Enslaved: Free at Last

It's been a while since i did a dedicated post to the actual gameplay of Enslaved. I have to say, now that i've finished the game, i think that was a mistake. The second half of this game was infinitely more enjoyable than the first. So much so that i have to question the producer's reason behind delaying the good stuff so long.

Picking up where i left off, the game's turning point comes when Trip and Monkey finally reach Trip's settlement only to find it's been cleared out by mechs. Trip's Dad is dead and now the note of the game's story changes significantly. No longer are we on a quest to safety, now we're on a quest for revenge.

Artist's Recreation of E-Cards in Enslaved.

The game seems to focus in at this point. Trip's rage definitely feels like a better impetus for our adventure than the ambiguous escape to safety from, well, the generic evil behind the state of the world. This was also the part in the game where i spent a ton of points on upgrades. Evade, Stun, Counter and Charge all made the combat with Mechs more interesting and Monkey more badass. Boosting the abilities of the plasma cannon on Monkey's staff also made the game a bit more like a run and gunner. This all came together to solve most of the gameplay issues for me.

"Blam! Blar blar blar! Boom! Pshhhhhhhh!!!" -Michael Bay

Around this time, we also get introduced to Pigsy. There's an oddball of a character if i've ever seen one. His half man, half pigbot style is ultimately meaningless since they don't give him much in the way of backstory. i'm wondering if his being so piglike is a reference to the original text. What's most important is his fondness for Trip and his jealousy of Monkey which winds up tossing a few unnecessary hurdles in front of you. Still, he enables you to continue on towards the source of the mechs power and, as a device, he helps flesh out the story more than the back and forth between Monkey and Trip would allow. When he goes all Harry Stamper on Monkey and Trip at the end, i was sad that i wasn't sadder, if that makes sense.

What follows is a handful of levels that all seem to blend together because you progress through them so much quicker than the previous half of the game. Enslaved never loses its linearity in level design or the contained nature of its approach to traversing the environment but it does add in quite a bit of action with big mech brawls and stepped-up puzzles to keep things interesting. Mostly, it works. I was eager for any opportunity to test my mettle against bigger bunches of mechs. And the puzzles, though a bit on the easy side, also weren't the frustrating back and forths that you occasionally encounter in the Zelda series but were often unchallenging. This was the case more than i would have liked. One real headscratcher in there would have gone a long way towards making the game better.

I sandwiched the final three chapters into a single session, not a huge feat since they were quick and chapter 15 was just an epilogue without gameplay. The final boss battle was....fine. Gigantic mechs, heartstring tugging, lots of explosions and combat, pretty much exactly what you'd expect with little to catch you off guard. It was actually sort of reminiscent of battling the Scorpions (were those scorpions too?) in Halo 3. Then again, Halo's megamech battle happens 1/3 of the way through the game which sort of puts Enslaved in its place in the scheme of 360 games. What's a final boss for Enslaved was a high point of Act One in Halo 3.

Monkey: Hover Hand Extraordinaire

It's the lead up to the final battle and the moments afterwards in the epilogue that really have the most poignancy. I'm specifically referring to the conversation between Trip and Monkey, where Trip disables the tiara that's given her control over Monkey all this time. Trip understands that what she did is wrong and says so but Monkey tells her to turn it back on. Monkey chooses to continue being enslaved and we're left to assume it's not because of the benefits of being tied to Trip via tiara (i immediately thought, "you can't turn off the tiara now! how will you communicate?!) but because of a choice to remain tied to her. How deeply are we to read into this? You could extract the metaphor of a relationship between a man and a women being a sort of enslavement. That even the healthiest of non-platonic relationships is predicated on some sort of dependency. But that might be giving too much credit to the writers. Then again, the idea that love is bondage isn't exactly new and maybe that's why the original story or Journey to the West is considered so important and regarded so highly. I wonder how deeply this theme is explored in the original 16th century story.

Finally, the Epilogue takes an entirely different stance on the idea of Enslavement. Though Monkey does end up looking like he may understand the reasoning of the man behind the curtain (a creepy piece of imagery that will stick with me long after i forget the rest of this game), Trip holds fast and keeps the righteousness of her revenge in the forefront. On Trip's personal level, it's about revenge...but the repercussions are bigger for those left in this world. Again, this is an older philosophical question, posed often in the classics and in pop culture, from Plato to The Matrix; Is the harsh light of reality better than the comfort of the darkness of the cave? Trip makes the choice without seeing both sides. Just like a woman...

...and what a woman! 

Ultimately, the story was executed well enough, the gameplay redeemed itself somewhat, the graphics continued to impress and so did the voice acting. But i can 100% understand why this game didn't make any kind of splash when it came out. In retrospect, it might be underrated but only slightly and only because it was universally crapped on.

Funny enough, my biggest frustration with the game was actually Andy Serkis' role. What was once a highlight going into this ended up being COMPLETELY squandered. The dude behind Gollum shows up in every single level of this game and he's meaningless. It could have been anyone, it certainly didn't have to be a jarring live-action version and it didn't even have to be Serkis who is only kind of recognizable as an actor (given his best film performances are largely mo-capped).

So here i am on the other side, not much better off for the experience but not entirely disappointed by it either. If nothing else, i'm now interested in reading the original text of Journey to the West and infinitely more intrigued by Stephen Chow's new movie by the same name (Seeing that March 3rd. Yeah!).

(aaaand Pigsy is starting to make more sense.)

Most importantly, i'm ready for a new game that's just, through and through, fantastic. No sleeper hit, no critic's choice or cult classic. I want a fucking blockbuster, unanimously beloved game that somehow slipped by. And don't say "The Last of Us" because i will (to borrow a phrase from Wallaby) "shit in your cereal" if you do.

Thoughts? (on the next game, not pooping in your cereal.)

-joker