Passive

Explore the 'Passive' guide for Eternal Strands. Learn about the game's mechanics, combat, crafting, and giant monster fights, comparing it to Monster Hunter and Shadow of the Colossus.

This section of the Eternal Strands guide focuses on the 'Passive' aspects of the game, as reviewed by Yahtzee Croshaw. It delves into the game's mechanics, combat, crafting, and boss encounters, offering comparisons to other popular titles.

Gameplay Mechanics: Eternal Strands is described as a gear grinder with extraction elements. Players mount expeditions from a base camp to open-ended areas, fighting monsters, gathering crafting materials, and pursuing story objectives. The game features a crafting system where recipes are unspecific, allowing for substitution of materials while maintaining functional results with different stats. This allows players to focus on exploration and material gathering without excessive grinding for specific components.

Combat: Standard combat involves fighting enemies like wolves, wasps, and robots, with an elemental damage system allowing for freezing and burning. However, the review notes that enemies can become less varied when encased in ice. The combat is contrasted with the giant monster fights, which are compared to the 'crawl around a big bastard's armpits' style of Shadow of the Colossus, but on a smaller, more manageable scale, akin to a 'six-piece McNugget box' compared to the latter's elaborate meals.

Giant Monster Fights: These encounters are highlighted as a key interesting aspect. Players learn new spells by defeating them once and then upgrade these spells by defeating them again in specific ways. This mechanic is likened to Monster Hunter, but in a more accessible, 'theme park version' where players can engage in large-scale fights without the extensive commitment of tracking and prolonged battles.

Overall Impression: The game is recognized as a debut title from its studio, evident in its generic art style and the combination of gameplay elements borrowed from classic games. Despite this, the unique combination of mechanics makes it worth exploring, particularly in the first half where exploration and discovery are prominent. The latter half of the game sees story quests becoming more repetitive. Eternal Strands is considered a solid starting point, demonstrating the developers' understanding of core principles, much like Picasso's early realistic works before his more experimental phase.