When it comes to story focused dramas on PlayStation VR, there are several choices available to consumers. Fated: The Silent Oath throws another hat in to the ring and does so for the fairly reasonable price of £7.99. It’s an interesting tale set during the age of Vikings. You play a man spared death, as long as he sacrifices his voice and tells nobody as to why. It’s refreshing to have reasoning for a silent protagonist and the other characters respond to it by asking them yes or no questions, as well as acknowledging their lack of a voice.
The issue with the yes and no questions is that you respond to them by shaking or nodding your head. It seems sometimes the game might not be expecting you to make that choice and thus doesn’t register it. This means that you’re moving your head about for no real reason, which instantly breaks immersion. Unfortunately it’s not the only thing to break immersion in the game. Invisible walls obstruct progression, characters don’t react when you stand right in front of them and they’re talking to others, and the animations aren’t the smoothest.
Minus the animations though, these issues won’t rear their head if you spend your time admiring the world building around you. It’s got a nice style and some solid voice acting that helps tell the story it sets out to well. The characters are likeable and you’ll want to see what happens next to them, even if there are a few story beats that you’ll telegraph long before they happen.
The game itself will last you around 90 minutes. In that time it’s stronger in the moments that you’re leading the progression of characters, in part due to the previously mentioned invisible walls. Fated does a good job in having different ways to progress things too. Although there’s a fair amount of walking places, the game also serves up puzzles to solve and dialogue options that will make you think about the right answer before jumping right in with a “yes” or “no”.
Due to the short play time of the game it seems the developers understood that they needed to mix things up to make sure gamers wanted to progress. Breaking the game up in to different acts works well too as it gives those that are wanting to just play in short bursts the chance to take a break. A chapter select also makes it easy to go back to a different point in the game if you want to. Whether that’s to try something else or just experience a part of the game again.
Chapter select is found via the main menu and there’re obviously options to fine tune your experience there too. You better make sure that you fine tune your options settings before delving in to the game because, oddly, there doesn’t seem to be a way to do this once you’re in the game. A lack of subtitles is also a massive shame that makes it even more inaccessible for those with hearing issues. If you do manage to get the audio levels right, though, you’ll be able to hear some lovely music to accompany the strong voice acting.
Fated: The Silent Oath is an interesting experience that delivers a package that never out stays its welcome. In fact, if anything, it leaves you wanting more thanks to the way it ends. Hopefully this becomes the first in a series of games, as there are a lot of unanswered questions. The cast of characters are built up in a way that will make you invested in them if you allow yourself to be absorbed in to the story. Fated: The Silent Oath may be fairly clunky game, but there’s a lot of nice elements that sequels could easily build upon. Let’s just hope they get the chance to.
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You can watch me play the first act of the game below.