Even the worst of games usually have something “good” about them, even if that thing is just slightly north of terrible, but in the case of Gangs of Sherwood, I literally cannot find anything good to say about the game beyond; I hope the developers never make anything like this ever again, and it’s the last lacklustre Robin Hood game we see for a long time.
While I will not list everything I disliked about Gangs of Sherwood (as who has time for that?), I will list the main reasons I gave it a failing grade and reveal its chances for future success.
The story of Robin Hood has remained a favourite for so long because it is a good story filled with heroes, villains, epic battles, and memorable locations.
I will never know why the developers felt Gangs of Sherwood needed the addition of magical crystals and cybernetic limbs in the Legend of Robin Hood, and based on its abysmal sales figures, most gamers feel the same way about these bizarre additions as I do.
While I can appreciate the developers were trying to do something different, it didn’t work.
Except for using the names of characters from the Legend of Robin Hood, the plot read like bad Robin Hood fan fiction, including an aerial bombing raid on Sherwood and Robin’s ability to summon magical arrows from thin air and hold them in suspended animation to be released in a single “epic” attack or the fact maid Marian appeared to be some kind of wizard or Jedi Knight, and hold multiple daggers in the air at once, with what I can only assume was telekinesis or a very strong (and illogical) magnetic field.
Overall, Gangs of Sherwood’s terrible narrative makes an already lacklustre game worse and is one of the main reasons (beyond lacklustre combat, a dead player base and dated visuals) that I put down Gangs of Sherwood as soon as I had played enough to give an honest review.
To me, playing Gangs of Sherwood feels more like a punishment for some unknown wrongdoing than anything resembling having a good time, and I just cannot force myself to play more without a good reason to do so.
Image credit Gangs of Sherwood - Published by Appeal Studios and developed by Nacon.
Gangs of Sherwood is very visually dated. I have played much better-looking Xbox 360/Playstation 3 games, which were released over a decade ago, and not only found them much more visually pleasing but much more enjoyable to boot.
While a few character models look better than others (for some reason, Alan of Dale uses a better model than any other character?), for the most part, nothing about Gangs of Sherwood’s visuals looks like they would have been impossible for 7th generation hardware, and certainly possible as an early 8th generation title, such as the low budget titles which are often released shortly after the release of a new platform to take advantage of players eager to play new games on their new console, despite many of these games using visuals from the previous console generation.
Image credit Gangs of Sherwood - Published by Appeal Studios and developed by Nacon.
I was very excited to step into the green tights and pointy shoes of Robin Hood (which sadly do not exist in Gangs of Sherwood); however, his longbow kind of does, and I was expecting to enjoy myself immensely performing a variety of amazing trick shots, astounding my allies, and driving fear into the hearts of King John’s men.
Sadly, none of that was to be the case, and instead, I would be allowed to use a single primary bow attack and a bizarre magical floating arrow attack that not only was boring to use but was nonsensical and immersion-breaking
Other than this, my primary heavy attack was hitting my enemies with Robin’s bow.
Let that sink in. Instead of unleashing a powerful bow attack, Robin slaps at his enemies with a bow, a move that is more likely to break his bow than do any harm to his predominantly heavily armoured foes, who undoubtedly would be very happy that he was using his longbow (with arrows that pierce armour) to club them, instead of using it to shoot arrows through their plate armour.
Image credit Gangs of Sherwood - Published by Appeal Studios and developed by Nacon.
The last time I played a game this liner was in the early 2000s. There was no mystery, no exploration, and no creativity. Rather, I was led through a poorly designed map that appeared to be comprised of muddy 2008-era textures and models designed by a college student while fighting the occasional repetitive enemy, which acted as if its AI was written when George W Bush was still the President and no one had any idea what a Tik Tok was beyond the noise that old wooden clocks made.
Gangs of Sherwood is one of the few games that is actually dead on all platforms, without crossplay and with some platforms going hours without a single person being online, there is not even a small but dedicated community to ensure that players have someone to play with (which is very important as the game was balanced around four-player co-op despite allowing solo play).
A game this bad needs a community behind it. While there are many better games, even something like Gangs of Sherwood can be enjoyed with friends (who have literally nothing else to play, including marbles, tag, or hopscotch).
However, without people to play with and the developers appearing to have moved in late December 2023, I can safely say that Gangs of Sherwood is dead, and its chances of recovery are close to zero.
Image credit Gangs of Sherwood - Published by Appeal Studios and developed by Nacon.
Gangs of Sherwood is a action video game developed by Nacon and published by Appeal Studios, it was released on 30 November 2023 and retails for $39.99+.
Gangs of Sherwood is available on the following platforms: PC, Playstation 4, Playstation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X|S.
Gangs of Sherwood is no longer in active development, and the developers have moved on to other projects.
As of April 2024, around 100 people play Gangs of Sherwood on a fairly regular basis.
Gangs of Sherwood is essentially dead, and finding full lobbies in a reasonable amount of time is difficult in well-populated regions, and next to impossible in less populated regions.
Gangs of Sherwood does not support cross-platform multiplayer.
Gangs of Sherwood offers the following matchmaking options:
The following peripherals are officially supported:
Gangs of Sherwood is rated PEGI 16+ and contains the following:
Gangs of Sherwood is a complete and total mess of a game, with lacklustre level design, dated visuals, a nonsensical pilot, a virtually non-existent player base, uninspired combat, and, most importantly, created without any consideration for what gamers expect out of a game, and the current market conditions.
Overall, this is an abysmal game, and I cannot imagine anyone choosing to play it if they had literally any other option unless they were forcing themselves to finish the game due to a feeling of regret at having wasted $39.99 on a game that offers less entertainment value than the box it came in.
