Garshasp's campaign gets worse as you advance, too. After you press the measly two to three buttons prescribed by the on-screen prompts, the game treats you to a forgettable series of-yep, you guessed it-simple stab and swipe animations, sometimes with an underwhelming flipping leap thrown in for okay measure.
You would think the protagonist would make up for the deficit in action by pulling off some sweet QTEs when dealing with middle and upper card villains, but once again the disinterest strikes. Rather, it's a lingering anticlimax that rears its head every time you exterminate a monster using an array of ordinary slashes. And yet it's not the necessity to deal with all opposition via button mashing that kills the experience. Most of all, though, it's Garshasp's combat system that fails to impress. Similar hints of indifference also run through the game's cliche level types, which include a marsh, a forest and a temple carved into a mountain. You can see apathy in the protagonist's "stereotypical hero" appearance, and in the "must've strayed from the set of 'Lord of the Rings'" bestiary. However, such high points do little to counter Garshasp's less inspired and more persistent design choices. It's a shame I have to say that, after the enjoyment I found in crawling through a fittingly bleak ruined city and dispatching a wonderfully grotesque swamp monster. The scene involving Garshasp's late sibling sets an indifferent tone that persists for the campaign's remainder. After slaying a squad of green monsters, he merely moseys on to the next fight while the narrator mentions in passing that the dead youngster lying in the street was the warrior's brother. Then again, we don't actually get to see Garshasp's emotional reaction. Even when Garshasp loses his brother in an early game battle, the best you might be able to manage is a shrug. I understand the need for a simple plot in combat-oriented games, but the "tell don't show" approach on display here robs the player of even the slightest motivation to invest in the titular hero.
Instead, the story chugs along joylessly while a narrator details Garshasp's plans for revenge and his sense of duty. The only point on the checklist that Garshasp's intro misses is a script rife with clumsy, yet charming dialogue. With added brutality, the game would be nearly indistinguishable-at least on paper-from God of War. Experience orbs rise from corpses and are absorbed into your body, imbuing you with new might and the knowledge to execute more complex combination attacks. Eventually, middle rank foes arrive, along with a mid-boss encounter that culminates in a simple QTE. You button mash your way through swarms of weak orc-like creatures, delivering a mixture of light and heavy blows. The early phases of Garshasp: The Monster Slayer offer a ho-hum hack 'n slash experience fit for the PlayStation 2.
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