Tainted Grail: The Fall of Avalon - Excalibur Edition

Tainted Grail: The Fall of Avalon has some grand ideas, and it nails a lot of what it tries, but uneven difficulty, a few poor design choices, and a Holy Grail’s worth of bugs prevent it from finding greatness.

Tainted Grail: The Fall of Avalon puts an interesting spin on Arthurian legend and presents a competent world that plays like a love letter to the open-world first-person RPG genre.

Tainted Grail: Fall of Avalon is wonderfully bleak and ambitious, though the experience is marred by a lack of polish that frustratingly still feels like early access.

There are things I respect about Tainted Grail: The Fall of Avalon. Its soundtrack, for one, is uniformly pretty good, and the game’s ambition is undeniable, but I can’t really say I enjoyed much of my time playing it, moment to moment. Occasional striking vistas and questlines can’t make up for a world that feels pretty inauthentic in its representation of a fictionalized version of Celtic culture, and the way you are forced to constantly wander it to complete straightforward missions makes it a space that is hard to enjoy exploring. And while there are interesting roleplaying narrative beats, that is rarely reflected in gameplay that railroads you into one of two playstyles.

The long awaited arrival of King Arthur in Tainted Grail is finally upon us, but does it live up to expectations?

Tainted Grail: The Fall of Avalon delivers a bleak, immersive RPG experience, though its clunky combat and unbalanced gear system hold it back.

Simply put, Tainted Grail: The Fall of Avalon is well worth the price of admission. It’s an RPG that was crafted with care and pays homage to titles that came before it. The focus on quality over quantity is a gamble that paid off when talking about the total package, but came with a few nagging issues that bring it down a notch. The minimal effort shown toward the facial animations is a true crime against the voice actors who brought these expertly written characters to life. Pair that with the rather dated combat system, and it truly pains me to not set this game in a league of its own when talking about games I’ve played recently. Those are issues that are quickly overshadowed by just how fun this adventure is and how well core RPG tenets are executed upon. The story, world, and expansive lands this game takes place within are truly something that could give Bethesda a run for its money.

Beneath its rough exterior lies a captivating project, kept alive by its vibrant open world, non-linear progression, and handcrafted gameplay. It's simply fun to play - unlike the heavily outdated Oblivion, which, aside from visuals, has little left to offer.

If you're craving dark fantasy and want to lose yourself in an open world, Tainted Grail: The Fall of Avalon isn't a bad game at all. That is if you can accept that it's a rough, raw experience that often feels like something out of a decade ago.

It’s easy to forgive a little jank, though, when the overall package is this impressive. Tainted Grail: The Fall of Avalon is an epic RPG that aims high and that, much more often than not, succeeds in what it sets out to do.