Gigantic: Rampage Edition Review – Average Ambitions

Motiga’s Gigantic was a lot of things when it was first released in 2017, including an Xbox console exclusive when Microsoft sorely needed it (which surely wouldn’t become a problem ever again). It was vibrant and unorthodox, featuring a unique cast of heroes, some intriguing mechanics like massive beasts that served as home bases and smaller creatures acting as makeshift towers to provide healing or reveal enemies.

Sadly, it wasn’t a competitor to hero shooters like Overwatch or even Battleborn in terms of player counts. This isn’t to say it didn’t at least surpass the latter in terms of quality and overall presentation, but Motiga was targeting a different crowd. Gigantic was still a third-person title, though, one that incorporated shooter and hack-and-slash elements, but pushing with your team, not getting caught out, knowing when to back off and choosing heroes that could complement allies or shore up any weaknesses were key.

"Gigantic is set in the world of Gig, where two houses – Daevaedra and Aurion – battle it out via giant Guardians. As both descend onto the battlefield, your job as part of either house is to gather Power Orbs alongside your teammates."

Perhaps because there was so much fever for Overwatch and what it was doing, but Gigantic never found an audience despite launching a year later. It shut down in June 2018 and seemingly vanished forever, even as it built a niche dedicated audience. However, a brief invite-only event occurred in October 2023. Before we knew it, Abstraction Games and Gearbox Publishing (now Arc Games) announced it was back, dubbing it the Rampage Edition.

Is it a major comeback for Gigantic? Yes, but its current player numbers, peaking at 6112 concurrent players on PC via Steam, is nothing to shout about, even if it is higher than the original’s peak. The Rampage Edition is for fans to indulge in and enjoy for however long it lasts. The real question is how newcomers should approach it, especially in this day and age. Based on my time with it, Gigantic feels like it has a strong base to build off but falls short in some aspects while fumbling in others. Whether it has the opportunity to become something better is the real question.

Gigantic is set in the world of Gig, where two houses – Daevaedra and Aurion – battle it out via giant Guardians. As both descend onto the battlefield, your job as part of either house is to gather Power Orbs alongside your teammates. Once enough charge is gathered, your Guardian will assault the other in a Rampage, pinning them in place and exposing a giant weak spot. Deal damage to it, and the process repeats once more until victory. If the other team gathers enough charge, you must defend your Guardian from attacks. Alternatively, you could try and impede your opponents, buying precious time since they have to get to your Guardian to deal any damage.

In the neutral, you can summon creatures who provide healing, attack enemy players, or even create a portal to help get you to and from fights faster. You can upgrade these using Focus – the catch is that it’s used for your Focus ability, which is an Ultimate that can potentially turn team fights. Since you only get so much Focus in a match, it’s a tradeoff between making big plays or contributing to the team. Enemies can also destroy creatures, so defending the latter is a must, especially since some will periodically spawn Power Orbs for you in Clash.

"Each hero is suitably unique, whether it’s Tripp, an emo assassin with lightning powers, or Queen Zenobia, slithering onto the battlefield and inflicting elemental statuses."

As for the heroes themselves, each has five abilities and a talent at level 5. You’re gaining experience through various actions, like assisting teammates, badges for certain feats (like saving teammates by slaying their attackers), killing creatures or even collecting Power Orbs. Upon leveling up, Skill Points can upgrade abilities in one of two ways. Once talents become available, you can choose one of three to bolster your build. All-in-all, pretty standard MOBA mechanics.

Gigantic doesn’t otherwise have any mobs to farm, and while some creatures can qualify as “towers” to destroy, you can traverse the maps unimpeded. There is the concept of lanes and assaulting different positions to gather Power Orbs, usually where team fights play out, but battling other players is the goal. You could run up to the enemy guardian when it’s not a Rampage phase, but they’ll quickly beam you down unless invisibility is active.

The aesthetic is rather fetching – the Guardians and each hero look distinct and well-animated, while most environments feel like organic, lived-in places. Each hero is suitably unique, whether it’s Tripp, an emo assassin with lightning powers, or Queen Zenobia, slithering onto the battlefield and inflicting elemental statuses. Some can appear a little goofy – Uncle Sven and Pakko come to mind – but they don’t feel out of place.

It’s also a testament to the design that they all feel unique to play. Certain elements are reminiscent of characters from other hero shooters – Rutger can create walls and burrow underground for survival purposes, immediately bringing two Overwatch characters to mind. Nevertheless, they control well, especially when you get down to interrupting enemies with Tripp and dealing burst damage before turning invisible and slinking into the night.

"While support heroes that provide dedicated healing exist, this isn’t quite like a tank/damage dealer/support composition where you must fill each role."

That is unless you’re crowd-controlled to hell and back. Because of its MOBA bent, Gigantic leans heavily into crowd control abilities, status effects and damage over time (known as degens). It’s all you can do to enter a team fight and not get slowed, poisoned, bled, burnt, receive reduced healing, deal less damage, immobilized, ensnared – the list goes on and would honestly make an Overwatch 1 player feel like they had it easy. You can only do so much with your positioning because, unlike a MOBA, this is a third-person game, and your viewing angles are naturally restricted.

The sheer number of effects also causes visibility issues, which would probably be less annoying if you had a bird’s eye view of the action. To perhaps compensate, almost every hero has an escape ability to disengage. There’s also a stamina bar to let you flee, though it’s consumed by side-dashing or jumping.

On the one hand, I like that it encourages you to be thoughtful about your fights and creates some tension when struggling to run away and find healing. However, it feels like this weird push and pull, where each team tries to burst the other down before anyone can escape. It’s not always the case, especially in some of the smaller fights, and your experience can vary depending on the heroes played, but it happened more often than not for me unless I went super long-range.

While support heroes that provide dedicated healing exist, this isn’t quite like a tank/damage dealer/support composition where you must fill each role. If you feel like your team can rock with two ranged damage dealers and two frontliners, go for it, though success is far from guaranteed if the enemy team sticks together and has abilities to specifically neutralize you. The crowd-control effects, statuses and whatnot are annoying, but some heroes like Tripp, Wu and T-MAT could use some balance passes.

"There are also two new maps – while I wasn’t too enamored by the closed quarters and awkwardly placed jump pads of one, Picaro Bay is a different story."

Controlling each hero feels decent enough, but there’s something off about the hit responses. It can feel like you’re slicing the air, and shots lack impact, to the extent that I had to look at an enemy’s health bar to see if I was dealing damage, even in close quarters. Initially, it seemed no melee attacks were causing harm, while a noticeable delay was seen when shots landed and registered. It’s become less prevalent as additional servers become available, but that lack of weight when attacking still throws me off. At least my character isn’t rubber-banding as much as before, so that’s a plus.

Gigantic: Rampage Edition offers two main modes – the classic Clash, which plays out over multiple rounds, and the new Rush, a condensed version on smaller maps where all heroes are automatically at level 10, and creatures are already pre-summoned (though manually collecting Power Orbs). The latter is also more appealing because you can switch between heroes as the situation demands. It has its appeal, given the pacing, and while I can appreciate Clash for providing more freedom and strategic potential, Rush is good for some quick sessions.

You also have Practice and Custom Modes, though the latter is extremely odd in that you need to enter the matchmaking queue to start it. Friends can be added to your team, but if you want to fight against each other, you need to start the Custom Match and have them enter a match ID. At least there are options to auto-fill games with bots who can range from downright awful to eerily coordinated.

In terms of new content in the Rampage Edition, I spent a little time with the cat-like assassin Kajir, who employs illusions and offers an alternate means of singling out and taking down weak enemies. Roland, a bounty hunter with a drone, was more appealing simply due to the ability to grapple out of danger when required. His Blunderbuss takes some getting used to, but they’re both solid additions to the roster. There are also two new maps – while I wasn’t too enamored by the closed quarters and awkwardly placed jump pads of one, Picaro Bay is a different story.

"It’s also odd to see the frame rate capped at 60 FPS or being unable to see your ping. These aren’t the hallmarks of a competitive title in 2024, which only raises further doubts about Gigantic: Rampage Edition’s lifespan."

It offers multiple vantage points, different flanking routes and elevations alongside well-placed cover made for some fun engagements. There’s also the opportunity for environmental kills if you can push opponents into the water near the ship, but it’s thankfully more situational than the norm.

Microtransactions are gone, so now you unlock heroes with vouchers and earn Crowns by simply playing the game to unlock new skins and, oddly enough, creatures. Various challenges, known as Fortunes, are available, ranging from General to Weekly, which provide the currency and XP to level up your profile.

Each hero also has specific Fortunes to pursue, but the downside is that you must “watch” a Fortune for it to track, and you can only watch three at the same time. Won five Rush matches or went invisible 50 times as Tripp? It doesn’t count towards the Fortune if you didn’t watch it. While I can understand not wanting players to unlock everything immediately, there must be a better solution – maybe providing more slots for Fortunes.

At least there’s a statistics and match history page to keep track of my player record. Oddly enough, it’s showing zero hours played for my most frequently used heroes. Granted, it’s a minor issue compared to the beginning of the launch, where logging in felt almost impossible. I’ve also been fortunate enough to avoid crashes, unlike some other players, though the game occasionally can’t fetch match results. It’s also odd to see the frame rate capped at 60 FPS or being unable to see your ping. These aren’t the hallmarks of a competitive title in 2024, which only raises further doubts about Gigantic: Rampage Edition’s lifespan.

"However, it whiffs on the actual combat feel, parts of the hero balance, the approach to crowd-control effects and statuses and lack of essential competitive features."

When everything comes together – the matchmaking, the hero matchups and the strategies – Gigantic: Rampage Edition can offer an enjoyable experience. Its mix of hero shooter and MOBA, leaning further towards the latter, remains unique, with that itch to learn more (thankfully facilitated by in-game guides).

However, it whiffs on the actual combat feel, parts of the hero balance, the approach to crowd-control effects and statuses and lack of essential competitive features. Perhaps most important is that the areas it excels in don’t necessarily put it above the more well-rounded competitors, which have had years to iterate and improve their systems.

Of course, as noted earlier, Gigantic: Rampage Edition doesn’t feel like it will spark an influx of new players. It caters to those who enjoyed it all those years ago and want to engage with it once more: no more and no less. Abstraction does have some updates in the pipeline, and its $20 entry price looks appealing, but it’s a toss-up on whether you’ll garner enough value in its potentially limited lifespan, especially if you didn’t get into it all those years ago.

This game was reviewed on PC.