Let’s face it right away without too many preambles, play The Gunk for this review he gave us mixed feelings. On the one hand, the quality of the game design it is indeed quietly above sufficiency, on the other hand, the technical solidity of the game is decidedly revisable, at times almost looking like a build in development due to the mediocrity of some aspects. So let’s see in detail how this new title is in exclusive to Xbox and PC.
Interesting idea, not flawless realization
The Gunk tells us about Rani’s adventure (the protagonist we will check) and Becks, two girls on a space expedition on a planet affected by the Gunk. It is a substance similar to a gigantic mucus (creepy as it may be, it’s literally how it is defined), dark and toxic to the surrounding environment. The mission consists in scanning the elements of interest on the planet and, above all, clean it from the gunk with the Rani glove, which will in fact suck it away. Our actions during the adventure are therefore characterized by the removal of the Gunk, through platforming sessions and small environmental puzzles to be solved. One time removed all traces of gunk in the surrounding area, outlined by red lines on the ground, an animation of sanitation of the area. Once sanitized, we will unlock new platforming opportunities (such as the appearance of previously not present vines or platforms, rendered as plant that freed from the toxin can now grow back). Some are born spontaneously, others are generated by sucking giant seeds with the glove and throwing them into pools of blue liquid, from which they will then grow.
There are also two other types of giant seeds, the first provides new resources to be collected while the second is a explosive seed that you can throw, sticking it to a pile of rubble for open new passages, both to advance in the game and to discover little extra areas. These optional areas have the sole purpose of collecting the aforementioned resources, which are of different types (such as metal, natural resources, and so on). THE materials can be used in its own base, that is the spacecraft with which we arrived on the planet, to enhance both our abilities and those of our trusty glove, so as to be able, for example, to shoot small energy bullets, useful for both puzzles and fights. There are in fact some creatures to face from time to time, but these clashes do not represent the core of the gameplay, they are rather an accessory addition.
Fighting is still very useful, since the monsters we will face are aliens and will offer additional materials once defeated. As you will have understood, therefore, every single exploratory action serves only to collect resources, which are designed to enhance us with crafting and therefore progress in our skills and executable actions. All this translates into a fairly relaxing, pleasant and entertaining gameplay experience, also thanks to the main mechanics of the glove. The Gunk focuses a lot on this aspect, often keeping the player active towards the game environment, so never really bored.
Although on paper it is all very functional, in practice, the sensation of superfluousness in the progression is strongly perceived. The amount of materials that can be collected is disproportionately greater than necessary, so much so that at the end of a single part of the expedition we have enhanced everything that I could enhance, in one fell swoop. We haven’t felt the “dilemma” in deciding which skills to aim for first, as often happens in games that rely on this type of progression. And if so far The Gunk has turned out to be a solid game all in all in this review, the technical side of the title is instead quite lacking from several points of view.
Too many technical errors, even if many harmless
When it comes to technical gaps in a video game, distinctions must be made, as there are those that are totally harmless to the gameplay and those that ruin the gaming experience. The Gunk, to be fair, has mostly of the first category. It has often happened to us, when we fell from too high positions, to die and go back to the checkpoint (which is automatically from where you died or just before) and not see the animation of the fall. Rani fell to her feet, like a log, and we were allowed to move for a few seconds before being sent back to the checkpoint.
The collisions with some objects in the scenario were also revealed to be heavily busted, such as rocks or plants, where it happens more times than understandable to remain stationary in a falling position, sliding over these elements and then returning to the ground standing up. At that point, personally, I started moving in circles with the stick and I couldn’t do it correctly, confirming what I suspected. The Gunk is developed in Unreal Engine 4 and, in Unreal, these problems arise when you don’t properly optimize the connection between animations. Here then explained the problems with falling and landing on objects (although in the second case it also relates to collisions).
The graphics and sound sectors, on the other hand, are very well done, without too many smudges. The only aspect, perhaps a tad little refined, is the post-process, with lighting at times a little too bright and tending to white, but nothing compromising for the glance. But what definitely ruined our experience with The Gunk was a gigantic bug, which prevented us from moving forward in the game by not sanitizing an area despite the absence of any trace of Gunk. After reloading every save we had we restarted the game in full, and then returned to that point without, fortunately, catching the bug again.
A similar problem definitely cannot be ignored, because not all are seasoned players like us, there was a real risk that a casual user might think that he does not know how to advance, not blaming a bug and ending up uninstalling it. Ultimately, we are facing a good product but significantly damaged by technical smudges. If you are a subscriber to the Xbox Game Pass, or the PC Game Pass, for other Microsoft titles (such as Halo Infinite or Forza Horizon 5), the advice is to try The Gunk anyway, since it is included and also weighs little in terms of downloads.
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