The Technomancer, Spiders, XBox One/PC £34.99, PS4 £39.99, Website
Currently on Sale on Steam for £29.74
The Technomancer is an action RPG, set a couple of hundred years after the colonization of Mars. You play a rookie Technomancer called Zachariah, newly initiated member of a society of mage-warriors on the Red Planet, skilled in combat and with powers to generate electricity that can empower weapons or fire a full on blast at the enemy.
The character has access to three styles of combat, quarterstaff, mace and shield or rogue-like hand weapon and gun and you can switch between styles mid-fight or specialise in one as you advance. The feeling is that you need a different style for fighting different enemies but I found the heavy hitting quarterstaff to be fairly effective against everything.
The game also has a system to bring along a team with you, each have their own skills to compliment your own.
The storyline is interesting and refreshing to see in a science fiction game, something we haven't seen since the Mass Effect series (which this game reminded me of)
On the downside, the graphics are a little clunky and somewhat dated. You tend to look over this mid combat but it's very obvious as you run about the world. I also found the cities to be confusing and with no way to view the map while you run, there's a lot of switching between map and the main screen to figure where to go, something that has been overcome in other games using minimaps or overlays.
In the early game there is an awesome and fiendishly tough bossfight with a giant spider and this bodes well for boss fights later in the game. 20+ hours in and I still feel like I haven't scratched the surface, I look forward to playing through the whole story to how it plays out
Overall though, The Technomancer is a fun game and definitely worth a playthrough, if only while you wait for the next Mass Effect to come out.
This review appeared in a more truncated form on the British Fantasy Society website
