Ryse: Son of Rome Is Phenomenal in 2025 — Review

Like many others, I too got Ryse: Son of Rome with the Xbox One on release day in 2014, but I never got to to play it until now, 11 years later. And the game's atmosphere, right from the beginning, is so telling of that era.

Powerful Performances & Ancient Vibes

The dialogue, in the style in which they talk I love, it's something they do typically in historical movies which sell the "ancient" aspect of the game. The voice acting is next level on the leading characters, and the score on top of the voice acting gave me chills during one of the cutscenes. The armours, although not historically accurate, look fantastic too. The UI however is pretty dated and inadequate.

Cutscenes That Rival Hollywood

The cutscenes/animations between chapters is also very well done, reminds me of the Skyrim Trailer, the game, similar to Wukong, is oozing with the developers and directors passion to tell a very compelling story. And they've truly succeeded.

Simple Yet Satisfying Combat

The gameplay is nothing spectacular, its about the same as Shadow of Mordor or the Batman games, although it has some unique aspects I do not want to spoil that really sell it as a game about the Roman Empire and it's military in many parts, that many people will enjoy. As you play it, you really start to like it.

Fixing the FPS Nightmare

There is a horrible FPS stuttering bug, that even with a 4080 caused 40-50 FPS drops and atrocious gameplay. This was fixed by going to Manage 3D Settings in the Nvidia Control Panel and going to Program Settings, then adding Ryse to the program list, and changing Low Latency Mode to Ultra, this gave me VERY smooth gameplay, and no issues after this point.

Roman History Reimagined

This game in particular is fantastic because I do love Roman History, and this seems to be loosely based on the Roman Occupation of the British Isles, which the game covers some cool concepts of, although greatly exaggerated for the sake of gameplay, which is a good thing.

Ryse: Son of Rome Conclusion

The voice acting, performance capture and story are just so well done, and it was a phenomenal cinematic experience, better than a lot of movies I've watched, and a more compelling narrative than many games. What it lacks in gameplay it makes up in an amazing narrative. And I absolutely recommend this game.

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Main Story	Main + Sides	Completionist	All Styles
6½ Hours	8½ Hours	19½ Hours	7 Hours

Music: 8.5/10

Gameplay: 8/10

Game Design: 9/10

Story 9.5/10

Graphics: 8/10

Enjoyment: 10/10

Overall: 9/10