The Falconeer

Despite a little turbulence, The Falconeer takes you on a memorable ride.

The Falconeer absolutely has its high points, and all of the elements of a great game are there. It’s just disappointing that they don’t gel enough to be wholly satisfying. Visually, the game is stunning, without caveat. The combat can be exhilarating … at its best. The story can be interesting, even fascinating … sometimes. The game’s heights are extreme, but so are its lulls.

There is a lot to enjoy in The Falconeer, a lot to keep you picking up a controller and having another flight. It’s also warmly satisfying knowing this well put together game is a project of passion and it feels like it has the backing of some solid developers and publishers. It was completely bug free during my time in the saddle and that can’t be said for most triple A titles nowadays. And while it’s easy to recommend you pick up and enjoy The Falconeer, its real magic lies in waiting. As hopefully it's the start of a new series, where we eventually see The Falconeer Black Flag, or whatever Tomas decides to call it. And that is really where it starts to fill my flight chaps with excitement juice.

The Falconeer is one of those games that forgets that it can be more than just a game, giving more importance to its mechanical elements than to the experience itself. However, even with its design flaws, Tomas Sala still manages to create a great title that can be fun, beautiful and really human, thus becoming one of the most singular products of this year.

The Falconeer sets players in a gorgeous setting with a storyline that keeps you entertained and intrigued, but falls short on both the amount to do and in keeping the gameplay as interesting as the story.

Falconeer is able to reach extreme heights. Blasting airships in a thunderstorm is nothing short than epic... but more often than not you are doing mundane jobs in lackluster locales.

The Falconeer’s undeniable strengths are its distinct, memorable atmosphere and beautiful visuals. I believe it would have been a better game if the developer had ditched combat (as well as arcade elements in general) and focused on exploration and uncovering the history of the realm. [01/2021, p.44]

The Falconeer is an ambitious title developed by one person. It aims to be an open world air combat title but doesn't completely stick the landing.

There’s substance to The Falconeer, and while there’s really something special here, it’s in the details instead of the big picture. For fans of air combat games, The Falconeer represents a breath of fresh air, and, quite frankly, it is pretty cool to be one with the falcon; for those simply curious, check out some YouTube videos before taking wing.

The Falconeer is a charming old-style shooter developed by a passionate one-man studio, partially spoiled by a fragmented plot and a repetitive quest design.

The biggest flaw in The Falconeer is trying to be an aerial action RPG. While this isn't going to be your type of game if you are looking for a more traditional RPG, The Falconeer invites you to disconnect and start flying without any limits, an experience that no one should miss.

When you finally begin to put the aerial maneuvers together and to great effect, as you’re dodging incoming falcons, stopping in mid-air to shake that tailing dragon, or barrel-rolling to produce near-miss fire.

It would be ungenerous to deny the good basic qualities of Tomas Sala's work, such as to ensure that this peculiar "bird's eye" combat simulator has a certain solidity, at least on the technical-artistic front. What emerges after a few hours strolling through the skies of the Ursee, however, is that The Falconeer is a product that shines more for aesthetics than for the actual ability to involve the player within the wet world that he chooses to tell.

The Falconeer boasts an intriguing story and a hauntingly beautiful setting, but is hampered by repetitive missions in an empty open world.

I find myself a little perplexed by The Falconeer. I still thoroughly enjoyed my time with the game, but it almost felt like I was doing so in spite of how I felt about the gameplay. I do think The Falconeer is going to find an audience that loves it wholeheartedly, but also that there will be plenty of others for whom this falls a bit flat too.

It’s clear that Tomas Sala has put a lot of effort into bringing us The Falconeer and it’s an absolutely applaudable effort. Boasting some impressive artistic direction, smooth performance, and enjoyable open-world exploration, it comes packed within an intriguing story that left me wanting to know more. It isn’t perfect though, and there are certainly flaws within the combat system, but ultimately, if you’re a fan of aerial combat that’s looking for something different, this is one game which comes recommended.

The single greatest oversight in this game, aside from the controls, is the inability to interact with your bird. You can inject it with mutagens to power it up but you can’t pet it? If I had been given the opportunity to interact with my warbird, customize its gear and coloration, and build a real bond with it, I would have enjoyed this game much more than I did. As is, I found The Falconeer to be a compelling but frustrating experience.

Despite his pleasant artistic direction and his ambition to tell a complex story with multiple ramifications, The Falconeer lacks a little soul during its ten hours of play. The developed lore struggles to include the player because of a lack attachment to the heroes while the uninspiring missions, even generic, plague the desire to progress. Fortunately, his overall successful dogfights as well as his few flashes make this aerial shoot an experience that deserves attention. The work done by its sole developer is obviously remarkable: his love for an endangered genre shines on every feather of the Fantastic Falcon.

The Falconeer blends aerial exploration with dogfighting, but doesn’t stick the landing. It delivers an interesting, but middling, action-fantasy experience that's filled with gorgeous sights and clunky combat.

This is a bang average dog-fighting game. It tries to hide its dullness behind a facade of high fantasy, but that’s just a cosmetic choice without any real impact on gameplay. The missions start to repeat themselves very soon and the second you tire of the beautiful graphics, you’ll just wish to fly away.

The Falconeer doesn’t do anything glaringly wrong, and yet, the overall experience doesn’t really click. The game looks lovely, controls well, and offers surprising depth considering it was created by a single developer, but an uninvolving world, repetitive missions, and combat that isn’t as visceral as it should be grounds its potential. Like many flights, The Falconeer is kind of exciting when you first take off, but by landing time you just want the experience to be over.