The first batch of reviews for SPIDERS’ action-RPG Bound by Flame paints a decidedly mixed picture, with scores ranging from 2 to 9 (out of 10).
Polygon, 4/10.
I tried everything I could think of to get myself to care about Bound by Flame, but eventually I tired of doing all the heavy lifting myself. Between a stale plot that goes nowhere, poorly handled characters and a clunky, boring combat system, there was nothing left for me to hang onto, no momentum left to help propel me. Bound by Flame is worse than just generic; it’s a mess of a game pretending at greater ambitions.
GameSpot, 4/10.
By RPG standards, Bound by Flame isn’t a very long or expansive game. If you don’t consider the battles you must repeat, the adventure is around a dozen hours long, and there is no world to explore, unless you consider a few medium-size levels made up of twisting hallways to be a world. Bound by Flame shoves too many ideas into its cramped boundaries, thus giving none of them the room they deserved to blossom, and thereby allowing the flames to burn the joy away.
IncGamers, 6/10.
A solid RPG experience offering everything you’d expect – but not enough surprises. Many enjoyable features but feels like playing part one of a two parter.
Videogamer.com, 2/10.
The narrative is not passable. It’s a mess, and it’s delivered via a script that is at once intentionally juvenile and unintentionally stupid. A script which has an unhealthy fixation on the words (whore), (bitch), and (slut). A script in which a character describing having non-consensual sex with his catatonic wife is served up as comic relief. This actually happens. Bound By Flame is an embarrassment on all fronts.
The Escapist, 2.5/5.
Of Orcs and Men was a truly great game, in spite of its flaws. Mars: War Logs was a truly rubbish game, in spite of its promise. Spiders’ latest lies somewhere in the middle the studio’s last two efforts. Bound By Flame isn’t awful, but it’s too sloppy a thing to ever live up to its potential. It frustrates me greatly, because I can so clearly see the sincerity this game has, an honest shamelessness that I cannot help but respect. I also appreciate how genuinely well put together its combat and world is.
It’s just a shame that there are all these great components that have just been mashed together in a completely haphazard way.
GamesRadar, 3.5/5.
Bound by Flame doesn’t put too much weight on the important choices you think you’re making, but its rich customization options and smart combat system are sure to give you that power you’re looking for.
GameReactor, 7/10.
In the end, and surprisingly after those first few hours, Spiders manages to deliver a compelling story; enough to raise our verdict a couple of notches from our original impression. However, the team immediately have a list of fixes they need to attend if they revisit this world. They need to make sure there’s customisation for our companion, while combat and armour choices should factor in earlier. If you know the studio’s past works, Orcs and Men and Mars: War Logs, will be at home with their idiosyncratic charm.
n3rdabl3, 1.5/5.
The Oxford Dictionary defines a game as (An activity that one engages in for amusement). This is why all the way Bound By Flame has no reason to be called a game. It could have been an immensely challenging yet rewarding experience, it could even have been a blindingly simple four hour visual novel and it would still be a game. However Bound By Flame instead sits at the bottom of all these piles. The only amusement to be had in Bound By Flame is at the expense its technical execution. Bound By Flame is an ambitious project which fails at every possible turn to be a game worth playing.
Softpedia, 8.5/10.
All in all, Bound by Flame is a worthwhile experience that takes an overplayed fantasy storyline and breathes new life into it, even managing to surprise at times, offering a captivating journey and luring you within its world, keeping you glued to the keyboard until you see its conclusion.
GameInformer, 8/10.
A skilled player doing no sidequests and blowing through dialogue can complete the game in about 10-12 hours, but this is sacrificing a ton of content both in the quest, exploration, and relationship-building categories. When you invest the time to master the challenging combat and explore the world, Bound by Flame is a solid romp with rewarding tactical action supported by rewarding boss battles and plenty of ways to see your choices reflected in the world around you.
God is a Geek, 5/10.
In Bound by Flame, Spiders deliver an action-RPG that just about manages to remain playable throughout, but offers not a single (wow) moment. An interesting but limited crafting system and an atmospheric fantasy world don’t make up for run-of-the-mill writing, 2-dimensional characters, imbalanced combat, and a rushed, unsatisfying narrative.
Like Of Orcs and Men before it, Bound by Flame is an uneven mishmash of decent new ideas and painfully generic genre tropes that struggle to gel, yet somehow it blunders through to deliver a mostly enjoyable adventure. Bound by Flame had a great deal of potential but it feels half-realised, and this is simply not the epic adventure we were promised.
Middle of Nowhere Gaming, 9/10.
Bound by Flame is a breath of fresh air in an otherwise crowded genre. Spiders has achieved what many developers fail to ever do: creating a beautiful world with an incredibly deep/interesting history while also including a rock solid fun combat system. Even though you can complete the main story and most of the sidequests in about 30 hours, many players will find themselves diving right back into the game to try and achieve the other two endings. Bound by Flame was everything I wanted it to be and then some. Spiders did an absolutely fantastic job and I hope that gamers will realize this so that we might see a sequel in the near future. How do I sum up the entire game in just three words? (Go buy it.)
Twin Stick Gaming, 7/10.
Bound by Flame feels like one of those rare games that is exactly the sum of its parts. Some of those parts are stunning, imaginative and exciting, other of those parts are bewildering, frustrating and defectively executed. I’m left with the feeling that this game could have been so much better if the studio hadn’t tried so hard to be a triple-A game and spread themselves too thin.
Trusted Reviews, 5/10.
Bound by Flame looks like a budget RPG contender, and there are some nice ideas in the combat system and the Bioware-like treatment of the side-characters. Sadly, there’s just too much about it that’s generic, unpolished, badly animated, poorly implemented or uninspired. If you must have a fantasy RPG to play on PS4 then this might do, but there will be better around the corner, and this really isn’t an easy game to love.
