Crytek’s next-gen title Ryse: Son of Rome has been receiving quite a bit of flak since its gameplay showing at E3. While the…

Crytek’s next-gen title Ryse: Son of Rome has been receiving quite a bit of flak since its gameplay showing at E3. While the visuals were truly stunning, offering a clear indication of what the Xbox One is capable of; it wasn’t what held the crowd’s focus.

The inclusion of quick time events (QTE) were what disappointed onlookers most of all; especially when it was discovered that they were impossible to fail at. You can literally avoid pushing buttons and still succeed.

The rewards in Ryse come from pushing buttons with perfect timing. Design director P J Esteves explained in an interview with Eurogamer, the difference between a “recruit” and “legendary” reward:

If you’re fighting five guys and your health is low and you get an execution and you choose the health perk, let’s say you don’t press any buttons, you’ll still get a health bump, but you maybe get 10 per cent. You get a legendary, you maybe get 70 per cent.

Since E3, Crytek‘s developers have switched the on screen Xbox controller buttons to a simple coloured outline instead. For example, opponents with a blue outline will be dispatched with a push of the blue “X” button.

What Esteves claims is “the most significant improvement since E3″, is the enemy AI:

When you’re doing something for E3 trying to get our message straight, maybe we dumbed down the AI a little too much, but when people play it now, they’ll say, holy crap, these guys are surrounding me. When they surround you, there are behaviours and attack patterns where they’re trying to work together, which is a new dynamic in this sort of crowd control combat game. You’re not fighting one individual at a time. Now, your deflect button isn’t just every second a guy is trying to hit me. These guys are actually trying to work together to take you down, and you use it to survive.

Ryse is to be released in November as an Xbox One launch title. Let’s see how well it does at launch, and how players react to this controversial style of play.

Read about Ryse‘s micro-transactions in our article here.