Review: ‘Fated’ is a Viking Age Adventure That Plays a Number on Your Heartstrings

8

I try not to let my emotions get the better of me, but in Fated: The Silent Oath, a first-person action-adventure game recently released for Oculus Rift and HTC Vive, there’s really nothing I could do to ward off the strange feeling that I, the least dad-like person on the planet, had to protect a human child. And you know what? I kind of liked it.

With a mead horn strapped to my side and impossibly broad shoulders, I wake up in the back of a horse-drawn cart, apparently fleeing from a destroyed settlement. Stepping into the shoes of a simple Viking villager, the silent protagonist Ulfer, I learn that I’ve lost my memory—and more importantly, my voice. Nodding my head ‘yes’ and ‘no’ is my only way to communicate, but my wife is glad that I’m alive just the same. Her father, not so much—and if that’s not realism, I don’t know what it.

The whole experience is set to the backdrop of the various gods and monsters of Norse mythology, and if you don’t know anything more than what you picked up from the Thor movie franchise (Do you even read the Poetic Edda, bro?), Fated is more than happy to teach you from the perspective of a child. Your daughter, Lif, asks questions about whether you believe in the Jötunn, the mythical ice giants, and the holy woman Edda tells you how the Jötunn came to be as your family runs for their life from the towering demi-god.

Fated delivers a sort of Pixar-esque cartoon style that hovers safely on the near side of the uncanny valley, which means you’ll be able to make the sort of emotional connection with the characters without over scrutinizing them visually. This is tinged however by brief moments of not-so-great voice acting—which at times felt unnatural. Voice-heavy VR experiences like Fated are kind of a risky proposition that way, as a single insincere line can be more of an immersion-breaker than a dropped frame.

SEE ALSO
New Qualcomm MR Reference Headset Shows What to Expect From Samsung

That said, I immediately bonded with my little daughter Liv for a few reasons. To me, kids are annoying little drunk people, and I’m the sort of person that would pay extra for an adults-only flight so I don’t have to deal with them. But when you’re put in the driver’s seat of a horse-drawn cart and you have to dodge the angry fist of an 800-foot tall ice giant, and a child is pleading “Daddy, help me!”… you’re going to feel something inside. I dare you not to.

These moments especially pull on your heartstrings—you can call it ‘latent paternal instinct’ if you want—but it’s the times when you’re hanging out, or walking somewhere when you really get a sense of what sort of person Liv really is. Like most kids, Liv does whatever the hell she wants, and there isn’t a spare moment when she isn’t bopping around and saying all sorts of silly things, whether it be a line of questions or the constant quipping between her and older cousin Sven. I got a real sense from Liv’s dialogue and direction that she’s got to be based on a real kid, an adorably cute one at that.

Warning: the video below contains spoilers.

While I’m not a dad (maybe I will be someday, I don’t know), for a brief 2+ hours I felt something I’ve never felt before: the burning need to protect my family in the face of dire circumstances. That feeling stayed with me well after I finished the game—only the first part of a multi-part series. In fact I was so surprised by the end of the last chapter, I replayed it twice to be sure what I saw was real. And that’s the sort of real drama that I want to experience in VR.

SEE ALSO
Vision Pro Has Apps and Quest Has Games, What Can Samsung Bring to XR to Compete?

There are a few puzzles scattered throughout the narrative, most of which focus on matching symbols, but I felt like these were just too simple to be truly engaging. Then again, movies and games have taught us that entering a centuries-old temple only requires minimal effort on the part of the protagonist, so this is par for the course I suppose.

Comfort

As with all first-person experiences, comfort is an issue. But with a good number of navigational options at your disposal you can almost always assure yourself a comfortable time. Fated not only includes a ‘snap turn’ rotational mode (aka ‘VR comfort mode’) with variable angles, and a ‘yaw stick pan’ for traditionalist, but also several styles of graphical overlays that give you anchor points in the world, like floating squares and other translucent particle effects. Particle effects have proven time and time again to help reduce the dreaded ‘sim sickness’, and it’s good to see a game lets you toggle these to suit your gameplay style.

To me, being comfortable also means being unencumbered, and the fact that there isn’t a fast-walk option—only the same slow plodding pace throughout the whole game—makes me feel slightly uncomfortable. Maybe not physically, but there is a certain amount of frustration in not being able to walk how 99 percent of the first-person games allow you to (and with no explanation as to why).

Overall, I really enjoyed Fated and can’t wait to see what happens next in the series, and maybe learn a little more about Norse mythology in the process. You can buy it on Steam or Oculus Home.

REVIEW OVERVIEW
Comfort
Gameplay
Immersion

This article may contain affiliate links. If you click an affiliate link and buy a product we may receive a small commission which helps support the publication. See here for more information.


Well before the first modern XR products hit the market, Scott recognized the potential of the technology and set out to understand and document its growth. He has been professionally reporting on the space for nearly a decade as Editor at Road to VR, authoring more than 3,500 articles on the topic. Scott brings that seasoned insight to his reporting from major industry events across the globe.
  • Justos

    I don’t know if you realized, but in the first scene you were basically knocked out and in trouble. I felt the slow walking added to the immersion of being torn down. Maybe a button to toggle short sprints would be handy.

    I give this game a 4/5 as well. Just a bit too short, but incredibly fun and polished.

  • Gene R.

    $20 Seems like an extremely high price for the experience and not because it is so very, very short (“Call of Starseed” was very short but it was an order of magnitude greater, truly incredible, memorable and worthwhile experience by comparison) . I wanted to love this game and was very excited to try it but just could n’t get over the flat and boring line delivery, stiff and lackluster character animation, and the horrible dissociate motion due to lack of room-scale movement and motion controls.

  • Sam Illingworth

    Hurray! Something that’s not an Oculus exclusive!

  • CMcD

    Great review! I was curious if my strong feelings for the daughter in the game were because I actually have a daughter of roughly the same age. Very cool that you felt those strong emotional ties as well.

    I thought this game was phenomenal and I can’t wait for future episodes. Nodding your head yes or no felt great and should pretty much just be in every VR game as an optional way to communicate with npcs from now on. I personally stood when my character was standing and sat when he was sitting reorienting each time and it definitely added to the immersion. Now, that said, if you’ve been spoiled by the greatness of room scale VR and touch controls you’re going to get frustrated playing this game on the Vive with a controller. For oculus rift this is the most immersed I’ve been with a controller. There are so many times you want to reach out with your real hands and comfort your daughter or wave a torch around or pick something up that you will miss your vive touch controllers for sure.

    All in all I loved that this game made me feel strong emotions and it was able to accomplish those emotional connections in a short time span. Now I need to go replay it again, cheers!

  • Muddy

    I was excited to try this but then found out it has no tracked controller support, only gamepad? After playing Vanishing Realms, I don’t think I could go back to gamepad. Thoughts on this anyone?

    • CMcD

      The main thing is, how much do you like story driven experiences? I can’t wait to get my Vive, room-scale feels like “true VR” and using a controller instead of my hands feels super lame in comparison. But I would gladly pay $20 again to experience this story and the emotions it makes me feel. Did I have to do a little extra work to “immerse myself”? Yes, I made sure to sit or stand based on what posture my character was in. Starseed is the game I’m most excited to play when my Vive arrives but I’m still going to come back to Fates for each episode because of what it made me FEEL. Hope that helps!

  • Nads

    Great review! But is this $20 for the first episode only? Or for the full series? Once purchased will you get future episodes free?

  • Shaun Oster

    I had full VR dreams after playing this. IMMERSIVE.