Agents of Mayhem - Review @ AusGamers

AusGamers checked out the action game Agents of Mayhem (which comes with a few RPG elements):

Agents of Mayhem Review

Calling in a vehicle in Agents of Mayhem creates a small circle that your Agent needs to stand-in as their vehicle of choice drives towards them at high speeds. When it gets close enough the Agent jumps into the air, strikes a pose, and then phases into the vehicle where they’re now behind the wheel and ready to drive. It’s a cool little transition effect, and one that you’ll no doubt see often throughout your time with Agents of Mayhem, the new open-world action game from Volition - the studio behind the Saints Row series. The only problem is that after the vehicle transition is completed, the vehicle comes to a complete stop.

Which is somewhat of a metaphor for the entire experience, it moves in the right direction but stops short of greatness.

Initial impressions are important. But none more so than with a piece of entertainment like Agents of Mayhem. It’s Saints Row IV by the way of a Saturday morning cartoon. Crude, juvenile, profane, and often very funny. And it feels like a natural progression from Volition’s last outing, Saints Row IV. Where, the GTA-inspired series moved so far from the its source material as to become an almost parody of crime-based open world action games. And in the process become one of the genre’s most consistently entertaining games.

[…]

Going back to initial impressions, the first few hours of Agents of Mayhem are genuinely exciting and entertaining. And funny too. It’s the open-world of high-tech Seoul and the repetitive missions that fail to live up to the colourful Agents and the Saturday morning cartoon vibe. Which is unfortunate. The juvenile sense of humour won’t appeal to everyone, but the same could be said for just about every Volition-developed title of the past decade. And in that sense, the studio’s latest effort is worth considering if you’re a Saints Row fan. For everyone else, imagine a ludicrous ‘80s cartoon built around the profane and juvenile marines featured in James Cameron’s classic film Aliens. Where they’re globe-trotting government agents, and prone to enter fits of gravity defying carnage.

Score: 7/10

What we liked

• Saturday morning cartoon vibe
• Colourful cast of somewhat juvenile Agents
• The Agent combo of Hollywood, Braddock and Red Card
• The Agent variety is diverse, as is the surprisingly deep customisation
• Oh, and it’s funny

What we didn't like

• Repetitive mission design
• Automatic difficulty scaling that removes the feeling of becoming all-powerful
• Which is a feature from Saints Row IV that we loved
• … But it can be adjusted
• Open-world of Seoul doesn’t really invite exploration
• No co-op

More information.

I'm 25 hours in the game.

Pros:
- everything AusGamers liked
- it's singleplayer only!
- no, difficulty scaling is not automatic, you can set it yourself at any time (except in sidekick unlock missions and holodeck)

Cons:
- not enough humor, it needs much more of it
- too much of grinding, especially for contracts, example, fall 10 times from a high spot
- randomly generated underground bases result in atrocious leveldesign in those
- poorly designed outpost takeovers that feel like a stupid dog chasing their own tail