Gameplay and Story
With two of the biggest blockbuster movies of all time, several amusement park attractions, and now a massive open-world game from Ubisoft and Massive Entertainment, the Avatar universe has grow into something of a beast. With Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora you get a much more detailed, intimate look at the characters, Na’vi, and their world. The opening of the game and its story are absolutely stellar focusing on you as an orphan soldier raised and trained by the Resources Development Administration (RDA). What happens next I will not spoil for you but I was extremely impressed by the smooth movement and gameplay that the intro provides instead of the all-too-common boring tutorials that most big open-world games give you.
As soon as you get to the outside and open-world part of the game, the world and the Western Frontier is your oyster. It’s an absolutely massive world that is filled with both stealthy and all-out action scenarios that are sure to be a delight for hardcore and casual Avatar fans. Cooking, crafting, hunting, and the like are all there and while you aren’t going to find anything groundbreaking, this is still one of the best Ubisoft games in years and a stellar Avatar adventure for fans around the world. While not every activity of the game is perfect, I was pleasantly surprised by just how great this game turned out.
Graphics and Sound
Lush. Gorgeous. Epic. Gritty. Triumphant. Those are just a few terms that come to mind during my play time with both the graphics and audio of Pandora. Right from the start, you can see the incredible graphics engine and passion put into this project. Bright and lush jungles, steamy vents, and dank caves are rendered in some jaw-dropping environments. Just click on any of the screens in our review to see unfiltered, maxed graphics on an RTX 4090 of the PC version. The game is extremely polished with the day 1 patch build were able to play and I’m shocked at how smooth it was overall.
The audio portion of the game is equally impressive with a better-than-it-should-be soundtrack and bombastic sound effects. The voice acting is also extremely well crafted bringing it all together as a stellar piece of audiovisual eye and ear candy. Bravo to the Massive and Ubi teams!
Feedback
While I don’t have a ton of things I would change about Pandora, I would say that the sensing ability that you find items, creatures, etc needs some work. Visually and functionality-wise wise it’s just lacking with a lot of clutter in some areas that made it difficult to spot what I was truly looking for.
Along the same line, some of the map markers are less than desirable with big glowing items overlapping items in a clump of clutter. While the map overall is fine, it could use some fine-tuning and clarity visually.
Verdict
Overall, I found Frontiers of Pandora one of the best and biggest surprises of 2023. I wasn’t expecting much to be honest and that aided in my joy with the game. It’s a perfect way to wrap up an already stellar year in gaming. For Avatar fans, this is what you’ve been waiting for. It’s an absolute treat to finally be able to live in this fully realized and gorgeous world. For open-world game fans, this is solid not perfect entry into the Ubisoft catalog that is huge but feels more focused and lovingly crafted than some recent games.
