There aren’t a lot of games that focus on the pre-apocalypse; some games will have a level that explains how things got really messed up and use it to emphasise the nihilism of the apocalypse. It is not often that you see As Far As The Eye ‘s lovely deviation from this theme. The events take place as a world-ending wave is surging and the remaining occupants are making a break for the centre of the planet, a place called the Eye.
The game itself is a 2D turn-based roguelike. Each level is a procedurally generated hex map, with the objective of collecting enough resources to be able to get to the next map and therefore closer to the Eye. This is done by taking control of a nomadic tribe of ‘Pupils’, gathering elements, building temporary bases and then harvesting and refining the elements available. If done before the waters arrive the player can gather up their tribe, the moving base and a limited set of resources to take with them. This introduces a good risk/reward element where staying a little bit longer on a map could help speed up progress in the next biome but could also end a run.
Each Pupil also grows as the player progresses – as they gather resources, build, hunt, etc they will gain affinity for those skills and get better at them and eventually unlock the ability to specialise. The game has a nice touch as the Pupils warp between different animal shapes to denote what task they are working on and what you should have them do. It also made me grow attached to them as they increased in skill and gave them a semblance of a personality. Not to mention as the tasks became more complex, I needed more skilled Pupils to help me through.
With how sprawling As Far As The Eye can sometimes feel with different characters harvesting and moving around, the art direction does a great job of separating everything out visually and the simple animations and outlines make it easy to distinguish everything at a glance. It also gives As Far As The Eye a really distinct look from a lot of its peers and if there were Pupil plushies I would probably buy one.
I was also enamoured with the message too. Yes, the world was on the verge of extinction, but it didn’t have to be that way. Each new map reached feels like an indication of hope, that rebuilding is still possible.
As Far As The Eye is mechanically no pushover either. It does a good job of making there feel like there are stakes at every point, whether it is building another building in the hope of having a few more spare resources; or the simple puzzle of stocking up the travelling base before moving – each type of produce has a different shape and so the player must engage in Tetris-style arrangement to get the best results.
With a few more tweaks I think As Far As the Eye would have been one of my favourite games of 2022, unfortunately it has one major stumbling block – the controller layout.
The layout never felt intuitive in the 8-9 hours I played it. There was a reliance on using the triggers to switch between Pupils, rather than a context sensitive select from the main map. Too often I would forget that once I select a Pupil I couldn’t just highlight a new one and issue new commands. This led to me committing to decisions where I would send the wrong Pupil to the wrong place and then have to spend my next turn undoing my mistake. The controls upgrading/demolishing/building also felt clumsily implemented, like there were too many things to map to a controller (a problem easily solved by having a keyboard to assign unique commands to) and the radial controls often left me struggling.
Over and over again these missteps, though small in isolation, added up to me failing a map due to wasted turns or misunderstanding a controller function.
This all ends up being a shame because when As Far As The Eye works there is a lot to love there. I would probably say that the Steam version is probably a better shot and only those that are console bound should give this version a go.
Conclusion
Aesthetically a wonderful little title that has lots of features in there that I wanted to play of. Sadly, As Far As The Eye is hindered by a counter-intuitive controller scheme.
This game was reviewed based on Xbox One review code, using an Xbox Series S|X console. All of the opinions and insights here are subject to that version. Game provided by publisher.
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