Vane Review

"Bird People"

Campaign

What a seriously odd game, I'm usually all for the more interpretative narrative driven experiences yet I can't even fathom an idea of what happened in this. To start, this is an exploration focused game where you start playing as a bird, to then transform into a person. This mechanic is interesting, but rarely deployed as the entire game is rather short. If you're knowing where to go this can easily be well under two hours of time, otherwise there's some wandering at the start.

From there, it largely becomes linear despite having some larger areas to explore. There's no real challenge here which is fine for the type of game it is, but there wasn't much of a story to grasp. You're witnessing some sort of ascension and then it goes strange for what could possibly be a more interesting continued story. I won't discuss that more as it's spoilerish and I believe some that dive deeper may find additional meaning, but I was done with this once it "concluded".

Gameplay

This game is focused mostly on flying, then puzzle solving as a kid. It brings vast landscapes that look actually quite good. They're geometry based which gives it a unique look, with very distinct structures. They created a really great atmosphere throughout with almost spooky elements across the tale. It just never dives into any sort of lore, or gives enough intrigue to capture my attention. I was asking what was going on, instead of wondering about where this was headed as it progressed. I should feel a level of intrigue as I play that keeps me pushing towards a conclusion, instead I was perplexed by the events I was witnessing.

I came across a number of bugs, including one that made me restart a segment of the game from the beginning. There were pockets of graphical problems, performance issues and generally just smaller errors I came across that made this seem as though it lacked polish. A shame, as they really do have a very cool looking world to explore. I also generally hated some of the interaction portions as that bird would just sometimes not nest on items.

The Conclusion

Vane comes across as an interesting concept, yet a light one that lacks polish. You have to keep in mind that I played this after a pre-launch update that was supposed to fix problems. There are many that still exist obviously and that might not be good for some that like this lighter, narrative driven type of experience. I enjoyed this, or at least the idea of it and mostly wanted something else.

Else being some point of reference for what this world was, what I was doing and just the point of it. There might be another thing hidden further along and I'm interested in hearing about the dedicated players that explore past conclusion. Again, trying not to spoil anything but that there might be an additional element to this. This isn't difficult, more of a meander at the start to then walk casually through linear puzzle segments.

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Vane Review on Playstation 4
Review Code Provided by Plan of Attack

Rating Overall: 4.0