Jett: The Far Shore Review – To Go Nowhere Boldly

“Surrounded by wonder, touched by dread” is a line from Jett: The Sacred Writings of Far Shore. These scriptures guide Mei, the protagonist, and filter into all aspects of the game. Convenient enough, The quote is an apt description of my time with Jett, and not always for the best reasons. Some narrative moments reach climaxes, although the tedious gameplay of the title always brought me down again.

Jett begins in a world in its last stages, where the inhabitants realize that they are doomed. The adventure begins strongly as I listen to the mourning of my people, knowing that I will not share their fate. I am also overwhelmed by his hope that my search will save part of civilization. Seeking comfort in religion, people cling to the idea that my crew’s prophesied scientific and spiritual mission across the galaxy will save humanity from total annihilation. The narrative never explains what caused my home sad fate of the world, but use excellent visual storytelling to fill in the blanks. Chimneys choke the skies around you, spreading smog and soot across the landscape. The grim spectacle brilliantly outlines one of the reasons for the crisis: rampant industrialization. In a darkly ironic way, it suggests that the factories creating your planet’s escape technology are killing those who remain, inspiring guilt from some survivors.

Sleek, minimalist world graphics provide a distinct and beautiful appearance, especially during key moments like your crew take off, when the horizon turns into a beautiful transition to the stars. Jett has a specific retro-futuristic design. This style works because you are bringing the past with you through time and space. While Chapter 0, a sort of prologue, has poignant goodbyes and thought-provoking visuals, the rest of Jett struggles to measure up.

After heading to “the far shore”, a place of legend described by sacred texts, my scout team The adventure quickly went from delicious to dangerous. After being exposed to the alien elements and touched by a mysterious presence, I began to see things. While passing out after an accident, I had crazy dreams about my village with shadow figures instead of people. But the visions didn’t end when I woke up and began to see signs on the ground that my fellow crew members couldn’t. These signs let me know when I might interact with something, like when I used my boat to make the flowers bloom. Although these exhibition-driven illusions lead to a series of wonderfully bizarre sequences, the story ultimately gets nowhere satisfying with them.

Much of the game takes place on your jett, a superpowered ship for two people that allows you to fly through the environment. Unfortunately, the strong visuals in the first section of the game are lost when flying. The reduced art style in these sequences makes the world look like unspeakable blocks of color. As a result, the characters’ reactions to the visually empty, but supposedly impressive world are jarring. I found it difficult to measure my speed due to the paucity of surrounding landmarks, which made me feel like a bug buzzing around the screen rather than an interplanetary rover traveling at super speeds.

Piloting your jett never feels good. The camera is focused on the middle of the screen, not the vehicle, making it awkward to move around and look where you’re going simultaneously. I was frustrated several times when performing delicate operations, such as hiding in the shadows for cover or aiming for the release of grasped objects, because the controls are difficult to operate. In addition, the game imposes a tedious limitation when it comes to flying at full speed. You need to continually keep an eye on a meter to make sure you don’t go too fast for too long so it doesn’t overheat and shut down the engines.

Getting off the ship is also an attempt. Every time my character’s feet hit the ground, I feel like I’m going through the pudding. And the off-jetty interactions, which often feature exhibit-packed dialogue, are rarely noticeable enough to make up for the tedious ride. Many of these issues are not glitches that spoil the game on their own, but Jett has so many minor annoyances that add up to making exploration a chore, which is a shame for a game about space exploration.

Jett: The Far Shore shines brightly in some narrative-heavy sections, and its visuals may be impressive, but – despite starting full potential – does not deliver on its promise. Sadly, Jett’s ending, like the time I spent piloting his interstellar spacecraft, feels more unsatisfying than exhilarating.