The Order: 1886

The "original sin" of The Order: 1886 is that it never manages to open up and share its wonderful world with the player.

If The Order: 1886 released at launch as it was originally intended, it most likely would have reviewed far differently because at that time, it would have showed us things we’ve never seen. However, with this generation of consoles, we’ve already seen how visually stunning the PlayStation 4 can be, we’ve seen better third-person shooters, and we’ve had more in-depth stories.

With a focus mainly on story, cinematics, directing and technical implementation, The Order 1886 leaves you with a sense of hunger and a feeling that you spent your money only to get a short portion of this stunning spectacle.

The Order: 1886 is a great game, as long as you treat it as a mindless shooter and not the bevy of innovation we were all led to believe it was. Graphically appealing, the title shows us once again, we should not judge a book by its cover.

When you experience a sense of repetition in game that is only five to seven hours long, you know that the actual game design aspect wasn’t the priority for the project.

We had approached the title with very low expectations, but seeing it break up our initial preconceptions just before falling miserably due to a horrible ending, a limited duration and some choices of game design that are anything that brilliant, it was very painful.

A visual masterpiece, but dragged down by some pacing problems, some questionable design decisions, and a lack of additional challenges outside of the campaign. Sill, a fun ride with some great moments.

The Order: 1886 is a good game and a great interactive movie. Not revolutionary in terms of gameplay, it offers fantastic art direction, good storytelling and, more generally, a true sense of elegance. It just lacks a bit of substance and some unforgettable scenes to make it a great game.

The Order: 1886 has exceptional graphics which give the player a totally cinematic experience with a thrilling story. Ready at Dawn shows us what the PlayStation 4 is capable of, but the game has minor flaws that influence the overall experience negatively.

The Order: 1886 is outstanding as a cinematic experience, with some of the best graphics we've ever seen. However it's very short, with quite simple shooting sequences, and there's no reason to replay it once finished.

The Order is thrilling and frustrating. I should make it very clear that I did enjoy my time with it. I didn’t want to put the controller down because Ready at Dawn did such an exquisite job of doling out the action. And that, combined with its decent concept, story, and gameplay, would’ve been enough a long time ago. But in 2015 it left me feeling discontent. Is this what I bought a PlayStation 4 to play? Is this what Sony is passing off as a bold new experience? A different shade of Resident Evil 4?

The Order: 1886 features a wonderfully crafted and realistic alternate history setting with the greatest visuals and production values so far on the PS4. While the first half or so of the story really works, it’s let down by the final few hours, which abandon things shouting out to be explored in favour of introducing forced plot points which do the world and the main cast a disservice.

The Order 1886 is an amazing rollercoaster ride with beautiful graphics, and a creative setting. If you're looking for a fun third person shooter, you've come to the right place.

When it's about to get better, The Order: 1886 ends abruptly and leaves us with a bitter taste. Its unimaginative level design, boring lycan combat and substandard pacing almost ruin the whole experience, had it not been for the best visuals on the console right now and great weapon design. The IP has potential, and we hope that Ready at Dawn learns from its mistakes. They've got something interesting here.

It would be a kind of justice for The Order to have its assets stripped from its skeleton and put into service of a more deserving project.

Even with the development delay and push into 2015, The Order: 1886 isn't exactly the action-packed, cinematic masterpiece we were hoping for. On the bright side, it's a mostly enjoyable ride while it lasts and is most certainly one of the best looking console games released thus far, so it’s worth a playthrough during the winter game release lull.

The Order: 1886 is a pretty good game, nothing else. Almost every part can be criticized: the story flows nicely but is extremely predictable, the fights are good, but only the ones with people in them (lycan fights are boring), graphics are gorgeous, but the world feels empty. Sir Galahad's adventure is yet another bit of proof that beauty isn't enough. You should see The Order in motion but do so only after some significant discounts.

When it allows itself to focus on action, it can provide a stimulating round of pop-and-fire combat, at least before it allows itself to drown in common distractions and intellectually insulting button prompts. While clearly assured in itself as a concept, it doesn’t extend that same faith to the player, so eager it is to hold its audience’s collective hands and guide them through corridors of patronizing tutorials and arbitrary gates to progression.

Its best aspects are its stunning looks, atmosphere, and style – which are truly fantastic – and entertaining fiction. But the shallow, slow, and generic quick-time event-riddled gameplay make it feel like an experience that would've been better served by a non-interactive movie than a game.

The premise is solid, the graphics are great, the voice casting is excellent, but in the end you have to ask yourself, are we buying games to watch them or to play them? This is something you need to ask yourself before picking up The Order. It’s a shame, too.

During the development someone probably should’ve raised an alarm when it turned out that the game about monster-hunters doesn’t have interesting fights with monsters. [April 2015, p.54]

A limp story, repetitive combat and lack of agency take the shine off a great technical achievement. [May 2015, p.64]

I like games that let me know that what I do matters or at least build a believable illusion of my indispensability. The Order: 1886 did not need me at all. It seems it was made by people who would rather do movies than games and the player is a hindrance for them. When it becomes available for free on PS Plus though, it will be worth downloading because it looks great and offers 5-6 hours of decent, even if derivative fun. [04/2015, p.60]

Visually astounding throughout. Graphics fans will adore every grimy nook and cranny of the Victorian London setting. Sadly though, the game around it is crushingly average. The shooting sections are fun enough but far too few and far between, and much of the game is spent watching cutscenes or being forced to walk through one, so much so that it rarely feels like you're 'playing' the game at all.

The Order: 1886 is such a great looking game, and it’s sad that the gameplay couldn’t be just as impressive. The game falls victim to the old cliche “All flash, no substance”. The cinematic experience is overshadowed by the boring gameplay leading to a visually stunning game but unimaginative, monotonous overall experience.

As a story, it’s all deeply unsatisfying. And that’s a real shame, because a cogent narrative could have papered over some more of The Order’s cracks. As it is, that job is left to visual splendour, decent shooting and a marvellous, if squandered, setting. And, while it lasts, The Order is a game that entertains almost as much as it frustrates. But not quite enough to shake the feeling of a wasted opportunity.

A decent concept, that has been marketed and presented totally wrong.

What I have a problem with is inconsistent narratives, and "gameplay" that has been so compartmentalised from the "story" that they may as well be in different products.

We need more game developers and publishers willing to gamble on made-from-scratch worlds and ideas, but The Order: 1886 feels like it might have fared better as a film, graphic novel or TV series. As a game, there’s just not enough propping up this shining suit of armour.

The Order: 1886 is bland gameplay wrapped in admittedly gorgeous next generation graphics. It's not bad through and through, it's just disappointing.

As you may have heard, The Order is also short. How short? Well, on normal or hard difficulty it should take the average gamer roughly seven hours to complete it -- a little less if you rush through and don't explore any other hallways, a little more if you check every inch. While the length doesn't bother me on principle, keep in mind that there's very little in the way of replay value, and there's no multiplayer -- not even co-op -- to speak of.

A middling and short title that is almost more of a movie than it is a video game. It’s relatively enjoyable while it lasts, but you won’t keep fond memories of it with you for years to come, nor will you want to revisit it once the credits roll.

The Order: 1886 is an amazing visual experience, but it has not become the game we all expected it to be and it's because of the bad execution of what looked like a bunch of great ideas.

The Order is a beautiful dud. Instead of building the core mechanics and then wrapping everything else around it, instead it appears Ready at Dawn made a movie and wondered how to put a game into it. By all accounts it still hasn't worked it out.

For all its derivative nature, The Order: 1886 falls well short of classic status; yet the premise here could definitely serve as the groundwork for a more creative, more substantial series. It's one of the most convincing steampunk/alternate history worlds video games have offered up. Now Ready at Dawn just needs to bring the script and mechanics up to that same standard.

An antique that's aged ungracefully. The presentation is sublime from the release's rousing start right the way through to its anticlimactic finish, but several shoddy design decisions detract from its otherwise exemplary gloss.

It's by no means a bad game, but it's hard to say it ever drags itself out of mediocrity. Yet at the same time it's an experience that's hard not to recommend.

It looks awesome and the borders between movie and game get blurred once again. But the linear, very simplistic game design doesn’t even scratch the surface – be it in the firefights, the stealth or the useless interaction. Overall: A tremendous amount of potential gone to waste.

There are brief moments throughout The Order: 1886 when it’s clearly striving for excellence, which only makes the end result more tragic. It’s easy to toss aside a game that looks bad or is full of bugs, but The Order feels like it should be a good game.

Great visuals alone do not a great game make - and there's unfortunately very little in The Order: 1886 to elevate it beyond being a pretty, but shallow and insipid shooter. It commits the one sin no interactive entertainment should: it's painfully boring.

It's amazing the mileage The Order gets from its incredible presentation and world, but that goodwill is squandered by a title that's middling to poor in most other areas.

Though it nails some of the fundamentals, The Order: 1886 has been released without answering the essential question of what it offers that other games aren't already doing better.

Visually it's everything you could have hoped for, but the compromises required to reach that fidelity, and moments of narcissism as a result of it, are hugely damaging. [Apr 2015, p.81]

It is as beautiful and visually majestic as any video game you will ever play. But it just isn't much fun.

It’s what the PS4 and this generation needed then, something to show off, but it’ll be gone as quickly as it came, and forgotten in half the time.

There was so much potential surrounding The Order, yet it hasn’t lived up to the expectations.

I simply wish there was more of it. Not necessarily in terms of length, but more combat, a more fleshed out story and more player agency. It has the ingredients to be great but it’s too restrictive and those aspects of its design are used so sparingly or aren’t yet fully formed, that it’s simply disappointing.

You get two for one price: a boring movie and a poorly-designed game.

The game shoves and commands me around as if I'm some mindless observer, while continuously bragging about the stunning but hollow-feeling visuals. The simple do-as-you're-told mechanics make no leeway for anything, and despite the game's alright shooting action, the result is overall quite forgettable.

Worthy in its (assumed) intent, and visually spellbinding, The Order’s archaic, player-detached approaches to interaction and narrative nonetheless make it a dated and instantly forgettable experience.

This is a showcase for the graphical power of the PlayStation 4 and nothing more. Rudimentary gameplay, a poorly executed story and an unwelcoming visual palette make it come off as cold, uninspired and most importantly not all that fun.