Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora Reviews
Thus, Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora is what one would expect of a soulless licensed game on the PlayStation 2/early-PlayStation 3 era. The main different is the monetary correction of inflation, updated to what one would expect to pay for an open world title in the current industry.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora held all the cards and, at least from our perspective, squandered them all. This reskinned Far Cry is a mediocrity gallery reflecting the current AAA production stuck in the last decade. The Snowdrop engine does help cover up some visible flaws, but when there's a lack of polished plot, quests, and meaningful gameplay, players will figure it out sooner or later. So, while Frontiers of Pandora may not rank among the worst games of the year, it is definitely one of those games that will soon be forgotten with all the mediocrity.
Review in Czech | Read full review
Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora had the components to be an excellent game. The narrative base was there, the premise too, and even the gameplay. Ideas that in theory could be interesting, but in practice fell far short of what was expected. I honestly felt that they took several titles from the Far Cry saga (based on Primal, but with current graphics), put them in the blue Avatar outfit and released this title.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora is a big misstep and feels like Ubisoft's biggest missed opportunity in a while. Not even the fantastical and majestic sights of Pandora and some engaging hunts can cure the buggy, unoptimised product presented to the world. Offering a dull story while it trips and stumbles on delicate themes, it too is simply a confused formula of everything you've seen before from other titles, almost all of it ill-fitting. Two adaptations under their belt and it seems Ubisoft just can't get that voyage of Pandora right.
An Avatar game was a strange choice to become a game from the beginning, and adding the Far Cry formula to it has resulted in a game that's not good but not too bad either; it's just mediocre. Hopefully, Massive Entertainment's next game, Star Wars Outlaws, looks to have higher prospects of being a better game and not just another uninspired game based on a famous IP. Avatar Frontiers Of Pandora is truly only for fans who just want more from James Cameron's Avatar, but not those looking for a great open-world game to sink their teeth into.
With a story that follows predictable beats, mechanics that provide zero gameplay benefit, and murky visuals, Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora delivers an extremely underwhelming experience. PC players be warned of many technical issues.
This is textbook average entertainment; it won't disappoint, but it certainly won't excite.
Frontiers of Pandora is, in essence, just another Far Cry experience—one with breathtaking art direction and a thoughtful portrayal of an alien culture, but a Far Cry experience nonetheless. It’s a tired formula applied to a property that’s capable of showing us much more. This game’s Pandora is a beautiful place to visit, but living there makes for a boring existence.
In the face of an IP filled with rich themes with something important to say, Frontiers of Pandora ignores the point entirely and goes on to have a gameplay loop where players spend most of their time killing otherwise docile animals to make arbitrary numbers go up so they can be as immortal as possible within the confines of the game. This would be business as usual for any other open-world gameplay loop, but it's embarrassingly ironic and tone-deaf for an Avatar game. Sure, anti-pollution sentiments are there because it's impossible to make an Avatar spin-off without them, but they're there superficially and treated as a checkbox for players to complete - ultimately ringing hollow. A betrayal of Cameron’s themes with the Avatar IP, seemingly stapled together as an attempt to get a slice of the highest-grossing film of all time’s pie, Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora isn’t just generic; it is downright cynical.
It helps that you can see what you're doing when you're driving around a desert.
Frontiers of Pandora's stunning presentation and fantastic world design are failed by atrocious technical issues.
Overall, Avatar is a strangely designed game that offers something different than you would expect from an action-adventure game in this world. Not an action adventure, it's more of a survival effort and slow stealth combat. But in no area is it fully fleshed out. But the world itself is handled very nicely.
Review in Slovak | Read full review
Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora is all spectacle being probably the most impressive current generation game when it comes to visuals, but alas a rather boring time lacking substance.
While Frontier of Pandora's open world is an audio-visual feast, the formulaic structure of its gameplay and the tools it give you to wade through it feels far too familiar to make it worth visiting for long.
Avatar fans will find it hard to resist the apparent attention that went into this game. Even though the Avatar directors at Disney took extreme care to ensure accuracy in every detail, this game will not win over fans of the Avatar franchise. Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora's lesser aspects, such as its dull narratives, lackluster antagonists, and uninspired RDA designs, are detrimental to the game's overall quality. It's frustrating because the core objectives in the game involve dull, uninspiring facilities and repetitive battles against the same enemies.
This was a journey full of ups and downs while exploring Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora. At first, the experience proved to be discouraging with a disconcerting entrance, but along the way it proved to be fun, having won me over with the visual exuberance of the scenarios, the game mechanics and the freedom to move around the map. However, the disappointment ended up being felt in the final part, with a poorly constructed ending, especially due to the poor quality of the cinematic scenes, something that should be at a higher level for such a reputable franchise.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
While it has some novel ideas, Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora's extremely repetitive quest design, underwhelming progression, and wholly monotonous gear system make it one of the most forgettable open world games of 2023.
There are lots of design choices I didn’t mesh with in Frontiers of Pandora. I love the world, but barriers blocked me from fully immersing myself in it, and it’s littered with activities and outposts plucked straight out of the 2010s and planted in Pandora’s soil.
The decision to make another Far Cry game with Avatar IP is very questionable. On the other hand, the game turned out to be very similar to the source: it's a bland adventure with passable story and unbelievable graphics.
Review in Russian | Read full review
Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora can't put its human nature aside long enough to properly honor the Na'vi.