- [Destin] God Eater 3 is one of those cases
where stellar gameplay thankfully makes up
for a boring story with bad writing.
You might have to dig through combo menus
to figure out how to do some of the coolest moves
and learn to live with some between-battle inconveniences,
but once you get the hang of it,
there's nothing else like it.
Sure, you can just button-mash
and get through most battles okay,
but understanding the intricacies and nuances
of the combat is where the real thrill is at.
Structurally, God Eater 3 is a lot like Monster Hunter,
in the best way possible.
You embark alone, with friends, or with NPC allies
on missions to track down giant, dangerous beasts
and kill them with oversized, ridiculous weapons.
Then you do that over and over again
across a small variety of maps,
as you make better gear
and incrementally increase your power.
But it's also a more streamlined experience,
with faster combat,
less focus on the sometimes tedious tracking, hunting,
and trapping from its rival series.
God Eater 3 marks a big shift for the franchise,
as the first game in the series designed for PC and consoles
rather than the PSP or Vita.
In it, you take on the role of a powerful human
with the ability to fuse parts of your body
with the Aragami, the monstrous beasts
that plague the post-apocalyptic world,
to wield massive and badass weapons called the God-Arcs.
Having an in-game explanation
for why the weaponry looks so ludicrous is clever,
especially since these hybrid weapons are the only things
that can kill Aragami.
- [Character] I'm ready to go whenever.
- [Reviewer] Everything in God Eater 3
just feels better than its predecessors,
thanks to some small but significant additions.
The new dive attack lets you zoom through the air
or across the ground to close distance on enemies
after getting knocked back,
which helps keep the already frantic combat moving
at a rapid pace.
God Eater 3 also introduces powerful new abilities
called Burst Arts, which are similar to Blood Arts
from God Eater 2: Rage Burst.
Charging up and using your Burst Arts
and staying in Burst Mode is where a huge chunk of the fun
and challenge comes from.
To enter Burst Mode, you must first devour an Aragami,
which is a move that literally has your weapon open up
a bloody mouth and take a bite out of the monster itself,
charging your Burst meter.
The animation is gory and satisfying.
There are two new melee weapon types
and a new ranged weapon type in God Eater 3 also.
Biting Edge is a pair of giant daggers
that are extremely fast and full of flair,
while the flashy and versatile Crescent Moon,
which became a favorite of mine,
is a large, circular blade that can also morph into an ax.
The new Ray ranged weapon is a bit odd
in that you toggle it on as a constantly pulsing laser,
rather than firing individual shots,
which lacks the punch of the other guns.
The new eight-player assault missions
are similarly underwhelming,
since the restricted time limit feels too short,
and it doesn't end up feeling like the large, exciting raid
it's trying to be.
Missions are split up into ranks, like in Monster Hunter,
to denote difficulty and quality of crafting materials
you can find.
In the tougher missions, you'll also have to contend
with superpowered Ash Aragami, who, just like you,
can use Devour attacks and take a bite
and charge up into a powerful Burst Mode
that can one-hit kill you.
Monster designs are fantastic across the board.
They aren't constrained to looking like actual animals,
and the diversity and creativity is refreshing
as a result.
You can get through the main story missions
in about 25 hours all told,
and the real meat lies in repeatable missions,
quick assaults, and side missions after that.
Unfortunately, long load screens and a melodramatic plot
make getting there a bit of a slog.
- We'd be risking our lives.
You can offer us appropriate compensation?
- [Reviewer] None of the characters come across as genuine
because of their overly-eager voice acting
reading poorly-written dialogue.
The issue is belabored even further in between missions
because you're forced to scour the entire base
to find NPCs with chat bubbles over their heads
waiting to talk to you.
- [Character] Go for it!
- [Reviewer] What God Eater 3 lacks in its story and content
it more than makes up for with great enemy designs
and some of the most exciting combat
the genre has seen to date.
In between those battles are a lot of dull
and mandatory NPC interactions, load screens, and menus.
But it's a relief to see the series
has made a mostly successful jump from handhelds
to consoles and PC.
For more on big-group style monster slaying,
watch our review of Monster Hunter World,
and for everything else, stay tuned to IGN.
- [Character] Hi! Yo-ho!