Biomutant - Preview, all the latest news on THQ Nordic RPG

It has now been more than a year since our last contact with Biomutant during the Gamescom 2018, from that day the title THQ Nordic disappeared from the radar of us players, but reappeared in recent days with a full-bodied 10-minute film. Last year, however, always during the German event, we had the opportunity to speak with some developers who confessed that, although the release date was still far away, they were finally starting to see a light at the end of the tunnel. Evidently there was some stumbling block, but what it was showing renews our confidence in the product that we can't wait to try again before the final review.

Biomutant has all the credentials to be a game able to have its say in the market: deep, rich and totally out of your mind, a role-playing game with a fluid and dynamic action system, all accompanied by a really well-characterized artistic sector.

General review

As is now known, Biomutant will give you the opportunity to create your avatar: a mutant raccoon freely customizable in every aspect, being able to access as many as six different races. The choice of these parameters will have repercussions on the statistics, which will naturally affect the game system itself: if you want a big and strong protagonist the speed will be reduced, but if you bet everything on the latter, your body will necessarily be smaller. These are just two examples, but the game will feature a huge range of choices.

What has just been said therefore gives life to a system of classes that also define the initial equipment of your protagonist, but that's not all: progressing in the adventure you can use and unlock any type of weapon, without exception. The arsenal will be rich and vast and, moreover, you can combine the various pieces together to create unique blades and guns, through a crafting system that should allow a very high number of combinations. The creation of objects is also encouraged thanks to the collection of raw materials, which you will find very naturally during the exploration phases.

In a post-apocalyptic world where man is hardly even a memory anymore, he stands sovereign on the planet The tree of Life, a plant that spreads across the entire globe and supports the stability of the planet. Its five main roots extend to as many different biomes, already suggesting that the team is working on a complex and cohesive open world. This tree is causing problems, however, and the player will have to go to the basics of these five roots to discover and stop anything that endangers the life of the planet. However, the developers have revealed that the decision to save or destroy the pieces of the Tree of Life will be up to you: this choice will obviously have repercussions not only on the end of the game but also on the continuation of the adventure.

THQ Nordic is aiming a lot to offer not only a long-lasting experience, but also rich in content, able to increase its number of hours through stories and side missions. The latter will allow you to obtain unique objects or abilities, which are perfectly implemented with the entire action system of the title. In addition there will also be the powers, which in addition to playing an important role during the battle will also give you the opportunity to access otherwise blocked areas.

The focus of the movie

The above is simply what we knew before the movie was released, but now it's time to talk about the really interesting things. As mentioned above, this Tree of Life has five gigantic roots as its basis: at the foot of them we will find some bosses that the game calls World Eater, special creatures that also differ greatly from bosses base. Precisely against these mammoth beings, we were able to notice how the fights provide not only a well-characterized arena, but that everything is accompanied by the use of very special vehicles. These phases, in addition to representing a change of gear throughout history, they should also highlight a prominent level design which we hope will be exploited in the correct way, so as to be able to give the player various freedoms to interpret the clash. The video does not seem to exclude the presence of cities and people at the head of them, with whom we can build peaceful relations or rivalries. We do not yet know if this will bring benefits or not, but we are curious to find out how the system will be deepened over the course of history.

The Biomutant trailer, in addition to what has just been said, highlights all its freshness in the combat system, offering moments of madness and unusual combinations, as if the only limit is the player's own imagination. Seeing the different elements that make up this aspect coexist in a cohesive way is certainly not a detail to be taken lightly. Another prominent element is the artistic sector, which makes areas as beautiful as they are magnetic. There are views that literally leave you breathless, and seeing the landscape react to the elements fills us with joy. It is fascinating to see how the grass moves with the wind, or how the rains leave puddles on the ground. Furthermore, the large size of the map is compensated for by the movements that seem really fast and effective: the player will have plenty of means to move around, from a two-winged balloon to glide from great heights, the possibilities are many and all to be discovered.

In conclusion we can say that Biomutant is worth keeping an eye on, especially after the latest information released. The THQ Nordic game continues to raise the bar of expectations, so we believe it is right that they have not revealed the release date, especially if some expectations of the production need further refinement. The development team is trying to create a dynamic open world, which can give the player different activities and game situations, all seasoned with a truly original artistic sector.