Games from the Backlog: The Order 1886

The Order 1886

Earlier this year The Order 1886 released a PlayStation4 exclusive. We passed on it then, but we’re looking into it now. Here are our findings. During our busy schedule of enjoying Assassin’s Creed Syndicate and Metal Gear Solid we found just enough time to cross this one off our backlog in time for Fallout 4. Life as a gamer sure is tough nowadays.

In sharp contrast to February this year, the expectations going into this game were pretty low. Overall the reviews were mediocre at best. Receiving a metascore 63 on metacritic. So with that in mind, we decided to go to London in the year 1886. The first scenes show us exactly how beautiful The Order 1886 really is. Without spoiling any of it, we are treated with an awesome introduction. Sure, we have no idea why the things we’re seeing are happening, but it looks amazing and sets the tone very well.

After the prologue you walk up onto a balcony. A nice view over 19th century London places us right in the mood. The way they show us the M2 Falchion Auto-Rifle, where we can turn it around to have a proper look at it, is a nice way to show of the incredible amount of detail put into this world. The short walk through a building and across the streets, combined with the great voicework are setting us up for a lot more then we expected. The world looks vibrant, alive and worth saving. The music adds further to the total feel of the game and we’re stoked to start the real meat of the game.

The real meat; not too meaty..

We say the real meat of the game, but we remember very well the complaint that the game was short. After about 6-8 hours, depending on difficulty and skill, you should be seeing the ending. Usually we would account the ‘sandbox happy’ factor into the estimated playtime. However even though these type of games are ment to be lineair and we in fact prefer them like that, The Order 1886 takes it somewhat into the extreme. They do try to get you off the beaten path by placing some objects for you to interact with, but they are hardly worth looking into as they are mostly boring and add little to nothing to the overall narrative.

The Order Sackboy

A pretty vital part of games like this is the shooting. Overall it feels pretty solid though very predictable. When you walk into a room with infamous ‘chest high walls’ your first though was to hide because there will be enemies. (and we were never wrong.) Knowing enemies will show up because the environment shows you this is a missed opportunity in a game this rich with details and atmosphere.

The verdict; We highly recommend The Order 1886!

With all this negative aspects you would almost expect a negative experience. But that is just the thing. Wether it’s the breath of fresh air after the big sandboxy releases of the past few months, the fact we were actually looking forward to a short, story driven adventure or something else entirely, we loved playing through it. If you have a chance to borrow it from a friend or are able to buy it for below €30,- we would definitely recommend it. All in all we loved being engulfed into the lore of The Order 1886 and are looking forward to Ready at Dawn announcing The Order 1887… just don’t call it The Order 1887.

 

Björn Jekel
Founder and Editor in Chief of PressQuit and the voice on our Twitter Feed. Interested in many things 'nerd' and above all madly in love with videogames of a wide variety. A year without Zelda and Final Fantasy is a sad year indeed and that is why it is my lifelong goal to yearly replay Ocarina of Time and Final Fantasy VII.
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