With the 20th Century Fox-owned franchise getting acquired by Disney alongside the rest of the studio's properties, it's likely the company will want to take a similar approach to this stunning sci-fi universe as they have with the MCU and Star Wars bra

Considering the Avatar IP hasn't been fleshed out much further than the initial movie, there's not a great array of villains for the game to capitalize on. The means that the title largely plays into the conflict audiences have previously seen, between the Na'vi and human

The first thing I noticed when jumping into the game was how much of its control scheme and gameplay mechanics feel transplanted from Ubisoft’s long-running open-world series. I can pull back a bow similarly, or sprint forward to clamber up platforms in ways that feel almost identical. You can’t shake the similarities, so much so that it wouldn’t be a stretch to label Frontiers of Pandora as a licensed side project, one that takes an existing universe and applies the Far Cry model to it.

Flying feels incredible, though, and goes a long way in conveying the sheer vastness of this world. Your Ikran isn’t limited to the clouds, but can soar far above them until it flirts with the precipice of space, all before flying back down in a process that not only takes minutes, but teases parts of the map I wasn’t allowed to explore yet, and couldn’t wait to uncover. It’s hard to ignore what Frontiers of Pandora is going for in its design philosophy, and how much of it fails to offer up anything new. But if it manages to flesh out the world of Avatar and its many ideas just enough, those shortcomings could be forgiven. There is a unique appeal to being dropped in a licensed game that goes beyond being a tie-in, and wants to push the universe further with its own spin on things, although it’s hard to tell how compelling its ideas can really be when the gameplay it relies on is made up of things we’ve seen so many times before, and also done better elsewhere.

The release date for Avatar: Frontiers Of Pandora hasn't been penciled in completely but has been confirmed to be at some point in 2022. The second film in James Cameron's sci-fi saga will also be releasing in cinemas across the world in the same y

Drawing from the movies and the creative designs for Pandora at the Walt Disney Parks , the video game will be portraying the Na'vi home and its society in great detail. All of the visual cues for the project have demonstrated the richness of the breathtaking alien planet. Players will especially be visiting the Western Frontier, a largely unseen area of the pla

When trying to track down an objective, instead of a map marker you are given a handful of generic descriptors that are meant to encourage natural exploration of the world, but in most cases I would simply follow the quest icon and walk around awkwardly until I stumbled upon what I was searching for. Pandora is a fairly homogenous mixture of bright colours and alien fauna, meaning it was difficult to pinpoint proper landmarks or feel like I was making a mark on a place I would come to fondly memorise. It felt like an extra hurdle, and one that doesn’t do enough to differentiate itself from its contemporaries. Sprinting can feel weirdly slow too, making on-foot traversal of Pandora a bit of an afterthought once you have access to a flying mount who can be summoned from literally anywhere. When I could fast travel or soar into the sky, walking around on my lanky blue legs didn’t feel worth the trouble without knowing exactly what side missions would await me on the ground.

Like other creatures on Pandora, the Na'vi can connect to Ikran through their braids, which act like chords joining them together. What distinguishes Ikran, however, is setting up the link permanently ties it to the rider. This means that any Na'vi and an Ikran that form this link remain lifelong companions. Because of this, many Na'vi clans view bonding with an Ikran as a rite of passage and most Na'vi warriors have an Ik

There are many ways that Ubisoft Action Adventure could make players pay for progression through the game. Even with the game focusing on the Na’vi people and the natural landscape of Pandora, Frontiers of Pandora can monetize cosmetics as well as the general progression through the game. From costumes to fast travel to creatures, the new Avatar game could give players plenty of opportunities to spend real mo

Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora could introduce new types of Na'vi previously unknown. Although it would not be surprising if James Cameron wanted to save new characters and cultures for the next films, it would also be exciting to have the opportunity to discover new types of life or even explore more differences between the forest and ocean tri

Your mileage with Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora will vary depending on two things: your love for Far Cry, and your love for Avatar. If you’re the only person on this planet who loves both of these things more than anything, then I have some amazing news. Otherwise, this feels like a visually stunning open-world game without the mechanical or narrative depth required to help it stand out in a year of masterpieces. I want to see more from the full game, but only for the benefit of my doubt that it offers something beyond these lukewarm initial impressions.