The best game of 2023? Well no, but it’s still awesome
Happy two-year anniversary to Immortals of Aveum, 2023’s most underrated game
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Two years ago today, one of the best games of 2023 launched. No, it’s not the one you’re probably thinking of. Not that one either. It’s Immortals of Aveum, baby, Ascendant Studios’ 2023 FPS that answered the question, “How ‘bout shooting with magic instead of guns?”
The answer to that question, it turned out, was a resounding “oh, hell yeah!” Spearheaded by a former Call of Duty dev, you can feel that series’ ethos coursing through the campaign, though using magic for guns is frankly way cooler than sniper rifles or SMGs. The magic in Aveum‘s world falls into three categories: blue, green, and red, which control like precision rifles, automatic firearms, and shotguns, respectively. Most characters in the world of Immortals of Aveum can only utilize one type of magic, but you play as Jak, the game’s Special Boy who can use all three colors of magic to quell his enemies.
Swapping between the three magic varieties during battle adds a light puzzle mechanic to your typical gun fights. You have to match Jak’s magic to a foe’s color-coded health bar to best take them down, helping to keep Immortals‘ combat from feeling mindless and adding a nice wrinkle that’ll keep you engaged.
Jak also obtains a magic shield, grappling hook, and a blast wave ability, among others, as the game progresses, ensuring his arsenal is never light on ways to clear out enemies. He can unleash a powerful magic beam that utilizes all three colors of magic, and all of this effectively makes Jak-without-a-C a one-man army.
I won’t extol the virtues of Immortals of Aveum’s story; it’s serviceable, and does its job in moving Jak and the other characters from one encounter to the next. But we ain’t here for the story; we’re here because we want to shotgun an enemy to the face with Jak’s magic arm boom cannon.
Immortals of Aveum released exactly two years ago today on Aug. 22, 2023. That year was a big one for video games (perhaps you’ve heard of Baldur’s Gate 3, I don’t know), and late summer to early fall was an especially good time to be a gamer. Baldur’s Gate 3, Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon, Sea of Stars, and Starfield all came out within weeks of each other on either side of Immortals of Aveum, and that’s to say nothing of later releases like Alan Wake 2, Lies of P, or Marvel’s Spider-Man 2. So, I’m not surprised Immortals of Aveum struggled to find an audience at the time.
It took a swing in bringing some originality to the FPS genre, even if FPS fans are just going to gravitate toward a new Call of Duty or Battlefield anyway. Immortals of Aveum may have swung and missed when it launched, but it’s a good game still worth celebrating, in a way — even if celebrating only means trying it out for an hour on Game Pass or PS Plus. (For those who like owning games, it’s frequently on sale, and is $10.49 for Xbox at the moment.)
So, move over, Be An Angel Day and National Surgical Oncologist Day. We’ve got a new holiday to celebrate on Aug. 22: Happy Immortals of Aveum Day, y’all.
