Aztech: Forgotten Gods is a third-person cyberstone action-adventure developed by Lienzo. The team started working on the game back in 2018 and even the pandemic couldn’t get in the way of developers’ love for their creation, bringing Aztech: Forgotten Gods to PC via Steam and Epic Games Store, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S and Nintendo Switch.
Now it is up to players to guide Achtli, a cybernetically enhanced Aztec warrior, on a quest to save her home, and fight colossal Forgotten Gods while maneuvering through the air with her unique abilities and an amazing prosthetic gauntlet. If you ever wondered what Arcane’s Vi feels when wielding her gauntlets, you won’t have to guess anymore!
However, Aztech is more than smashing blows, jetpack maneuvers and high-octane action. It also features a heartfelt, deep story of loss and personal growth that is enhanced by the dizzying soundtrack.
Are you ready? Put the Lightkeeper on, and let’s get going!
The game follows the story of Achtli, a young Aztec warrior that must face off against the gigantic beings resembling the ancient forgotten gods of the Mesoamerican pantheon. The events of the game take place in an alternate future where the Aztec empire flourished into a hyper-advanced civilization away from European interference. The developers have done a great job to incorporate advanced technology and futuristic details into the Aztec designs.
The game has a unique style that sets it apart from other action-adventure titles, both in terms of character design but also when it comes to locations, full of vertical space to explore and take advantage of, abilities and, of course, creatures.
In order to protect her home, Achtli will use a unique artifact – a mechanical gauntlet called the Lightkeeper. It is capable of collecting energy and synthesizing it in order to propel our heroine forward, providing players with the ability to control aerial movement and attacks.
The gauntlet’s ability to collect energy will come in handy when you are facing off against the enormous deities threatening the safety of the futuristic city. There are a number of ways to upgrade the Lightkeeper, including 22 potential passive enhancements to empower Achtli and make your battle against the Forgotten Gods all the more impressive.
That said, the game also gives players an option to change Achtli’s hairstyle and outfits so that the heroine can take on the monstrous creatures in style.
The game is quite open when it comes to exploration and movement around the in-game world. I loved spending time flying in circles over the city, simply eyeing ancient city with a veneer of futuristic technology. There is a number of activities to partake outside of the main plot such as participating in races that will help you choose the best options for covering a certain route.
Just be careful around water, our protagonist doesn’t like it!
Unfortunately, all of Aztech: Forgotten Gods’ strong sides and unique features come with a profound “BUT”.
While the game’s story and writing are not bad, the narrative lands on its face when the time comes to present it to players: long, drawn-out dialogues, lack of voice acting, repetitive animations and grunts during cutscenes, etc.
I’d have loved to have more details about the origins of the deities that face off against Achtli as well as the heroine’s interactions with them. Of course there are some opportunities to learn more about the gods or even talk with them, but they are infrequent and only feature some faces from the pantheon.
Aside from facing against the mentioned deities, the combat in Aztech is a repetitive button smasher if you learn enemies’ behavior, roughly split into three categories: soldiers, tanks and mages.
As you can imagine, soldiers are not particularly challenging opponents that tend to attack in a group; tanks are ape-like constructs that can take some hits and prefer to pursue Achtli in melee while mages, on the other hand, try to keep their distance and smack the heroine from afar.
Once you have that down, there is basically no need for strategic thinking, simply bashing your opponents with the Lightkeeper before they can do the same to you works out well enough.
Aztech: Forgotten Gods is a fun but flawed game. The developers had interesting ideas such as the setting, flying around the ancient but futuristic city and impactful combat throwing players in the middle of action.
However, its shortcomings manage to dull the impression. Full voice-acting would have done wonders to make the story of the game more comprehensible. Altogether, during my time in Aztech: Forgotten Gods I couldn’t shake off a feeling that I’m playing a modern port of an older console game.
Note: the Steam key was provided for free for the purpose of this review.
