In a month of big Electronic Arts sports titles, Microsoft released the Xbox One and Windows 10 exclusive title, “ReCore”. The title was developed by Concept Armature Studios and spearheaded by Mega Man producer, Keiji Inafune.

“ReCore” is a third-person action-adventure platform game with some puzzle elements. Gameplay is focused on using the robot companions to solve puzzle and fight off enemies.

“ReCore” is a visually wonderful game that starts you off in a desert planet that harkens back to that start of each Star Wars trilogy. The game centers itself around the main character Joule, who is woken from cryo-sleep on the planet of Far Eden after the demise of Earth. With the help of her CoreBot companions, she traverses the desert world in search of finding other humans and taking back Far Eden from the corrupted CoreBots.

The combat focuses around using Joule’s energy rifle to shoot enemies and then grapple their core out of them to be used at a later date. Matching the color of your rifle shot to that of enemies deals more damage. The CoreBot companions will also do passive attacks with one attack that is controlled by the player. The same color-matching mechanic plays into dealing extra damage.

Advertised as a spiritual successor to both “Mega Man” and the “Metroid” series, the gun play and some of the puzzles definitely have that vibe. A bigger influence seems to be “Legend of Zelda”, as the game has a few major dungeons where you get a weapon or item that is used to complete it and many smaller dungeons that use a combination of items found near the major dungeon.

The main problem with “ReCore” is that with so many influences it has a hard time deciding what it wants to be. In the few hours I spent playing,  it felt very much like a science fiction, similar to “Legend of Zelda”, but rarely did it progress past that standard format.

At a purely aesthetic standpoint, “ReCore” stands out and then some. From the strange design of the enemies and the breathtaking desert canyons, it really pushes the power of the Xbox One. Now, that isn’t to say the Xbox One is the most attractive system to play on, as it is missing details in its features that are shown in the PC version. An excellent sounding electronic soundtrack accompanies the game that make the boss fights feel epic and fit the game’s nature versus technology theme.

“ReCore” has a hard time establishing what sets it apart from other similar platformers but could be a strong start to a studio with very little in the way of titles.

“ReCore” gets a 3 out of 5 stars.

This months free games on Xbox One: Earthlock: festival of Magic and Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China

Free PS4 games: Journey and Lords of the Fallen