Remnant: From the Ashes is a little bit of Destiny, Demons Souls, and a generic third person shooter. You can buy and upgrade guns and armor and test them out on your enemies while you also try to learn their tactics and weaknesses in, sometimes difficult, combat. It is enough for you to play through Remnant even though the rest of the game is uncompelling.
Story
Remnant is a tough story to explain because...well...I could not follow it outside the generic: you play as one of humanity's final soldiers who is washed up on an island and saved by one of the last settlements on Earth: Ward 13. Upon talking to their leadership, you come to realize the world is being overrun by a mysterious entity called the Root. You are tasked with going out into the world, as well as other realms, to find Ward 13's long lost founder and retrieve knowledge on how to stop the Root from taking over the planet.
The initial part of the story has a good premise, but it pretty much stops there. Once you get into the missions, the story was lost to me. You do meet characters throughout the journey, but I never fully understood what the Root was and how to destroy it. A part of it comes from the games story direction. Though you choose your character's design and even provide them with a certain voice, your hero does not speak. Instead you choose dialogue options to progress the story forward. This is not a bad system - tons of different games use this but I found it weird that the game would have you identify a voice for your character that is not used outside of typical shooting comments like "Reload" or "Need Ammo." The other reason, and probably most important, is the game's lack of any real interesting level design. The areas you explore are pretty generic and did not help me get engaged with the world and, therefore, the characters within the story. It's disappointing because there was a lot of potential for this game to be very intriguing but the areas you are exploring are not much different to other worlds in other games.
Gameplay
As I mentioned earlier, Remnant is a third-person shooter with some RPG elements and a level of difficulty that can be seen in the Souls series. Upon finishing the tutorial, you select your type of character and from there you can hold two firearms and a melee weapon. All of your weapons, including the armor that you find or purchase along the way, are upgradable by trading in components you find out in the world (which are very common to find). You also have the option to attach modifications to your two weapons. These mods provide you with special powers that range from incendiary rounds to healing areas. The mods themselves are temporary but are useful when combat becomes overwhelming.
In terms of challenge, there is a level of difficulty to Remnants combat but not nearly as much compared to the Souls series. Yes, the enemies can be quite vicious and attack you consistently. It can be easy for you to be surrounded by a group of enemies who are continuously depleting your health bar. I would say the enemies are not as ruthless as Bloodborne but not as "easy" as Dark Souls. But like the Souls games when you die it's probably because you are not paying attention to the enemy's tactics - so there is a little bit of a learning curve to the combat. I will say that there were sometimes I died because my character could not evade fast enough. From time to time, you character can feel quite heavy which makes running away seem like your doing a brisk jog. There is an equipment load that can alter how much stamina you use or how fast your doges are. But even so I was playing at Medium load and I still felt slow.
There is also a leveling system to Remnant as well. As you progress through your journey, you will level up and have the opportunity to upgrade traits related to your character. These traits range from health and stamina increases to reload speeds. Also, unlike the Souls series when you die you do not lose your money or experience.
There is also a co-op option to play with friends or open to the public. I did play with a few random players online and had a good time going through the game with some assistance. I will say I ran into players who were far and beyond above my level and were going through enemies very quickly. A small downside but still fun to play online.
Graphics
Remnant does have lovely graphics. While the worlds themselves are cliched compared to other games in the genre, Remnant does have visually appealing worlds. The frame rate can drop in certain areas and the game did crash on me a few times throughout my journey but nothing too crazy to derail my experience.
Verdict
While Remnant: From the Ashes does not have a cohesive story or an interesting world, I did have fun going through the game. The gameplay kept me entertained enough for me to complete the story but outside of that, there is not a lot of things that stand out. It's a shame because there was potential for it to be a great fantasy / sci-fi shooter. Instead, we have a fun shooter with a story and lore that, quite frankly, never rose from the ashes.
Score: 7/10