I Am Alive - IGC Review

[Remilia Scarlet]

SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST

There's something to be said about a company that tries to differentiate itself in a genre. Oftentimes, it works, and other times it doesn't. Unfortunately for Ubisoft, it didn't work with I Am Alive. While the game does take a novel approach to the survival genre, foregoing the safe area of horror for a more gritty, realistic approach, the game's shortcomings just take away too much of the enjoyment. Let's dive into the muck.

Visuals

The game is not all that impressive graphically, being only 1954 MB, however, to its credit, it does look nice. The draw distance is not very far, but aesthetically, the game is pleasing to look at, utilizing a muted color pallet consisting of grey, brown, black and a few other colors. It works, and certainly gets the message across that something is not right. Unfortunately, this also works against the game, as navigating dark areas becomes a chore given the color scheme of the game.

While the game will not push your system to its limit, it is nice to look at.

I did notice blurry textures here and there, mostly on tarps and awnings, but you have to get very close to notice it. The protagonist is nicely modeled, if a little cliche in his design. Small details such cuts and scrapes on his body help with immersion.

I couldn't help but feel that the perpetual glare and haze in the game was unnecessary, and it made navigation outside a pain, due to constantly getting in my field of vision and blinding me, even when the game was set to 50% brightness.

Story

There isn't much story here. An earthquake ravaged the city, and now it's inhabitants have degenerated into maniacs. The protagonist's wife and child are missing and he is on a mission to find them. Along the way, you encounter a young girl named Mei, and suddenly you are tasked with protecting her. Simple and straight to the point. This is not an Emmy winning plot by any means, but I guess it gives players a reason to keep going. You will also find various victims of the savages and quake scattered throughout the city, and have the option of helping them. Doing so earns you a Retry token (more on that later) and a trophy for helping all of them. I guess you could consider them like side quests. They're boring though, and just feel like a cheap way to extend the length of the game.

Don't worry, little girl. I don't have a white van because it was destroyed. Too soon?

Eventually, the protagonist and Mei meet up with other survivors and they form a plan to escape the city, The latter half of the game is taken straight from George Romero's Dawn of the Dead. However, unlike that film, the ending here leaves one feeling empty with a "that's it?" look on your face. There is no conclusion, no resolution, nothing. It just ends, and it is one of the most unsatisfying endings I have seen in a long time.

Gameplay

The gameplay for I Am Alive is a very mixed bag for me. On the one hand, the controls are responsive. On the other hand, they suck badly. Controlling the protagonist is like trying to drive on ice without chains. It's slippery and nearly impossible to have full control. Moving the character feels like walking through thick tar when walking and running on ice when sprinting. Climbing is like trying to give instructions to a child with ADHD - he won't do what you tell him. Try to go left, he attempts to go down. Try to turn a corner and he attempts to go back the way he came. Considering that Ubisoft had refined Assassin's Creed's climbing controls to near perfection by the time this game released, I was thunderstruck by how horrible the parkour was here. Climbing uses up stamina, indicated by the white bar on the left. Once the stamina is depleted, you have to press R1 repeatedly to continue climbing. Doing so further depletes the maximum gauge, limiting how much stamina can be be restored. While pressing R1, a white circle outline will gravitate to the center of the screen. When it reaches the center and turns red, the player will fall.

While this is admittedly a novel idea, it becomes tiresome very quickly. There is so much climbing in this game that takes forever to complete, and constantly running out of stamina turns what should be a fun aspect into a chore.

I said go left, not right!

Combat is a mess. The player character takes far too much damage for combat to feel remotely fair, and oftentimes you never have any or very little ammo. When using a gun, the game switches to FPS mode, which allows you to aim and dole out some damage. However, aiming a gun at anyone with a gun of their own is basically a death sentence as they'll shoot you dead before you can pull the trigger. Players can aim at hostiles that don't have a gun to intimidate them and make them back down, which then opens them up for a knock out strike. When using the machete, you can enter a struggle, but this leaves you vulnerable to attack from other enemies, so I can't recommend doing this. When sneaking, you can do a surprise attack, which yields an instant kill. The bow allows you to attack from afar, but with enemies constantly moving, aiming is a pain.

If you die in combat, you have 3 Retries, which allows you to restart at a previous checkpoint. By completing the victim side quests, you get an extra Retry, and they can also be found in the world. upon using all your available Retries, you must start the episode again from the beginning. Use them sparingly.

The inventory is accessed by pressing L2 or Select. It is divided into 4 segments - the top segment shows all your collected items, the middle shows the details of the selected item, the bottom left shows weapons, and the bottom right shows equipment. You can hold a maximum of 16 items, 4 weapons and 4 pieces of equipment.

The one refined area of the game in all its glory.

By pressing R1 on the inventory screen or Triangle during the game, you access the map screen. As there is no objective marker, you will constantly be coming back to this screen to make sure you are on the right path. The map periodically updates as you explore the city. These appear as red scribbles on the map indicating blocked areas or holes in the ground. Each street is named, which doesn't really help, to be honest, as the text ends up obscuring the (far too small) player indicator.

This being a survival game, resources, of course, are limited. However, playing on normal mode, I found a total of 2 bullets, 1 medkit, and 2 painkillers in 2 hours of playing. The resources are so scarce in this game it makes impossible mode on Dead Space look like easy mode. It was frustrating and just irrational that for all the exploring I did that I found a total of 5 resources. And I heard that they're even scarcer in Survivor mode! I get it, this is a survival game. Resources are supposed to be hard to find, but this is flat out unfair and puts the player at a disadvantage far too great to be overcome by skill alone.

The level design is confusing and difficult to navigate. I get what the developers were trying to do here, but there is a right way to portray disaster, and there is a wrong way. I Am Alive went the wrong way. As stated before, there is no objective marker until you actually reach your destination, and given how open this game is, you are often left wandering around aimlessly trying to find your way through the ruins of the city. This breaks immersion horribly.

Audio

The audio is one of the few things Ubisoft got right with this game. The music is foreboding, and fits the atmosphere great, changing appropriately with the situation. Voice acting is top notch from all the characters, and the sound effects are satisfying to hear. When low on health, the sound will become muffled, which is strange, but I digress.

Final Verdict - 5/10 - Mediocre

Despite having a lot of novel ideas to differentiate itself from other survival games, I Am Alive just has too many shortcomings holding it back from being a fun experience. With no resolution to the story, bad combat, poor level design and too few resources for the player, I cannot recommend this game. There are just too many better games in the genre that overshadow this one. Edited April 6, 2016 by Harley Quinn

[NullRay85]

Nice review. I've been interested in the game for a while but after reading some of its shortcomings, I'm glad I waited for it to be on PS+

[Lord_of_Ra]

Some pretty hard critics indeed, and on the core aspects in a game nonetheless.

 

Very nice, thank you for taking the time to do this lil sis. I'll keep this one in mind while watching a gameplay to see if it's worth my time.

[LetsTurnJu-On]

I actually really like this game. Some good mechanics for a survival game, (i.e. pointing an empty gun at someone and them surrendering, it would happen). Even prefer this game to TLoU, sure it doesn't have to production value, but it's still better in my opinion.

[StrickenBiged]

 

Good review. I played the game on 360 back in the day and, while I had a bit more of a positive attitude towards it when it originally released, it's not something that I have any desire to go back and play again. I can't imagine it will have aged well.

[Ruliya]

Great review sis! You gonna do more?

[Remilia Scarlet]

Great review sis! You gonna do more?

Yeah, definitely. I enjoy writing reviews of games. Not really sure what to do next, though.

[Dragon-Archon]

Wow, that is detailed . I bet you'd make a fine guide writer. Anyway, thanks for the review. I was on the fence about this one, but decided to skip it after reading the OP.

Edited April 6, 2016 by Dragon-Archon

[Ruliya]

Yeah, definitely. I enjoy writing reviews of games. Not really sure what to do next, though.

Teach me senpai! I've always wanted to write reviews, but have never been that great at doing them  

 

That being said, can't wait for more

[Superstarmaste1r]

Good that I try this out on PS+ as well and i's okay so far. Having knowing somewhat back at 2012 when I watxhe video walkthroughs of uberhaxornova, I kind of knew what to suspect except the damn stamina is really annoying where I don't know how in the hell he can be this tired by climbing things and even running slow can make him fatigued. Alright game where I haven't beaten yet, but wish I was more prepared on which trophies I should unlocked first of a guide where I was about to do survivor, but heard the retries is so hard that you'll get one chance before you die having to start over of the chapter. Also, the way how they said that the normal description trophy saying I won't get most of the trophies parts of it and the bonuses really misleading where I just unlocked one trophy of pressing the square button by making a surprise attack of the enemies. 3/5

[Juzota]

Nice review. Just finished my first run and I'd rate it 4/10. Didn't really enjoy this game. Controls were just god awful and that pretty much sucked all the enjoyment out of gameplay.

 

Still need to do Survivor run some day, but I'm sure that day isn't soon.

[bpmotard]

Yeah, definitely. I enjoy writing reviews of games. Not really sure what to do next, though.

It's actually nice to see someone doing reviews on PS+ games, I hope you do more in the future

Maybe you're already writing on something else, but I would actually love to hear an honest opinion on either MXGP 2 or DiRT Rally

[Remilia Scarlet]

It's actually nice to see someone doing reviews on PS+ games, I hope you do more in the future

Maybe you're already writing on something else, but I would actually love to hear an honest opinion on either MXGP 2 or DiRT Rally

 

I haven't played an off road racing game since 2007. I might give them a go and do a review of one of them. 

Edited April 16, 2016 by Harley Quinn

[Andrea]

Really nice review, pretty much exactly what I'm feeling so far too. It's a very amateurish game and I'm actually amazed that it came out before both The Last of Us and Spec Ops: The Line because it is similar to both games in some departments, yet does nothing better than either of them. At first I thought I was going to be liking the climbing (at least more than the combat) but it quickly gets frustrating, especially when you're playing on survivor and have such a small amount of lives to work with. I've learned the hard way that you have to stop completely whenever you want him to change direction on a pipe or he will just muck about and keep going back and forth.

 

The items being scarce makes it so annoying. Definitely the kind of game I would not want to play without a walkthrough/roadmap handy. Thus far I'd have to rate it less difficult than Dead Space 1 on hard or RE4 on professional, but when you do die it almost always feels cheap and not your fault, it's the polar opposite of what something like Dark Souls tries to accomplish.

 

If you're searching for more games to review, perhaps make a feature out of reviewing the PS plus games for each month? Definitely some are more review-friendly than others, but I would expect there to be at least 1 title each month worth writing about.

 

I'm a sucker for the rare 3rd person budget title, but I'm not sure why because the quality is so rarely competent. I'd rate this about a 3/10.

[I_wear_pants]

I love playing games. It's one of my favorite things. Period. Because of this I tend be very positive about games overall. If the pros outweigh the cons, then the flaws mean much less. For example, Splatterhouse is not perfect... to say the least. It still makes my personal Top 20 PS3 games because I had so much fun with it! I only point this out to show that negatives can be overcome if a game speaks to me on some level.

 

This game speaks to me on no level. 

I put the game to the side for a few days to clear my head. I realize that this is my second least favorite game of all time. I won't bore people articulating details since I'm posting underneath a great written review and other intelligent comments. But there is no aspect of this game that I enjoy. I can tell that nobody is loving this game, but I seem to dislike it a lot more than everyone else. Oh well.

Typing my thoughts right now is making me realize that there is no reason to keep playing. I'm not having fun & I'm not a huge trophy hunter. I might as well delete it from my PS3 and move on.

 

At least the next title I play will be better. (I just found a positive for this game!)

[ERICVOLTAGE]

I remember writing a guide on another site for this, and I remember having a pretty good time.

 

I liked it on the occasion, but I can't seem to ever go back and play it again, seems tedious now. 

 

So, spot on review; bit of potential but also a bit lackluster title. 

[snacklepuss]

On 4/6/2016 at 8:45 AM, LetsTurnJu-On said:

I actually really like this game. Some good mechanics for a survival game, (i.e. pointing an empty gun at someone and them surrendering, it would happen). Even prefer this game to TLoU, sure it doesn't have to production value, but it's still better in my opinion.

 

 

This Game is Very Very underrated for some strange reason. I think its a great game and has that Silent Hill type feel to it and TLOU as well. The grainy GFX makes it for what it is, a bit spooky and eerie. Im currently capturing my game play and will upload once complete. Overall I think this could make it to the Remaster Version for PS4. 

[Solid-Fisch]

Good and most important: honest review. While i really liked the idea of this game and the survival aspects come out greatly, this game fucks up on the important points. Controls for example. Or visuals. They're just ok, could have been so much better. The game may be underrated but i don't see a reason why it should be overhyped. But to be honest i see quite a few ideas that imo made their way into TLoU, so i think it's obvious that Naughty Dogs employers were "creatively inspired" by this game. Whatsoever, if you liked the survival concept of TLoU, you should give this game here a try. Don't expect too much, but it's also far away from being crap.

Edited August 6, 2018 by Solid-Fisch

[aimeraya]

I knew a guy who has been in its development team in Ubisoft Shanghai. 10 years ago, he told me that Ubisoft has cut their budget and made them publish a much shorter game than planned. In this game's map, you can see 2/3 of the region has been barricaded. But in the initial design, all the region was available to explorer.

 

This game is really really underrated. Ubisoft has tried to let it be vs TLOU but they changed the mind afterwards.