well done, it seems maybe wasted on a twin stick shooter?

The tiny text used is annoying

Map navigation is confusing at first until you get used to it.

The fixed camera can be fucking annoying, and just seems a little too close in, at least to me it did.

Brief dialogue and cut-scenes are a definite positive, too many games now bore my arse rigid with tedious conversations.

Combat gets better as you unlock more stuff, but it's essentially a twin stick shooter and if you don't (really) like that, you're going to lose interest very, very quickly, to be fair the cover system works great and relies on you actually using the environment and not pressing a button to hide in auto-covershoot.

Instead of installing on my PC, I installed it on my cats new Xbox series S.

Spoiler

I recently acquired a new Xbox..


It was for Archie, he's not ready for a PC yet

I've had no stutter issues even with the entire screen exploding..however precise shooting with a controller is non-existent, tricky.

I haven't played co-op as I have no friends.

Crossplay with PC is possible, but I think watching the Xbox player trying to shoot accurately would lead to the PC user killing himself laughing.

Edit : You get to collect alien testicles, in a side mission.

 

[Darkwind]

https://www.gamespot.com/reviews/the-ascent-review-wretched-hive-of-scum-and-villainy/1900-6417706/

6 out of 10 cuz muh feelz got hurt. LMAO! It reads like a Babylon Bee / The Onion article but it is real. These SanFran faggot game journos literally are now living in a self-projected reality distortion field that is a wholly different experience than what the rest of us live in. Ridiculous...

Main negative of the game: "Tone is extremely, unnecessarily hostile and dour'

Cyberpunk. Which was always rainbows and fucking unicorns along with Warhammer 40k, innit?

 

[mediocrepoet]

https://www.gamespot.com/reviews/the-ascent-review-wretched-hive-of-scum-and-villainy/1900-6417706/

6 out of 10 cuz muh feelz got hurt. LMAO! It reads like a Babylon Bee / The Onion article but it is real. These SanFran faggot game journos literally are now living in a self-projected reality distortion field that is a wholly different experience than what the rest of us live in. Ridiculous...

Main negative of the game: "Tone is extremely, unnecessarily hostile and dour'

Cyberpunk. Which was always rainbows and fucking unicorns along with Warhammer 40k, innit?

Can't wait for the SJW edition of WH40k: "In the grim darkness of the 41st millennium, there is only friendship."

"Cherish the Xeno and love in the name of the Emperor of all Personkind!"

It's going to be brilliant, D1P.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

https://www.gamespot.com/reviews/the-ascent-review-wretched-hive-of-scum-and-villainy/1900-6417706/

6 out of 10 cuz muh feelz got hurt. LMAO! It reads like a Babylon Bee / The Onion article but it is real. These SanFran faggot game journos literally are now living in a self-projected reality distortion field that is a wholly different experience than what the rest of us live in. Ridiculous...

Main negative of the game: "Tone is extremely, unnecessarily hostile and dour'

Cyberpunk. Which was always rainbows and fucking unicorns along with Warhammer 40k, innit?

Can't wait for the SJW edition of WH40k: "In the grim darkness of the 41st millennium, there is only friendship."

"Cherish the Xeno and love in the name of the Emperor of all Personkind!"

It's going to be brilliant, D1P.

Yeah, Day One Purge is a certainty.

 

[mediocrepoet]

I played through the introductory section (about 35-40 minutes of gameplay). So far, I've had no performance issues, stuttering or hitches of any sort. The graphics are great, if you like the neon and trash cyberpunk style, which you've probably made a decision on already based on all of the marketing videos and art that's been floating around.

What's harder to pick up from that is how great the sound is. Explosions and gunfire, etc. are LOUD and sound appropriately impactful. You can also tell how close you are to having to reload your gun by how it sounds as it's firing.

I was playing with mouse and keyboard and the control scheme is fine, although my old man motor control maybe wasn't as precise as I'd like. Also, I find navigating a twin stick shooter with WASD to be a bit weird, but most things I've seen had suggested that M+K was superior to the controller schemes.

The game kind of reminds me of a weird mashup between Smash TV and Diablo for game play with visuals ripped out of your favourite cyberpunk pulp. So far, I've really enjoyed it, but I think you have to enjoy the more arcadey, action type of games.

From what I can tell, this isn't really going to be a loot game (so that's something it doesn't take from Diablo) and the RPG mechanics are something that I suspect will be more tangential with the bigger factors being equipment upgrades and the like and basically being an arcade like shooter with RPG elements and some sort of storyline to give you a reason to blow everything up.

Anyway, bear in mind that everything I've said is more of a first impression as I've spent less than an hour on it.

 

[ferratilis]

I love how they have the Dead Space locator thingy, that was always a neat idea in a game where most environments look similar to each other. It seem like a fun game so far. I also installed it on Xbox Series S like the guy above, but I can't aim for shit with a controller, so I'll just download it on game pass for PC. Hopefully there won't be performance problems.

And the most important thing: Cyberpunk's UI team alone was probably bigger than this game's entire development team, yet this game's UI can take a curly shit all over Cyberpunk's terrible UI, from a 50m cliff and then force it down Cyberpunk's throat. Half the difficulty of playing Cyberpunk is fighting with the terrible UI design. Good job.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

I love how they have the Dead Space locator thingy, that was always a neat idea in a game where most environments look similar to each other. It seem like a fun game so far. I also installed it on Xbox Series S like the guy above, but I can't aim for shit with a controller, so I'll just download it on game pass for PC. Hopefully there won't be performance problems.

And the most important thing: Cyberpunk's UI team alone was probably bigger than this game's entire development team, yet this game's UI can take a curly shit all over Cyberpunk's terrible UI, from a 50m cliff and then force it down Cyberpunk's throat. Half the difficulty of playing Cyberpunk is fighting with the terrible UI design. Good job.

Sounds good but is there melee combat

 

[mediocrepoet]

I love how they have the Dead Space locator thingy, that was always a neat idea in a game where most environments look similar to each other. It seem like a fun game so far. I also installed it on Xbox Series S like the guy above, but I can't aim for shit with a controller, so I'll just download it on game pass for PC. Hopefully there won't be performance problems.

And the most important thing: Cyberpunk's UI team alone was probably bigger than this game's entire development team, yet this game's UI can take a curly shit all over Cyberpunk's terrible UI, from a 50m cliff and then force it down Cyberpunk's throat. Half the difficulty of playing Cyberpunk is fighting with the terrible UI design. Good job.

Sounds good but is there melee combat

I think it's mostly guns, but you can get some* melee cyber augmentation things that give you a melee attack. It's not a main attack though, it's more like a special that you have to use your power points for.

* At least one.

Spoiler

So in the introductory section, you can find this power fist thing that gives you a strong punch that can knock back or kill enemies, but it uses the special energy meter that regenerates over time.

 

[Sad He-Man]

https://www.gamespot.com/reviews/the-ascent-review-wretched-hive-of-scum-and-villainy/1900-6417706/

6 out of 10 cuz muh feelz got hurt. LMAO! It reads like a Babylon Bee / The Onion article but it is real. These SanFran faggot game journos literally are now living in a self-projected reality distortion field that is a wholly different experience than what the rest of us live in. Ridiculous...

Main negative of the game: "Tone is extremely, unnecessarily hostile and dour'

Cyberpunk. Which was always rainbows and fucking unicorns along with Warhammer 40k, innit?

Can't wait for the SJW edition of WH40k: "In the grim darkness of the 41st millennium, there is only friendship."

"Cherish the Xeno and love in the name of the Emperor of all Personkind!"

It's going to be brilliant, D1P.

In the Noble Brightness of the 41st millennium, there is only HIGH ADVENTURE!

 

[Yosharian]

"Tone is extremely, unnecessarily hostile and dour"

Dude has an Akira avatar

Cos that movie isn't hostile, bleak, dour no no no

Poser detected 100%

 

[ferratilis]

Some schmuck from Gamespot gave Sponge Bob Battle for Bikini Bottom 2/10 because he literally didn't know how to play the game. Imagine what a dumbfuck you have to be to fail at controlling the character in a 3d platformer and then scoring the game so low. Their opinions are irrelevant. The only reviewers worth following on yt are ACG (afaik the only guy who refused to review Cyberpunk on release), or Mack just to have a few laughs. And Codex for RPGs. That's it, it's grim out there.

 

[Rieser]

https://www.gamespot.com/reviews/the-ascent-review-wretched-hive-of-scum-and-villainy/1900-6417706/

6 out of 10 cuz muh feelz got hurt. LMAO! It reads like a Babylon Bee / The Onion article but it is real. These SanFran faggot game journos literally are now living in a self-projected reality distortion field that is a wholly different experience than what the rest of us live in. Ridiculous...

Main negative of the game: "Tone is extremely, unnecessarily hostile and dour'

Cyberpunk. Which was always rainbows and fucking unicorns along with Warhammer 40k, innit?

If a game journo whines about a game being "difficult" and "bleak" it is nearly always an endorsement.

 

[Daedalos]

Looks cool, but is it fun? Not boring and repetitive?

Whats the goals like? story? writing? if theres barely any RPG elements, then whats to set this apart from other games in the genre other than pretty graphics?

I might get it at a discount

 

[mediocrepoet]

If a game journo whines about a game being "difficult" and "bleak" it is nearly always an endorsement.

If a game journo whines about a game being "difficult" and "bleak" it nearly always means it isn't a screen saver. FTFY

 

[Junmarko]

 

[Ivan]

Looks cool, but is it fun? Not boring and repetitive?

Whats the goals like? story? writing? if theres barely any RPG elements, then whats to set this apart from other games in the genre other than pretty graphics?

I might get it at a discount

nephew has gamepass on console, so I get to check in on any PC titles. It is quite repetitive. My biggest complaint is that it's not structured by levels. You have to travel through an overworld to accomplish missions. I would have much preferred a nu-Shadowrun approach. Return to HQ to upgrade/sell guns, deploy to mission areas. Exploration is encouraged, but often you'll get one shotted and forced to reload if you overstep your bounds into areas you aren't meant to be in, which you won't know until it's too late.

Gameplay design gripes aside, aesthetics are fantastic. Sound is great, animations are awesome, visual effects are impressive, and the music is well done and conducive to high octane action.

 

[Infinitron]

https://www.gamebanshee.com/news/125326-the-ascent-released-reviews.html

IGN 7/10:

The Ascent’s satisfying gun-tastic action-RPG gameplay loop mixes with its beautiful cyberpunk aesthetic to create an overall enjoyable experience. Neither its story nor its characters are all that memorable, and its enemy encounters can stumble toward the end, but its gunplay and ultra-violence in a neon-soaked world combine to craft a co-op-friendly game you don’t see every day.

PC Gamer 84/100:

But whenever The Ascent does something to disappoint me, the world always wins me back. From the lavish Golden Satori casino to the bleak, dilapidated Black Lake slums, this is a masterclass in creating a sense of place and establishing an atmosphere. Just be aware that, even though the screenshots might make it look like it's a CRPG similar to something like Shadowrun, it's a fast-paced, challenging, almost arcade-like shooter above all. A city this well-realised perhaps deserves more than that, and I'd love future games to expand on the role-playing aspect. But I can still enjoy The Ascent for what it is: a superb action RPG elevated by an exceptional setting.

Game Informer 7.25/10:

The Ascent has issues, but those issues don’t detract from my overall enjoyment of the game. I won’t write my thesis on its commentary on capitalism, but I’ll fondly remember my co-op sessions where I tore through this cyberpunk world. That being said, the shallow RPG elements, lack of meaningful narrative, and exploration frustration were constants that really dragged the experience down. Neon Giant has made a solid foundation to build on, and I hope we can see future installments grow into something truly worthy of ascension.

Eurogamer Scoreless:

The more you play, conquering the arcology's upper tiers and toppling its kingpins, the less enthralling this marvelous city becomes. Quests drag you back and forth between far-flung NPCs, your journey interrupted every few seconds by hoodlums arbitrarily defending bits of floor. There's fast travel in the shape of free metro stations and airborne taxis that can be summoned for a negligible fee, but you can only use the central elevators to travel between arcology tiers, which creates more legwork and more opportunities for boring fights. Worst of all, there's no fast travelling from the maintenance districts, docks, plants and factories that account for a majority of dungeons, so if you reach a boss you're under-levelled for and need to juice up your gear, you'll need to trek all the way back to the hub.

PC Invasion 8.5/10:

The Ascent is for the most part a polished experience that's tons of fun to play and behold. The narrative will carry you along to many interesting places with different baddies to fry, though a few encounters feature enemies that are pure bullet sponges. You will need to pick the right equipment and keep up with leveling, but these issues can be overcome. Hardware requirements shouldn't hold you back too much, and glitches are few and far between. The overall quality makes this one a must play for cyberpunk and isometric shooter fans.

God is a Geek 7/10:

Ultimately, then, The Ascent really is a bit of a mixed bag. On one side it’s gorgeous in places, the combat is excellent when it works, the story is passable if not thrilling. On the other side it’s marred by difficulty spikes and take-it-or-leave-it character progression. There’s a sense that Neon Giant are very proud of their world – and they should be. But the gameplay needs more polish and the world needs to be streamlined just a little. There’s no doubt people will have fun despite my complaints, but with a bit more time The Ascent could have been something special.

COGconnected 92/100:

Setting aside it coming from such a small team, I think The Ascent is miraculous in a couple of ways. First, the detailed world-building, environmental storytelling, and atmosphere are maybe the best expression of the cyberpunk aesthetic I’ve ever seen in a game. Second, the developers have seemingly cataloged every annoying mechanic in RPGs and action games — from death to rapid travel to inventory management — and found a way to make them less onerous or disappear altogether. The Ascent is not an easy game, either mechanically or thematically, but it is completely engaging if for no other reason than to see into a very convincingly realized future.

 

[dragonul09]

It seems that the gamepass version is missing dlss, day one patch and diffculty options.

Kinda feel bad paying that 1 dollar for 3 months right now.

 

[ferratilis]

Game Pass for PC is a complete travesty that everyone should avoid if possible, even though it's completely fine on console. The problem is not only how it handles encryption, but the fact that you sometimes have to redownload games a few times for them to work. I recently wanted to check out Solasta, and two installs failed. Only after a third attempt it installed successfully. Some people have this kind of problem, but when they redownload a game, it takes double or triple the space it should. The only way to regain that lost space is to reinstall Windows, because of how fucked up the file system is. THE worst game launcher on PC, by far. Epic Store seems amazing in comparison.

 

[Siveon]

Looks cool, but is it fun? Not boring and repetitive?

Whats the goals like? story? writing? if theres barely any RPG elements, then whats to set this apart from other games in the genre other than pretty graphics?

I might get it at a discount

Don't give my opinion much merit, I have only played like, the tutorial? But it's not much of a looting game and it's definitely not much of an RPG

So it's mostly a top down shooter with some good polish, and decent story. The voice acting is also pretty damn good. But it was kind of boring when I played it lol, you get two guns in a loadout, you get a dodge roll, two active skills and a deployable. Not many options at once, and usually you don't fight more than 15 enemies or so? Not my cup of tea, I prefer something more hectic.

 

[Tyranicon]

Looks cool, but is it fun? Not boring and repetitive?

Whats the goals like? story? writing? if theres barely any RPG elements, then whats to set this apart from other games in the genre other than pretty graphics?

I might get it at a discount

Don't give my opinion much merit, I have only played like, the tutorial? But it's not much of a looting game and it's definitely not much of an RPG

So it's mostly a top down shooter with some good polish, and decent story. The voice acting is also pretty damn good. But it was kind of boring when I played it lol, you get two guns in a loadout, you get a dodge roll, two active skills and a deployable. Not many options at once, and usually you don't fight more than 15 enemies or so? Not my cup of tea, I prefer something more hectic.

The fact that they'll call anything a RPG these days has me wary, but I like the atmosphere a lot. Might have to give this a try.

 

[Miner 2049er]

Around 10 hours in. It's such a joy to traverse this highly detailed sci-fi world. For hours I didn't follow any quest. I just let myself drift and take in the scenery. It's that stunning. RPG elements could be deeper, but I'd rate them sufficient. They're definitly more impactful than the ones in the tech demo of that other game in the same setting.

The two gripes I'm having are frequent 1 second long freezes (so waiting for some updates is advisable) and where in the diverse land of the rainbow are the hot space chicks ?
I almost exclusively play turn based-games. Point me towards a real time game with combat as satisfying as, say Jagged Alliance, Silent Storm or TOEE. But once in a while I play an action game to value turn based goodness and The Ascent is the right game at the right time for me.

 

[Smerlus]

I was able to dl the game on Xb fine. The PC version errored out twice and then 8 hours into downloading it was at 17%.

Fuck this.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Point me towards a real time game with combat as satisfying as, say Jagged Alliance, Silent Storm or TOEE

7,62 High Calibre