The pitch for Immortals of Aveum seems simple: it’s Call of Duty with sorcerers for soldiers, magic spells for guns. You’re still a man on a mission in the middle of a worldwide conflict, but instead of Tom Clancy high-tech espionage with all guns blazing, you’ve got sub-Tolkien fantasy meets Marvel movie flash and thunder. It’s an interesting twist on the FPS formula, with all the required bombast, battles, and blockbuster set pieces, so why is the result so underwhelming?
Here, there are definite parallels with recent Marvel efforts. There’s too much focus on lore and world-building at the expense of a storyline and characters you care about, despite some impressive motion-captured performances here and there. The realms of Aveum have descended into an endless ‘everwar’ between kingdoms of feuding magicians, each determined to hold all the power. Worse, the world itself is collapsing in its own magic eco-catastrophe, creating a growing zone of decay and disruption known as the Wound. You play Jak, a raw and reckless young mage hoping to join the Immortals of the title; a sort of team of sorcerer superheroes fighting the armies of Sandrakk and the kingdom of Rasham.
