FAU-G : The Beginning of Gaming In INDIA

FAU-G is one of India’s most hyped up games, and for good reason. The Made-in-India game is an action title that revolves around real-life events that took place on Indian borders. It features an in-game store where you can buy merchandise and contribute to the Indian Army.  It’s even got its own anthem.

When FAU-G launched on January 26, India’s 72nd Republic Day, we decided to give the title a shot and played it for quite some time. Here’s our review of FAU-G in detail.

Gameplay

Unlike popular belief, FAU-G is as of now, a close-combat game. Most of the action is fist punches and kicks and handcrafted weapons that get their own names like ‘Lalkaar’, or ‘Tandav’. This immediately sets it apart from PUBG and other action titles, which have a larger emphasis on shooting. 

We will focus on the single-player campaign mode, which is the only mode that is available to play. Battle Royale and Team Death match modes are yet to be added to the game. 

FAU-G features a rather simple linear narrative where you follow a path from checkpoint to checkpoint and deal with enemies who get in the way. Gameplay is restricted to just three elements for now – movement, strike and defend. There is no jumping, no weapons you can throw. This often left us with a feeling that the game is getting repetitive as it progresses. Once the hand-held weapons are introduced, there is nothing new to try out. 

Combat and weapons

The three-button combat system in FAU-G has a lot of room for improvement, especially when it comes to hand-held weapons. Weapons that you collect after beating such enemies will also last for only a few strikes before they vanish.

While this is challenging, what was very frustrating is that weapons have only a couple of strikes left in them and cannot be replaced with new weapons even if they are right in front of you. Instead, players will have to look for more enemies, use up the remaining strikes of that weapon, and then come back to pick up the replenished weapon. This was also time-consuming.

Verdict

The FAU-G experience for us has been a mixed bag. Great at graphics and fluidity, the game is let down by its poor combat implementation and uninspiring, unchanging gameplay style. Throughout our experience, the game often felt incomplete, repetitive and simply put, boring.

While we wouldn’t exactly call the game half-baked, we would strongly say that FAU-G needs more focus and polish on actual combat, before it can be enjoyable for people beyond the first 30 minutes or so.