The Technomancer

 Xbox One
User Score
7.0

Mixed or average reviews- based on 72 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 42 out of 72
  2. Mixed: 15 out of 72
  3. Negative: 15 out of 72
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  1. StanleyPain
    Jul 4, 2016
    5
    Technomancer is a hard game to review. As a continuation of what Spiders was doing with Mars War Logs (a game very few people seem to have played), it works on the level of story and setting, but the gameplay seems to really, really drag it down. If you read other reviews, you get a general idea for the game, so I'll just get to why I think this game really doesn't work is simply: theTechnomancer is a hard game to review. As a continuation of what Spiders was doing with Mars War Logs (a game very few people seem to have played), it works on the level of story and setting, but the gameplay seems to really, really drag it down. If you read other reviews, you get a general idea for the game, so I'll just get to why I think this game really doesn't work is simply: the combat. The combat system is a derivative of the Arkham Asylum-style beat-em-up (also seen in Shadows of MOrdor, Mad Max, and a few other games), but it lacks all of the visual cues and technique necessary to make it work. You have a myriad of special abilities, no matter what class you choose to focus on, yet it seems like none of the moves really change the nature of the situation in any meaningful way. Most battles are best settled just punching your way out, because the fancier movies either do pathetic damage or leave you too open to attack. Easily the most fatal aspect of the game is that while even the weakest enemies in the game can withstand loads of attacks, your character, no matter how high a level they get and no matter how advanced their abilities and equipment, can be decimated in a matter of seconds by simply succumbing to a few melee hits. Yes, the advanced cyber-augmented special security forces of the distant Martian future can literally be layed flat by a few punches from a street punk, meanwhile I have to an assortment of guns, melee weapons, and lightning bolts just to whittle that very same punk down to maybe half health. It makes no sense in-game, in-lore, and it especially makes no sense from a design perspective. The needlessly over-complicated crafting system allows you to modify your equipment (because, of course, when cops are sent out on duty, they are expected to just have their own equipment or build it themselves), but I am not exaggerated when I say that no matter how you upgrade your equipment, it will make minimal, almost unnoticeable, difference in combat. In summary, this makes Technomancer a chore to play, frankly. Even on the easiest difficulty, combat is a controller-breaking, maddening experience especially once you get to the point in the game where most enemies have guns and can just outright murder you before you can even start the fight proper. Outside of that, the game clearly wants to be interesting and immersive, but it takes so much effort to enjoy it since so MUCH of the game relies on the combat.… Expand
  2. Derf_Xephon
    Jul 1, 2016
    7
    I bought this game because I'm a huge sci-fi fan, love action RPGs, and liked the idea of supporting a developer that wants to make AAA games but isn't quite there yet. While I certainly don't regret my purchase, the game is noticeably rough in a lot of areas and feels like it needed to be in development a while longer to be fully realized.

    To give you a better idea of what I mean, here    I bought this game because I'm a huge sci-fi fan, love action RPGs, and liked the idea of supporting a developer that wants to make AAA games but isn't quite there yet. While I certainly don't regret my purchase, the game is noticeably rough in a lot of areas and feels like it needed to be in development a while longer to be fully realized.

    To give you a better idea of what I mean, here are some examples:

    - Of the three combat styles, the staff feels more developed and powerful than the others. Choosing one of the other two attack styles makes for a more frustrating experience at times.

    - Combat and movement are sluggish, with very noticeable delays between input and action on screen especially in hectic moments.

    - Companions give personal quests at odd times that can easily conflict with main story progression. This can lead to easily missed side objectives with companions, and cut scenes being shown out of sequence.

    - Quest goals can be unintuitive and nebulous at times. Occurs too often to simply write off as a design choice.

    - Certain climactic sequences quickly become anti-climactic in certain cut scenes.

    - Missions constantly have the player running back between the same two/three hubs to make the same arduous trips to talk to the same NPC instead of allowing the player to efficiently complete multiple goals in the same locations. This feels like a conscious decision on the part of the developers to lengthen the overall playtime.

    Despite all these flaws however, I did actually have fun playing this game. What The Technomancer lacks in polish it attempts to make up for in ambition. This game wants to be the next Mass Effect, and Spiders studio's love for their creation does come through. I commend them for trying to make this space (or rather Mars) opera without the budget of companies like EA or Ubisoft.

    In summation, if you're a sci-fi RPG junkie like me you'll probably enjoy your experience with this title. But if the above issues already have you worried or frustrated, give this one a pass or wait for a good sale.    … Expand
  3. SuperkenGaming
    Jun 30, 2016
    7
    The Technomancer
    Dragon Age in Space
    The Technomancer took me on a rollercoaster of emotions, and not necessarily in a good way... This game tells the story of a young technomancer living on mars… You eventually set out to find information on the planet earth… This is the games overall objective But of course there are others inhabiting mars that want this info as well.. They want    The Technomancer
    Dragon Age in Space
    The Technomancer took me on a rollercoaster of emotions, and not necessarily in a good way...
    This game tells the story of a young technomancer living on mars…
    You eventually set out to find information on the planet earth…
    This is the games overall objective
    But of course there are others inhabiting mars that want this info as well..
    They want access to the technomancer secrets
    Being a technomancer means that you have these awesome electrical powers that the other residents on mars don’t…
    You do get to customize your technomancer in the beginning as well as start to build your specific mancer based on your play style..
    You can be a warrior, rogue, or guardian…
    Basically you can choose quick close combat, quick and ranged combat, or guarded close combat...
    All of which can be switched to mid combat just by changing your fighting stance
    But you’re better off sticking to one style
    I personally dumped all of my skill points into the warrior and technomancer skill tree, upgraded my electrical powers and staff attacks…
    I wasn’t too big of a fan of the game during its first few hours..
    The amount of choices and skill perks were far too overwhelming for me to grasp at first, leaving me to believe that maybe introducing the skill tree at the start of the game wasn’t too great of an idea...
    youre practically asked to make a choice on something you have no idea about…
    But as the game went on, by hour 5 I was hooked…
    Leveling up felt satisfying and addicting as any good rpg should…
    The story also started to get its hooks in me as I was learning about all of the characters who enhabited mars.
    This game is most comparable to dragon age…
    This isn’t necessarily an open world game, but an open hub game where you travel from hub to hub to complete tasks and take out enemies along your way for xp and loot…
    You also have the choice to drain your fallen enemies for serum which is a currency on mars...
    The only issue though is that doing this will kill that person and life is still valued on mars... and doing so will give you bad karma…
    And all of this may seem like it doesn’t matter, but much like dragon age you also have companions with you..
    You can bring any 2 along and change their weapon and gear, but they pay attention to every choice you make as you play the game, and if they don’t agree with your decisions they can and will leave you...
    So if you do get attached to any of your companions make sure you listen to them and try to stay on their good side..
    Which can be done by helping carry out their requests in side missions, or to choose the answer they feel is best during a main quest...
    The best is that their kills do count towards your xp, so they never feel like they get in the way of your progress and are great to have by your side….
    My biggest issues with this game is its combat and lack of overall variety…
    Combat is probably the least satisfying aspect of this game…
    You do have awesome moves depending on the skills you choose to unlock, but the weapons stay the same throughout just with different stats... you can upgrade your weapons through crafting, but even if you pour your skill points into crafting you still have to find the diagrams to craft a new part… and the world really isn’t engaging enough to want to go out and do this…
    Because by hour 15 of 25 this game really starts to get boring as it takes your nowhere new
    you’ll go to 3 different hub cities throughout the games campaign but for all 25 hours you’re going back and forth between the same 3 places….
    You literally get a task, complete it, are told to return to a city to update your progress, then are told to go back to the same place to do something else, then told to comeback, then you’re told to go to a different place, complete, come back, go back to the first place comeback rinse and repeat for 25 hours…
    I got so tired of walking through the same paths over and over…the scenery literally doesn’t change from hour 1 to hour 25 other than the city you return to to turn your mission progress in..
    And the worst is you have to fight the exact same enemies in the exact same place over and over and over…
    and the combat itself can feel super cheap and frustrating at times and is really trash…
    The hit detection is straight up garbage..
    Enemies don’t really have a block animation.. Your attacks just sometimes won’t do damage when you can clearly see your staff going right through them…
    This poor hit detection greatly hinders any sense of satisfaction as you pull off cool moves and dodge your enemy’s attacks…
    Meanwhile you don’t have this luxury…
    if their weapon hits you - you’re taking damage no questions asked…
    And any area can definitely have you out numbered with multiple heavies or ranged enemies which will lead to constant deaths even on the games easiest difficulty...
    And if you do die in the middle of a city you have to restart from where you entered the city, and guess what?
    Fight the enemies you already fought...
    This can thankfully be overcome by manually saving after you complete an enemy encounter as this game only AutoSaves when you climb a ladder or open a door….
    But when you come back later they will be back...
    Even if you kill them…
    Honestly I think choosing to kill for the bad karma but in return not having to deal with that creature or human enemy anymore would’ve really made the choice of kill or not much more meaningful and consequential… But unfortunately, this choice doesn’t go that deep… The combat highlight is definitely the games bosses… But you don’t have to do much to defeat them other than spam attacks and dodge… Every encounter especially the final encounters all ultimately feel anti-climactic… There’s a lot to do in the technomancer… There’s just not enough variety to want to do it all… I Give the Technomancer a 6.5/10    … Expand
  4. ortizarmy81
    Jun 29, 2016
    7
    I really want to love this game. It really seems to be a good game so far but most of the reviewers are correct. It could be a Xbox 360 or PS3 game concerning the graphics. I think the story so far is good and there is a lot to learn about. The controls are pretty ruff and the fighting is not easy at all. I am just starting, and once you are in the first city the "thugs" are really kickingI really want to love this game. It really seems to be a good game so far but most of the reviewers are correct. It could be a Xbox 360 or PS3 game concerning the graphics. I think the story so far is good and there is a lot to learn about. The controls are pretty ruff and the fighting is not easy at all. I am just starting, and once you are in the first city the "thugs" are really kicking my butt! I'm playing on EASY and it's NOT! I am not going to quit on this game but unless you love games like Mass Effect or Witcher then take a pass because you will not like it with all of these weak points.

    The story is good so far and the idea of the game is cool but it seems like a game that was rushed or missing like $200,000 more to get it polished.    … Expand
  5. TheQuietGamer
    Aug 22, 2019
    7
    Back in 2013 developer Spiders released the downloadable RPG known as Mars: War Logs. It was a flawed, low-budget title that was clearly trying to ape the works of BioWare at a fraction of the scale. It succeeded rather admirably considering how small the project was, and showed what potential Spiders could have if they were given the financial freedom to more fully chase their ambitions.Back in 2013 developer Spiders released the downloadable RPG known as Mars: War Logs. It was a flawed, low-budget title that was clearly trying to ape the works of BioWare at a fraction of the scale. It succeeded rather admirably considering how small the project was, and showed what potential Spiders could have if they were given the financial freedom to more fully chase their ambitions.

    Three years later and out came The Technomancer. An indirect sequel that sees them revisiting the world they created on Mars, only this time backed by more money. It's not a triple-A production by any means (more like double-A), but they were certainly able to create a much better game as a result. However, The Technomancer isn't quite a true success story. Some of War Logs' issues are still hanging around. So rather that being the title that cements Spiders reputation as one of the RPG greats, it's more of just another step in the right direction that shows off their increasing skill as a developer and what heights they could reach later on down the road.

    By far the game's greatest strengths lie in its world and story. Set on a version of the red planet that's plagued by an endless war between corporations over water, you play as the newest inductee into a group of powerful warriors with a pretty big secret to hide. What follows is a lot of treachery and backstabbing that sees you on the run with a group of interesting, if a tad underdeveloped companions and getting involved with various factions across Mars. Interesting stuff, and thanks to the excellent amount of player choice I really felt like I made a significant impact on the planet by the time the credits rolled.

    The areas you'll discover and explore are quite memorable and full of personality. Although they aren't the prettiest to look at. The Technomancer's graphics are certainly dated. Characters animations are stiff and awkward during gameplay, and the fact that only their mouths move during conversations make everyone you come in contact with look a little plastic.

    When it comes to defining your own playstyle you really get to see how deep the game's RPG mechanics are. Multiple branching skill trees allow you to outfit yourself with a variety of interesting abilities and buffs. The combat system also has a lot of flexibility as it lets you switch between four different styles on the fly. Unfortunately, neither of these elements are able to shine like they should do to some troubling balance issues.

    I started the game off on normal, but quickly had to switch it to easy just to make any progress. The default difficulty setting is the equivalent of nightmare mode in any other game. No matter how much you level up even the basic enemy types can decimate in only a few hits while you're only able to continuously chip away at their seemingly much larger health bars while hoping to not die from an attack you just didn't see coming. I thought technomancers were supposed to be tough?

    But even when I lowered the difficulty I wasn't exactly having a blast. Unfortunately easy mode turned out to be too, well, easy. Outside of a few boss and mini-boss encounters I was largely able to button mash my way through every fight. So I never really felt the need to experiment with all of the different styles and powers I had at my disposal. A shame because the combat system is really great on paper and the environments are littered with enemy encounters so it's not like you can really avoid fighting. With no comfortable difficulty setting to choose from, two of the game's best features are never able to be fully taken advantage of, and that's what makes The Technomancer disappointing.

    Spiders fell just short of greatness with this one. Their most admirable effort to date is held back by last gen visuals, poor balancing, and technical issues. Their are also some design flaws like the one that locked out of completing one of my companion's quest threads because apparently you only have one of those going at once and there was no dialog option to go back and get it from them later on. Yet, this is still a genuinely good RPG. It's clear that player choice was the central focus in every aspect of its design and that's what drives people to play these kind of games in the first place. Spiders definitely needs to continue refining their technique, because if they learn their lessons here they could very become the genre's next household name.

    7.5/10    … Expand
  6. closedsocket
    Dec 22, 2016
    6
    Technomancer, you were almost great! Man, what could have been. Technomancer does a lot of things right, and a lot of things very close to great, but falls short almost every time. The game reminds me of an early Bioshock game, very early. You have choices, but you never feel like your choices have meaning. What really drags the game down is the difficulty. The game is frustratinglyTechnomancer, you were almost great! Man, what could have been. Technomancer does a lot of things right, and a lot of things very close to great, but falls short almost every time. The game reminds me of an early Bioshock game, very early. You have choices, but you never feel like your choices have meaning. What really drags the game down is the difficulty. The game is frustratingly difficult on normal, and manageable on easy. I don't mind difficult games, as long as they are fair. There is nothing fair about giving enemies assault rifles that can kill you before you can get to them, while the only gun you have fires three shots before overheating. I played this game much later than it released, so I am not sure how release copies were, but I didn't see any frame drops during play. I also thought the graphics were great. While character graphics and animations were average, the environments were massive and well designed. Many times I would catch myself looking at the sky just to take in all the level of detail the developers put into the game. Characters have a lot of personality, that develops over the course of the story. The game has no fast travel and instead makes you walk back and fourth between the same locations, over and over again. The biggest problems with Technomancer, in my opinion, is the unfair difficulty, the forced back tracking, and the short length (for the triple A price, it was perfect for the $15 I spent)… Expand
  7. Borschkovski
    Jun 30, 2016
    6
    From what little I've played of it the combat is solid enough and the menus and such are intuitive, but the plot is something out of a mediocre YA novel, the graphics would look more at home in 2008 than 2016, and there's some serious framerate drops at least in the Xbox One version.
  8. Kirst0ne
    Jul 26, 2016
    6
    The game is mildly enjoyable, even if the combat is quite obnoxious on a multitude of occasions. Biggest problem this game has is, that even though the basic story is an interesting premise, the characters you encounter are so flat and uninteresting that you don't care about them other than the meat shield capacity. Second issue is the sheer amount of time you spend running from point AThe game is mildly enjoyable, even if the combat is quite obnoxious on a multitude of occasions. Biggest problem this game has is, that even though the basic story is an interesting premise, the characters you encounter are so flat and uninteresting that you don't care about them other than the meat shield capacity. Second issue is the sheer amount of time you spend running from point A to point B back to point A, only to turn around and guess what, go back to point B.… Expand

Awards & Rankings

44
#44 Most Discussed Xbox One Game of 2016
43
#43 Most Shared Xbox One Game of 2016

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
68

Mixed or average reviews - based on 12 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 4 out of 12
  2. Mixed: 8 out of 12
  3. Negative: 0 out of 12
  1. Pelit (Finland)
    Sep 28, 2016
    76
    Great fighting system, but game suffers from lackluster manuscript and voice acting. [Aug 2016]
  2. Official Xbox Magazine UK
    Aug 13, 2016
    50
    There's promise but The Technomancer just can't get away from well-worn genre conventions. [Sept 2016, p.84]
  3. MondoXbox
    Jul 16, 2016
    77
    A good an passion-infused cyberpunk RPG, witdh great landscapes and a good multi-approach combat system. Unluckily the game gets dragged down by a flawed technical production, with many graphical flaws and unconvincing animations, and some bad design choices like the heavy backtracking.
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