Introduction

An open world “dark” RPG, Viking action, a dark fantasy narrative…these are just a few things YAR: Forgotten Throne has that piqued my interest. As someone who loves Norse mythology and Viking themes, I was hoping to love this game developed by Honor Games and published by Axyos Games (who published one of my more disliked games we reviewed, EBOLA Village). I went into YAR: Forgotten Throne with some hope in my heart. Does this action open world RPG beg for an adventure to be taken, or should it be set on fire in an honorable Viking pyre? We find out in our review of YAR: Forgotten Throne for the PS5. We did receive a review code for this game so thank you to the devs and publisher.

Gameplay

When I booted up YAR: Forgotten Throne on my PS5 and I was thrown into a language selector that used a sword mouse cursor…I knew something was wrong. When my game crashed when I died from not being able to attack a giant bear because my sword vanished…I knew something was wrong. YAR: Forgotten Throne has many problems and I could spend a few hours talking about them, but let’s first discuss what this game is trying to be and where it fails…

At its core, YAR: Forgotten Throne is an open world RPG in every sense of the words. The first game I thought of, and no it wasn’t Gothic like I’ve seen some people say online, was Two Worlds fused with a Viking and Slavic theme. That part grabbed my attention. Then I arrived on an island and immediately my heart sank. The tutorial level alone, where I spent a few minutes wondering many things like why does my stamina bar go up and down with attacks, and why heavy attacks drained it but normal attacks didn’t, or why my special attack, which was just a dodge into attack, took almost 30 seconds to cool down. I think I asked myself “why” almost in my entirety of playing YAR: Forgotten Throne.

Combat alone feels…horrendous. Moving around, which I still can’t tell what constitutes a sprint or regular walk in this game, feels floaty and combat is off putting in the worst way. Dodging, which didn’t always work and sometimes just led me to block with my shield, just further made me realize why YAR: Forgotten Throne doesn’t feel good in play. I’m not saying every RPG needs high octane sword strikes or punishing counters like Elden Ring, but if my game costs $29.99, I do want some level of fun combat, and there have been plenty of indie games or even AA titles that do combat with some level better than most. Oh, and did I mention that YAR: Forgotten Throne costs $19.99 on PC? Why the price increase?

Exploration and inventory management don’t fare much better in YAR: Forgotten Throne. Probably due to, again, the UI being made for a PC, YAR: Forgotten Throne on the console just makes moving items or even using them feel archaic. I have to wonder if I played this on PC would I have the same feeling? Honestly, probably would because YAR: Forgotten Throne just doesn’t have a good system for exploring or using your inventory. You might be also wondering, why is he combining these two elements together? That’s because whether it’s talking to a NPC or moving items around in the field, or even just looking through my map, YAR: Forgotten Throne seems to forget that these two systems can work separately and should be that way. I shouldn’t need a PC UI to appear when I’m interacting with something on the field.

Is there anything redeemable about the gameplay in YAR: Forgotten Throne? Honestly, not really. Killing enemies feels hollow as they just go limp or don’t do anything at all. Exploring feels lifeless and leveling up doesn’t feel rewarding, just…a means to show progress. YAR: Forgotten Throne’s gameplay shows signs of something better, it just didn’t become what it envisioned.

Graphics

I was very confused playing YAR: Forgotten Throne. At times, the visuals could look quite good. There’s a scene where I’m running through a field of wheat and going wow…this looks great. Then a giant rat-like creature attacked and I went wow…this looks horrendous. YAR: Forgotten Throne has moments where I feel like the developer wanted to try to make the game look modern and then they decided nah, let’s make it look okay…or maybe let’s make it look like a RPG from 2010! I have my suspicions on why YAR: Forgotten Throne looks so abysmal and that stems from who is producing the game…because I still have PTSD from playing EBOLA Village…

Sound

Probably one of the few things I was okay with in YAR: Forgotten Throne is the ambiance and music. While nothing incredible, there are some good tracks in here that can sound epic and give the game its fantasy vibe. Unfortunately, what will rip you right out of that immersion is the generic, almost AI sounding voice. I’m not accusing YAR: Forgotten Throne of using AI for its voice work, but there are times where it is so flat and dull I almost wonder if these were people paid to voice characters in a modern game. Your male lead himself literally talks like he’s lost in an AI generated world. NPCs also sound like they are there but not caring about being there. YAR: Forgotten Throne’s sound is pretty rough and it’s why I tried to read dialogue fast to skip hearing the characters talk.

Story

I try to be very straightforward and honest in my reviews for games. As a gamer with many, many years of gaming under my belt, I believe in transparency when I review a game. There is a story in YAR: Forgotten Throne…I know that because the opening tells me there is one. Now ask me again, do I remember said story or cared about anything that happens? I will promptly say no. When a fantasy story hits me with so little care, as a nerd and geek, I will say the story is pretty bad. That’s not me going off memory, that’s me saying I never cared to remember anything in YAR: Forgotten Throne.

Overall Impression

YAR: Forgotten Throne should have been a fun game, and I think it had the ideas to make for a fun action RPG with a large world to explore and a deep narrative. In the end though, all those things never happened for YAR: Forgotten Throne. Maybe it was due to budget issues or a team too small for such an ambitious game. Whatever the reason, YAR: Forgotten Throne fails in way too many categories, making it probably one of the weaker games I’ve played in the last decade.

Conclusion

YAR: Forgotten Throne has an idea of what it is trying to be but ends up feeling like an unpolished title that fails on every aspect it presents. Terrible combat, boring quests, dull narrative, and unimpressive visuals are just the tip of how bad YAR: Forgotten Throne is, sadly. Add to that the price jump for a game clearly not made for consoles and I just scratch my head. If you like, and I mean REALLY like, older RPGs and need to laugh at one made in 2026, YAR: Forgotten Throne is for you. Everyone else, find something significantly better and avoid YAR: Forgotten Throne like EBOLA Village.