Albatroz

~ V1.000.000 (19.93GB / "ver. 0.9.0.5.11 | PS5" via in-game menu) on disc

Download required. While playable offline, an update is essential due to significant performance issues and, ultimately, a game-breaking bug that halted progression. Utilized default settings until the midpoint of the experience where difficulty was dropped down to 'Easy' as a result of unbalanced mechanics. 100% platinum trophy status likely impossible due to select accolades unlocking with unrelated requirements.

A different route of story can be pursued after the first handful of hours between a snowy mountain range or Lago village, but we opted to follow an online video guide that pursued the latter choice to minimize confusion & compare given the obscurity of the game. Other minor issues did occur that weren't documented below for reference.

-- Throughout the entirety of the game, expect to encounter countless instances of framerate drops / hitches (ex. around waterfalls, climbing, etc.) along with floating textures / pop-in effects.
-- Difficulty appears to be unbalanced beyond 'Normal' settings as the 'Misty Lands' area near the midway of the game was brutal with hardly any food & water consumables. After two failed attempts to cross the area with no items & fully recharged stats at the Lago village lodge did nothing to improve the situation, the difficulty was dropped down to 'Easy' which slowed stat consumption enough to pass through it. About an hour of progression was lost in total.
-- Several trophies appear to unlock with incorrect requirements. For example, 'The Wanderer' achievement for viewing all rare stones registered after hitting 'Explorer - 100,000' rank while driving. 'Albatroz Follower,' the final travel rank, unlocked after doing the hide-and-seek quest in the Silent City instead of its respective trophy, etc.
-- Game-Breaking Bug: During Scene #16, where Isla must navigate a surreal 'Nameless' realm, a floating rock platform that's required to move between two larger formations is completely absent. 'Collapsing' in the area appears to impact movement of certain platforms where some no longer get close enough to reach or stop moving entirely. After reaching the last functional rock without any errors, the necessary platform still failed to appear. Climbing the last structure leads to falling through the top form onto the ground floor & efforts to jump out into the void to see if it would respawn at a further point produced no results. Reloading checkpoints, save & reinstalling did not fix the issue and, thus, we abandoned the playthrough.
-- Character portraits during VN-style dialogue appear to be 3D models with overexposed lighting.
-- During Isla's first flashback sequence, a second copy of her spawned nearby for a brief second as she wakes up from bed. The preceding dialogue bit showed a bluish skybox instead of her bedroom interior. Once those scenes finished, everything went back to normal function.
-- In the El Condor Village & Nameless Realm, the dirt mound texture for the various tulip gardens was missing. One crash occurred while trying to leave the NPC house that provides the lantern in El Condor. Redoing the task from a save worked without issue. When viewing landmarks from the telescope via the windmill, a texture-less rock formation would pop out depending on zoom distance. It would also appear in person when examining the area to the north at the end of the first river point of interest. Climbing a nearby mountain side near the condor landmark caused Isla to be pulled out of bounds. While she was able to jump back inbounds, it caused all of her stats to reach critical status.
-- After collapsing in the first trip after the El Condor Village, numerous rock & tree stem textures glitched out into a reddish-grating pattern. Restarting the game fixed the problem.
-- Around the spot where the player meets the old mountaintop woman, all related cutscenes that showed a distant village had it sitting on top of a texture-less base.
-- In the second village, Lago, the game crashed around 10 times while moving through the area. Might have something to do with the weather effects as several previous circumstances were "avoided" by waiting for clear / foggy conditions. Tried to bypass the area by proceeding to next objective with an NPC at a nearby hilltop, but approaching the girl on the cliff side causes Isla to suggest not bothering her. The player has to speak with Kerren in Lago before & after the cliffside local to continue the story where multiple crashes occurred.
-- In the opening dream sequence for Scene #16, the cavern did not have any weather effects in comparison with a completed video walkthrough. The subsequent cutscene had no water effects & featured a brick-like frame texture along the borders of the screen.