RedBackLoggd
2018
Original review published on: https://www.flickeringmyth.com/2018/09/video-game-review-planet-alpha/
When Super Mario Bros. hit the shelves in 1985, the success of the platformer became built on innovation. Anyone was capable of making a game where you had to jump on blocks to reach the end- it was Shigeru Miyamoto’s decision to include warp pipes, power-ups, and water physics that made Mario the critically-acclaimed darling that it is.
Many games have flooded the genre since then, with only a few contemporary titles making it to the big leagues through some new gimmick or another: Super Meat Boy combined grody visuals with an extreme difficulty; Shovel Knight modernized 80s platformer mechanics, and A Hat in Time provided pseudo-parkour movements under a tongue-in-cheek narrative.
Planet Alpha, which was developed by the eponymous company Planet Alpha ApS and published by Team17, tries to make its way into that same category, with it relying on pure beauty for its special presentation. Does this aesthetic overcome its flaws or does it fall into decorative decadence? The short answer is this is ultimately a niche game, but if you want the long answer, read on!
Like most platformers, there really isn’t much of a story, with Planet Alpha’s made all the more difficult to discern because of the lack of dialogue. From what I could understand, you play as a martian cosmonaut who is gathering intelligence on an exotic astronomical body. Your efforts are immediately impeded, however, by the arrival of these robotic enemies that want to destroy you and the entire biosphere around you. There’re are some environmental themes I could gleam as I progressed through the game, and an admittedly-interesting plot twist does happen towards the end, but overall this is not a title that anyone is going to pick up for the narrative.
From there, we move onto the look of Planet Alpha. I have always been of the opinion that art styles outclass realistic graphics. Every console generation, technology brings us closer and closer to some of the most authentic-looking human sprites in video games. But no matter how close programmers get, their creations will always fall into the uncanny valley. Meanwhile, the crayon drawings of Yoshi’s Island look better and better each year.
Indie games that throw their budgets towards that kind of creativity always bring something new to the table, and in that regard Planet Alpha was nothing short of a visual orgy. If Limbo was an example of how to best utilize a monochrome setting, Planet Alpha is the epitome of bringing in the full spectrum of the rainbow. Throughout my 7-hour playtime, I believe I saw every single primary and secondary color on screen, from the green of the foliage to the bright red-orange of magma to the violet sky up above to the glowing hot pink crystals down below.
There was a good chance that this could have all gone wrong and turned into another Problem Solverz disaster, but the team, lead in this department by founder Adrian Lazar and 3D art-and-animation director Tim Løye Skafte, have funneled their evident chroma love into some of the most unique game worlds I have ever had the privilege to enter. To describe the visual style of Planet Alpha would be a challenge in its own right- it’s like there were four roommates: one of them was watching Avatar, the second was playing Pikmin, the third was playing ABZÛ, and the fourth walked in at that moment and had a eureka moment.
There’s a clear attempt at creating something alien, yet very Terra-reminiscent here, with extraterrestrial life meeting conventional Earth surfaces. You have your familiar grassy steppes and rocks in the foreground, but in the back are ginormous quadrupedal creatures that peacefully move with the clouds. During the game’s action beats, though, these scenic sights turn into full-blown nightmares with the flora and fauna devastated by the machines. These two extremes, in addition to the many other backdrops in the game’s eight levels, provide some intriguing panoramas, and there were times where I actually died because I was so invested in what was happening in the scenery.
Unfortunately, all that hardwork in crafting Planet Alpha’s pulchritude doesn’t translate over to the sound design. I mean, there is technically variety in the sonority- the resonance of your character’s stomping varies with each surface you walk on. But the whole time I was playing the game, I couldn’t help but feel that the developers, guided in this department by Planet Alpha ApS sound designer Jesper Krogh Kristiansen, were using stock noises for the majority of their acoustic areas, particularly with regards to the mechanical enemies whose beeps and boops are reiterated ad nauseam. There’s just a lack of strong quality in the mixing and editing, with everything sounding generic compared to the awe-inspiring spectacle around you.
I could always be wrong about my stock theory, but even if I am Planet Alpha was disappointing in this field, especially for a game that takes clear inspiration from Ori and the Blind Forest and Limbo: two platformers that excelled in their sonic environments.
Luckily, this criticism doesn’t extend to the score by Siddhartha Barnhoorn. If you’re a fan of atmospheric music with distinct harmonies like myself, you’re going to love what Barnhoorn puts on the table. With his music in the background, you really do feel like an explorer as you traverse the game’s many places, both above and below ground. He is master of alternating between ataractic and thriller tunes, and it is for his score alone that I recommend playing the game with headphones on if you are willing.
Of course, the main reason people will want to play Planet Alpha is if it’s a good platformer, and on that front I am mixed. I said above that this is a niche title, and I say that because this is a game that feels like it started out as an arthouse game before it was changed to its current form. There’s so much beauty and ambiance, but little in the way of interesting puzzles. Most of the time you’re just dragging blocks from one end to the next to create makeshift steps.
Now, Planet Alpha does introduce one seemingly cool gameplay element, and that is the ability to actively forward or rewind the game’s dynamic day/night cycle. You’re given this from the beginning, but only start to use it about a third of the way in. I say seemingly because it unfortunately isn’t utilized to its greatest extent. Changing the time of day is usually just done to create platforms or stealth cover from whatever vegetation happens to be blooming in the area. There is one part later in the game where you have to use this power to guide a bioluminescent beast through some caves, though again, not much outside of that was done with this godlike ability. I was hoping we would be able to do more things, like change the environmental layout through the heat/cold of the morning/nightfall, similar to the Rod of Seasons in The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons, but that isn’t the case here.
There’s also a big pacing problem with Planet Alpha. You’ll be going through a place, taking in the view, and the next thing you know a bunch of drones appear out of nowhere and you’re on the run. This repeats again and again, and for a game that is reliant on its art presentation, this felt strangely at odds with that intention as the creators are punishing the player for wanting to admire their craftsmanship. Now, a part of me suspects that this was done intentionally. I mentioned earlier that I interpreted some conservation themes out of the game’s minimalist set-up, and this could be the developers telling us how we waste time rushing through life while other forces destroy our precious home. Or it could simply be a result of the designers trying to squeeze in as many different levels as possible, and pushing players to progress faster and faster to get to each one.
Both of these criticisms are significantly tempered in one of the game’s more extraordinary-looking areas (and that’s saying something), and that is these recurring interdimensional planes. You access them through entering portals hidden throughout the world, which drop you in an environment that looks like the smoke-filled heart of a purple supernova. Here, your time-casting is made null-and-void, with you instead having to navigate an area full of shifting stones and weak gravity. These reminded me of the secret levels from Super Mario Sunshine in terms of finding them and the subsequent gameplay changes. Getting to the end rewards you with an artifact, much like the shine sprites, and collecting all of them adds to the game’s replay value. Unfortunately, there’s no way of telling which ones you got, with the level-select screen not providing any indication, unlike Donkey Kong Country 2 which added an exclamation point to the level’s title to indicate if all the K.O.N.G letters had been collected.
Overall, I have to say that, objectively, I can’t quite recommend Planet Alpha for purchase. As readers know, my rule has always been $1.00 (or £0.77) should give at least 30 minutes of gameplay, and, as stated, it took me only 7 hours to beat the game. At the $20.00 asking price, this falls short, and though you might get some replay value from the aforementioned covert dimensions, it will be more frustrating than anything to try and find them, and even then you’re only going to get about 30 minutes extra.
But at the same time, I’ve always said that it’s good to support indie developers that put time and effort into their works, and it would be an understatement to say that Planet Alpha ApS put in the effort to create a visually memorable game. Combined with Barnhoorn’s music, this could very well be the kind of title that fans of games like Journey and Inside will enjoy. But with basic platforming, weak sound design, and an underutilized chrono mechanic, Planet Alpha feels like a Reservoir Dogs– a title with a lot of potential: potential that will hopefully be expanded upon in Planet Alpha ApS next project ala Tarantino’s classic follow-up Pulp Fiction.
Pros:
+Gorgeous graphics
+Superb score
+Varied environments
+Rift areas surreal
Cons:
-Weak SFX
-Rushed pacing
-Underused day powers
-Unmemorable platforming
When Super Mario Bros. hit the shelves in 1985, the success of the platformer became built on innovation. Anyone was capable of making a game where you had to jump on blocks to reach the end- it was Shigeru Miyamoto’s decision to include warp pipes, power-ups, and water physics that made Mario the critically-acclaimed darling that it is.
Many games have flooded the genre since then, with only a few contemporary titles making it to the big leagues through some new gimmick or another: Super Meat Boy combined grody visuals with an extreme difficulty; Shovel Knight modernized 80s platformer mechanics, and A Hat in Time provided pseudo-parkour movements under a tongue-in-cheek narrative.
Planet Alpha, which was developed by the eponymous company Planet Alpha ApS and published by Team17, tries to make its way into that same category, with it relying on pure beauty for its special presentation. Does this aesthetic overcome its flaws or does it fall into decorative decadence? The short answer is this is ultimately a niche game, but if you want the long answer, read on!
Like most platformers, there really isn’t much of a story, with Planet Alpha’s made all the more difficult to discern because of the lack of dialogue. From what I could understand, you play as a martian cosmonaut who is gathering intelligence on an exotic astronomical body. Your efforts are immediately impeded, however, by the arrival of these robotic enemies that want to destroy you and the entire biosphere around you. There’re are some environmental themes I could gleam as I progressed through the game, and an admittedly-interesting plot twist does happen towards the end, but overall this is not a title that anyone is going to pick up for the narrative.
From there, we move onto the look of Planet Alpha. I have always been of the opinion that art styles outclass realistic graphics. Every console generation, technology brings us closer and closer to some of the most authentic-looking human sprites in video games. But no matter how close programmers get, their creations will always fall into the uncanny valley. Meanwhile, the crayon drawings of Yoshi’s Island look better and better each year.
Indie games that throw their budgets towards that kind of creativity always bring something new to the table, and in that regard Planet Alpha was nothing short of a visual orgy. If Limbo was an example of how to best utilize a monochrome setting, Planet Alpha is the epitome of bringing in the full spectrum of the rainbow. Throughout my 7-hour playtime, I believe I saw every single primary and secondary color on screen, from the green of the foliage to the bright red-orange of magma to the violet sky up above to the glowing hot pink crystals down below.
There was a good chance that this could have all gone wrong and turned into another Problem Solverz disaster, but the team, lead in this department by founder Adrian Lazar and 3D art-and-animation director Tim Løye Skafte, have funneled their evident chroma love into some of the most unique game worlds I have ever had the privilege to enter. To describe the visual style of Planet Alpha would be a challenge in its own right- it’s like there were four roommates: one of them was watching Avatar, the second was playing Pikmin, the third was playing ABZÛ, and the fourth walked in at that moment and had a eureka moment.
There’s a clear attempt at creating something alien, yet very Terra-reminiscent here, with extraterrestrial life meeting conventional Earth surfaces. You have your familiar grassy steppes and rocks in the foreground, but in the back are ginormous quadrupedal creatures that peacefully move with the clouds. During the game’s action beats, though, these scenic sights turn into full-blown nightmares with the flora and fauna devastated by the machines. These two extremes, in addition to the many other backdrops in the game’s eight levels, provide some intriguing panoramas, and there were times where I actually died because I was so invested in what was happening in the scenery.
Unfortunately, all that hardwork in crafting Planet Alpha’s pulchritude doesn’t translate over to the sound design. I mean, there is technically variety in the sonority- the resonance of your character’s stomping varies with each surface you walk on. But the whole time I was playing the game, I couldn’t help but feel that the developers, guided in this department by Planet Alpha ApS sound designer Jesper Krogh Kristiansen, were using stock noises for the majority of their acoustic areas, particularly with regards to the mechanical enemies whose beeps and boops are reiterated ad nauseam. There’s just a lack of strong quality in the mixing and editing, with everything sounding generic compared to the awe-inspiring spectacle around you.
I could always be wrong about my stock theory, but even if I am Planet Alpha was disappointing in this field, especially for a game that takes clear inspiration from Ori and the Blind Forest and Limbo: two platformers that excelled in their sonic environments.
Luckily, this criticism doesn’t extend to the score by Siddhartha Barnhoorn. If you’re a fan of atmospheric music with distinct harmonies like myself, you’re going to love what Barnhoorn puts on the table. With his music in the background, you really do feel like an explorer as you traverse the game’s many places, both above and below ground. He is master of alternating between ataractic and thriller tunes, and it is for his score alone that I recommend playing the game with headphones on if you are willing.
Of course, the main reason people will want to play Planet Alpha is if it’s a good platformer, and on that front I am mixed. I said above that this is a niche title, and I say that because this is a game that feels like it started out as an arthouse game before it was changed to its current form. There’s so much beauty and ambiance, but little in the way of interesting puzzles. Most of the time you’re just dragging blocks from one end to the next to create makeshift steps.
Now, Planet Alpha does introduce one seemingly cool gameplay element, and that is the ability to actively forward or rewind the game’s dynamic day/night cycle. You’re given this from the beginning, but only start to use it about a third of the way in. I say seemingly because it unfortunately isn’t utilized to its greatest extent. Changing the time of day is usually just done to create platforms or stealth cover from whatever vegetation happens to be blooming in the area. There is one part later in the game where you have to use this power to guide a bioluminescent beast through some caves, though again, not much outside of that was done with this godlike ability. I was hoping we would be able to do more things, like change the environmental layout through the heat/cold of the morning/nightfall, similar to the Rod of Seasons in The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons, but that isn’t the case here.
There’s also a big pacing problem with Planet Alpha. You’ll be going through a place, taking in the view, and the next thing you know a bunch of drones appear out of nowhere and you’re on the run. This repeats again and again, and for a game that is reliant on its art presentation, this felt strangely at odds with that intention as the creators are punishing the player for wanting to admire their craftsmanship. Now, a part of me suspects that this was done intentionally. I mentioned earlier that I interpreted some conservation themes out of the game’s minimalist set-up, and this could be the developers telling us how we waste time rushing through life while other forces destroy our precious home. Or it could simply be a result of the designers trying to squeeze in as many different levels as possible, and pushing players to progress faster and faster to get to each one.
Both of these criticisms are significantly tempered in one of the game’s more extraordinary-looking areas (and that’s saying something), and that is these recurring interdimensional planes. You access them through entering portals hidden throughout the world, which drop you in an environment that looks like the smoke-filled heart of a purple supernova. Here, your time-casting is made null-and-void, with you instead having to navigate an area full of shifting stones and weak gravity. These reminded me of the secret levels from Super Mario Sunshine in terms of finding them and the subsequent gameplay changes. Getting to the end rewards you with an artifact, much like the shine sprites, and collecting all of them adds to the game’s replay value. Unfortunately, there’s no way of telling which ones you got, with the level-select screen not providing any indication, unlike Donkey Kong Country 2 which added an exclamation point to the level’s title to indicate if all the K.O.N.G letters had been collected.
Overall, I have to say that, objectively, I can’t quite recommend Planet Alpha for purchase. As readers know, my rule has always been $1.00 (or £0.77) should give at least 30 minutes of gameplay, and, as stated, it took me only 7 hours to beat the game. At the $20.00 asking price, this falls short, and though you might get some replay value from the aforementioned covert dimensions, it will be more frustrating than anything to try and find them, and even then you’re only going to get about 30 minutes extra.
But at the same time, I’ve always said that it’s good to support indie developers that put time and effort into their works, and it would be an understatement to say that Planet Alpha ApS put in the effort to create a visually memorable game. Combined with Barnhoorn’s music, this could very well be the kind of title that fans of games like Journey and Inside will enjoy. But with basic platforming, weak sound design, and an underutilized chrono mechanic, Planet Alpha feels like a Reservoir Dogs– a title with a lot of potential: potential that will hopefully be expanded upon in Planet Alpha ApS next project ala Tarantino’s classic follow-up Pulp Fiction.
Pros:
+Gorgeous graphics
+Superb score
+Varied environments
+Rift areas surreal
Cons:
-Weak SFX
-Rushed pacing
-Underused day powers
-Unmemorable platforming
2018
Review originally published on Flickering Myth: https://www.flickeringmyth.com/2018/01/video-game-review-nantucket/
When I first saw the concept for Nantucket, I admit I was quite piqued. As someone who enjoyed the literary classic Moby-Dick, here was a game that, on the outset, took Herman Melville’s epic and combined it with a good old-fashioned graphic adventure.
Unfortunately, the experience I got from playing it ended up being disappointing. While the team at Picaresque Studio is clearly passionate about the source material, they have faltered in creating a title that will have long-lasting fun for general gamers looking for something entertaining.
The problems with Nantucket begin with its concept and inherently niche appeal. Not only is the target audience only limited to people who have read Moby-Dick, but also only fans of 90s point-and-click video games. This is not an exaggeration. If someone is interested in the game because of its seafaring story, they have to understand that the narrative is a fan-sequel to the 19th century text. On the other hand, if someone is interested in the title because of its gameplay, then they have to understand that every single feature revolves around accurate clicking: combat, commerce, communication, exploration, and so forth.
This brings us to the gameplay and pacing of Nantucket, which can best be described by one word: repetitive. As I played through the first hour, I could not help but be reminded of the worst parts of AAA titles like The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind and Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag. In the beginning of Morrowind, you could not progress further in the main story until you gained some notoriety in the world. Nantucket retains through a noted system called “prestige,” which is distinct from your avatar’s level. You gain prestige through both killing whales and completing jobs posted in each port city, and this is where that repetition comes in: the jobs revolve around the same four tasks. Either you have to discover a new whaling location, deliver goods from one place to the other, find out what happened to a missing ship by following its latest route, or hunt a leviathan that is causing damage to sailors.
The lack of variety here is bad enough on its own, but it has another negative aspect to it in the form of procedural generation. There is no guarantee that the money you will receive from finishing an assignment will cover the travel costs because they are randomly generated at each port. So not only are you forced to participate in these grindfests in order to progress the story, you have to deal with the fact that you may be operating on a small budget that requires precise planning to ensure that you have enough resources to reach your destination. This is particularly cumbersome when delivering goods as they take up integral cargo space that could be devoted to holding precious resources.
There are four of these resources: food, water, grog, and wood. Food and water are necessary for obvious reasons, grog keeps your crew happy, and wood is used to keep your ship afloat and build makeshift ports in certain parts of the ocean. Running low on any of these can lead to damages, so it is important to keep things filled. One positive aspect is that the game tells you about how many days your provisions will last and how long it will take you to get to a specific locale. The problem, though, is that you will more than likely be late to your destination courtesy of the doldrums or avoiding perilous waters and storms, meaning you often have to keep more goods in storage than the game tells you. This adds a realism factor that could have made navigation interesting. However when combined with the aforementioned part about some procedural jobs requiring you to fill your ship’s hold with a random item, you can understand how it feels like the game is punishing you instead of encouraging you.
Technically speaking, though, you do not only have to look in the newspaper’s yellow pages to make money. Whaling, which was at the heart of Moby-Dick, is your other method of progressing in the game. It follows a basic system: you travel to an area on the map where a herd is currently active, set your ship to “hunting mode,” and then complete a minigame to kill the whales and sell their blubber and oil. Sadly, this opens up a new set of problems relating to combat. I made a comparison to Black Flag earlier. Fans of that game may recall how monotonous it got to replay the same actions over and over again, whether that pertained to destroying other ships or killing sea animals.
The same thing applies to Nantucket’s combat: you roll a set of dice for three of your crew members, are (hopefully) given an attack card, and then direct who they will attack Yu-Gi-Oh style. Not only is it boring, but the designers made the inane decision that only one of your characters can attack per a turn, meaning battles can feel painfully slow. Now, there is an option before you enter a battle to skip through it via sending out your shipmates to do battle for you. However, there is a good chance, at least in the first couple of hours of the game, that you will lose a crew member, so it is ultimately best that you stick to doing these fights yourself.
There is one last victim of this grinding, and that is the events. Events are essentially things that happen while you are sailing out on the sea, and, unlike the random nature of jobs, some of these are actually the aftereffects of some decision you made beforehand. At first I was surprised by the sheer array of occurrences that came about, and the choices I was forced to make in response. For example, having too much food can cause some crew members to take greater rations, or having too much water can result in it getting contaminated. Do you let your mates get away with this, thereby giving them a gluttony personality trait but keeping their morale? Do you risk keeping the water, increasing the chance of someone getting sick but keeping your water supply intact?
Like a lot of things with Nantucket, though, the charade of variety wore off in the first hour of playing. You will experience the same exact events with the same exact choices and the same exact consequences. Considering the basic nature of the game, it makes you wonder why the writers did not add more circumstances as they could have been the title’s saving grace.
Despite my criticisms, there are some good parts to Nantucket starting with its look. Graphically, Nantucket is pretty simple, and I do not mean that in an insulting way. As stated before, Picaresque Studio was clearly hearkening back to older point-and-click titles like The Secret of Monkey Island and Maniac Mansion, which featured 2D characters against flatter backdrops, with some motion thrown in to give it “life.” Sadly, for the most part, the same exact background is used for each port location, meaning the game was either rushed out or the graphic artists purposely rehashed the same art for the different places you visit.
Nonetheless, the scenery and the few cutscenes you will watch are beautiful to look at it courtesy of the unique art style. Moby-Dick was published in the 1850s, which happened to be the transition period between Romanticism and Modernism, and Nantucket pays homage to this with its illustrations: they have an industrial grit to them elevated by an individualist focus highlighted through alternating shades of light and dark. That is to say characters and settings may look grimy, but there is a enough flush on them to get a sense of the time period.
The sound design retains that simplicity. As your ship sails on, you will hear the crashing of waves, thunder from storm clouds, and a whirlpool-like noise in dangerous waters. However, sound does include music, and once again Nantucket stumbles in this department. I personally caught less than five tunes, and they are prompted in the same part each time, like when you are at a harbor or in combat. One surprise, though, was hearing songs sung similar to Black Flag’s sea shanties. I do not know exactly what triggers them, but whenever they played I found myself enjoying the quality.
In the end, I wanted to like Nantucket. I do not believe anyone delves into something wanting to complain about it. But the game had too many problems that impeded my enjoyment of it. And keep in mind that I fall within the game’s niche target group of not only being a fan of Moby-Dick, but also of point-and-click PC titles. I honestly do not think anyone outside of this circle will like this game for longer than an hour.
Pros:
+Gorgeous, though limited illustrations
+Good voice acting for the cut scenes, but again limited.
+Quick transitions between the settings.
Cons:
-VERY repetitive, grindy gameplay
-Takes too long for story to get started
-Limited appeal.
When I first saw the concept for Nantucket, I admit I was quite piqued. As someone who enjoyed the literary classic Moby-Dick, here was a game that, on the outset, took Herman Melville’s epic and combined it with a good old-fashioned graphic adventure.
Unfortunately, the experience I got from playing it ended up being disappointing. While the team at Picaresque Studio is clearly passionate about the source material, they have faltered in creating a title that will have long-lasting fun for general gamers looking for something entertaining.
The problems with Nantucket begin with its concept and inherently niche appeal. Not only is the target audience only limited to people who have read Moby-Dick, but also only fans of 90s point-and-click video games. This is not an exaggeration. If someone is interested in the game because of its seafaring story, they have to understand that the narrative is a fan-sequel to the 19th century text. On the other hand, if someone is interested in the title because of its gameplay, then they have to understand that every single feature revolves around accurate clicking: combat, commerce, communication, exploration, and so forth.
This brings us to the gameplay and pacing of Nantucket, which can best be described by one word: repetitive. As I played through the first hour, I could not help but be reminded of the worst parts of AAA titles like The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind and Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag. In the beginning of Morrowind, you could not progress further in the main story until you gained some notoriety in the world. Nantucket retains through a noted system called “prestige,” which is distinct from your avatar’s level. You gain prestige through both killing whales and completing jobs posted in each port city, and this is where that repetition comes in: the jobs revolve around the same four tasks. Either you have to discover a new whaling location, deliver goods from one place to the other, find out what happened to a missing ship by following its latest route, or hunt a leviathan that is causing damage to sailors.
The lack of variety here is bad enough on its own, but it has another negative aspect to it in the form of procedural generation. There is no guarantee that the money you will receive from finishing an assignment will cover the travel costs because they are randomly generated at each port. So not only are you forced to participate in these grindfests in order to progress the story, you have to deal with the fact that you may be operating on a small budget that requires precise planning to ensure that you have enough resources to reach your destination. This is particularly cumbersome when delivering goods as they take up integral cargo space that could be devoted to holding precious resources.
There are four of these resources: food, water, grog, and wood. Food and water are necessary for obvious reasons, grog keeps your crew happy, and wood is used to keep your ship afloat and build makeshift ports in certain parts of the ocean. Running low on any of these can lead to damages, so it is important to keep things filled. One positive aspect is that the game tells you about how many days your provisions will last and how long it will take you to get to a specific locale. The problem, though, is that you will more than likely be late to your destination courtesy of the doldrums or avoiding perilous waters and storms, meaning you often have to keep more goods in storage than the game tells you. This adds a realism factor that could have made navigation interesting. However when combined with the aforementioned part about some procedural jobs requiring you to fill your ship’s hold with a random item, you can understand how it feels like the game is punishing you instead of encouraging you.
Technically speaking, though, you do not only have to look in the newspaper’s yellow pages to make money. Whaling, which was at the heart of Moby-Dick, is your other method of progressing in the game. It follows a basic system: you travel to an area on the map where a herd is currently active, set your ship to “hunting mode,” and then complete a minigame to kill the whales and sell their blubber and oil. Sadly, this opens up a new set of problems relating to combat. I made a comparison to Black Flag earlier. Fans of that game may recall how monotonous it got to replay the same actions over and over again, whether that pertained to destroying other ships or killing sea animals.
The same thing applies to Nantucket’s combat: you roll a set of dice for three of your crew members, are (hopefully) given an attack card, and then direct who they will attack Yu-Gi-Oh style. Not only is it boring, but the designers made the inane decision that only one of your characters can attack per a turn, meaning battles can feel painfully slow. Now, there is an option before you enter a battle to skip through it via sending out your shipmates to do battle for you. However, there is a good chance, at least in the first couple of hours of the game, that you will lose a crew member, so it is ultimately best that you stick to doing these fights yourself.
There is one last victim of this grinding, and that is the events. Events are essentially things that happen while you are sailing out on the sea, and, unlike the random nature of jobs, some of these are actually the aftereffects of some decision you made beforehand. At first I was surprised by the sheer array of occurrences that came about, and the choices I was forced to make in response. For example, having too much food can cause some crew members to take greater rations, or having too much water can result in it getting contaminated. Do you let your mates get away with this, thereby giving them a gluttony personality trait but keeping their morale? Do you risk keeping the water, increasing the chance of someone getting sick but keeping your water supply intact?
Like a lot of things with Nantucket, though, the charade of variety wore off in the first hour of playing. You will experience the same exact events with the same exact choices and the same exact consequences. Considering the basic nature of the game, it makes you wonder why the writers did not add more circumstances as they could have been the title’s saving grace.
Despite my criticisms, there are some good parts to Nantucket starting with its look. Graphically, Nantucket is pretty simple, and I do not mean that in an insulting way. As stated before, Picaresque Studio was clearly hearkening back to older point-and-click titles like The Secret of Monkey Island and Maniac Mansion, which featured 2D characters against flatter backdrops, with some motion thrown in to give it “life.” Sadly, for the most part, the same exact background is used for each port location, meaning the game was either rushed out or the graphic artists purposely rehashed the same art for the different places you visit.
Nonetheless, the scenery and the few cutscenes you will watch are beautiful to look at it courtesy of the unique art style. Moby-Dick was published in the 1850s, which happened to be the transition period between Romanticism and Modernism, and Nantucket pays homage to this with its illustrations: they have an industrial grit to them elevated by an individualist focus highlighted through alternating shades of light and dark. That is to say characters and settings may look grimy, but there is a enough flush on them to get a sense of the time period.
The sound design retains that simplicity. As your ship sails on, you will hear the crashing of waves, thunder from storm clouds, and a whirlpool-like noise in dangerous waters. However, sound does include music, and once again Nantucket stumbles in this department. I personally caught less than five tunes, and they are prompted in the same part each time, like when you are at a harbor or in combat. One surprise, though, was hearing songs sung similar to Black Flag’s sea shanties. I do not know exactly what triggers them, but whenever they played I found myself enjoying the quality.
In the end, I wanted to like Nantucket. I do not believe anyone delves into something wanting to complain about it. But the game had too many problems that impeded my enjoyment of it. And keep in mind that I fall within the game’s niche target group of not only being a fan of Moby-Dick, but also of point-and-click PC titles. I honestly do not think anyone outside of this circle will like this game for longer than an hour.
Pros:
+Gorgeous, though limited illustrations
+Good voice acting for the cut scenes, but again limited.
+Quick transitions between the settings.
Cons:
-VERY repetitive, grindy gameplay
-Takes too long for story to get started
-Limited appeal.
2009
One of the ways developers try to spice up an all-too familiar formula is through zaniness. No seriously. Most ideas are blatantly recycled from some originating source, and so the best method of conveying “originality” is through sheer creativity.
The point-and-click or PnC genre is no stranger to this. These adventure titles were arguably the first major video game genre to gain afoot amongst mass audiences since they could be produced relatively quickly on shorter budgets. Many companies, from Sierra of yesteryear to Daedalic of present, have made a name off of their exploits here, and it’s a platform that I only see more indie developers taking advantage of.
But here, I am tasked with reviewing Axel & Pixel, an older PnC by developer Silver Wish Games that was released back in 2009. In contrast with most PnCs, Axel & Pixel isn’t narrative-focused, instead resting its appeal on the aforementioned eccentric factor. You play as the eponymous Axel, an artist who is hypnotized alongside his dog Pixel by a nefarious rat, causing the two to enter a dreamscape where said rodent holds the key to their escape. It’s not made clear whether this is simply a nightmare or an actual illusory trip brought about by the rodent (though the ending implies the former), but regardless that is irrelevant as that is all the story entails. The question remains- is the gameplay and general worldly aesthetic worth it? The short answer is yes, but only if you don't mind the lack of a challenge.
What I mean by that is, gameplay-wise, AnP isn't like most PnCs that feature hub filled with extensive (in the case of the 90s, infuriating) puzzles for you to move between screen solving. AnP is much more akin to a platformer, with each area being a self-contained level that, once beaten, cannot be returned to.
This is by no means a criticism, just a heads-up for vets expecting something akin to a Grim Fandango or Night of the Rabbit. AnP's puzzles are purely environmental, relying on players to find objects in the vista and use them with another object/character/environ via the mouse (or joystick if you are playing with console). Occasionally, there are quick-time events you will need to use other keys for, and the game throws in some racing sections involving you operating a vehicle with either the mouse or a key configuration.
It's a straightforward set-up that works well. One of the greatest things Silver Wish Games does is how they program a unique reaction for most of the incompatible interactions. What I mean by this is, usually in PnCs, when you can't use one item with another or you can't do some action, you tend to just have the main character shrug their shoulders or have some audible indication that it's a no-go. In AnP, on the other hand, 9 times out of 10 you'll get a humorous animation of one or both of the characters doing something and it backfiring. It's something I hope more developers do as it made for some surprisingly humorous moments in an already comedic game.
The only criticism I have about the puzzles is that a lot of them are straight-up linear and easy. That is to say, you have to do them one-at-a-time and, when you do get to them, the solution isn't the hardest thing to figure out. I'd be lying if I said there wasn't a sense of satisfaction, but for those craving something a little more challenging, you may be disappointed here. The presence of a hint button doesn't help this much xD.
Graphically, AnP is very unique. Those who have seen the show The Amazing World of Gumball will notice similarities- you have 2D cartoony characters amidst photorealistic backdrops that look like they were cut out of paper. Some will find this off-putting, and I won't blame you given the questionable nature of the artistic contrast (outside of maybe conveying the surrealist nature of dreams?), but for me I liked it. As I said in the introduction, you have to do what you can to differentiate yourself from the competition in an overcrowded genre, and this is one way that Silver Wish went about it. Axel and Pixel and other important NPCs always stand out from the generally murky backdrops courtesy of their pleasant shades.
If I had a criticism of the aesthetic, it would be just that- that the backgrounds are a little too dark for my liking. I get that, that may have been a thematic decision, and it certainly helps the characters pop-out, but I still feel a little more saturation would have gone a long way towards making things more pleasant. There were also times where the developers would throw in a 3D CG character, akin to those CGI atrocities you'd see in Courage the Cowardly Dog- like the scenery, I didn't have an issue, enjoyed them, and thought they served the purpose of giving a cool flavor to the AnP, but again, your mileage will vary.
The last thing I'll say on the graphics front is that, animation-wise, Silver Wish opted to go for a stop motion-style wherein characters move kind of jaggedly. This took me some getting used to, and I admittedly couldn't help but feel that it was partly done to alleviate programming more-fluid movements. But given the papery-ness of the visuals, it does fit in the end.
The sound is more of a mixed bag. The actual SFX is strong if a little repetitive, with sound cues corresponding anytime a character does an action or an NPC initiates something, though you will hear the same din each time they do. Unfortunately, the voice acting is a misfire. It's less voice acting and more just grunts given to Axel and barks to Pixel, but they are some of the most irate (for the former) and generic (for the latter) noises you will hear in a video game. I honestly wish they had gone full silent protagonist over this animalian sonance they opted for.
The music is tranquil and goes a long way towards establishing a calming atmosphere. You get a different track for each area, and the actiony parts have that appropriate adrenaline beat. It's not an OST you'll be humming after you've put down the title, but it works and supplements wherever needed.
So overall, Axel & Pixel was a nice diversion from the usual onslaught of AAA and indie madness. Here you get a smaller-scale title with a lot of love put into it, featuring some of the funniest environmental humor I have ever experienced. Solid PnC gameplay, easygoing puzzles, and an appropriately-priced runtime add up to a recommendation in my book. Just keep in mind the strange graphical mash-up, some annoying sound choices, and the lack of a real challenge.
The point-and-click or PnC genre is no stranger to this. These adventure titles were arguably the first major video game genre to gain afoot amongst mass audiences since they could be produced relatively quickly on shorter budgets. Many companies, from Sierra of yesteryear to Daedalic of present, have made a name off of their exploits here, and it’s a platform that I only see more indie developers taking advantage of.
But here, I am tasked with reviewing Axel & Pixel, an older PnC by developer Silver Wish Games that was released back in 2009. In contrast with most PnCs, Axel & Pixel isn’t narrative-focused, instead resting its appeal on the aforementioned eccentric factor. You play as the eponymous Axel, an artist who is hypnotized alongside his dog Pixel by a nefarious rat, causing the two to enter a dreamscape where said rodent holds the key to their escape. It’s not made clear whether this is simply a nightmare or an actual illusory trip brought about by the rodent (though the ending implies the former), but regardless that is irrelevant as that is all the story entails. The question remains- is the gameplay and general worldly aesthetic worth it? The short answer is yes, but only if you don't mind the lack of a challenge.
What I mean by that is, gameplay-wise, AnP isn't like most PnCs that feature hub filled with extensive (in the case of the 90s, infuriating) puzzles for you to move between screen solving. AnP is much more akin to a platformer, with each area being a self-contained level that, once beaten, cannot be returned to.
This is by no means a criticism, just a heads-up for vets expecting something akin to a Grim Fandango or Night of the Rabbit. AnP's puzzles are purely environmental, relying on players to find objects in the vista and use them with another object/character/environ via the mouse (or joystick if you are playing with console). Occasionally, there are quick-time events you will need to use other keys for, and the game throws in some racing sections involving you operating a vehicle with either the mouse or a key configuration.
It's a straightforward set-up that works well. One of the greatest things Silver Wish Games does is how they program a unique reaction for most of the incompatible interactions. What I mean by this is, usually in PnCs, when you can't use one item with another or you can't do some action, you tend to just have the main character shrug their shoulders or have some audible indication that it's a no-go. In AnP, on the other hand, 9 times out of 10 you'll get a humorous animation of one or both of the characters doing something and it backfiring. It's something I hope more developers do as it made for some surprisingly humorous moments in an already comedic game.
The only criticism I have about the puzzles is that a lot of them are straight-up linear and easy. That is to say, you have to do them one-at-a-time and, when you do get to them, the solution isn't the hardest thing to figure out. I'd be lying if I said there wasn't a sense of satisfaction, but for those craving something a little more challenging, you may be disappointed here. The presence of a hint button doesn't help this much xD.
Graphically, AnP is very unique. Those who have seen the show The Amazing World of Gumball will notice similarities- you have 2D cartoony characters amidst photorealistic backdrops that look like they were cut out of paper. Some will find this off-putting, and I won't blame you given the questionable nature of the artistic contrast (outside of maybe conveying the surrealist nature of dreams?), but for me I liked it. As I said in the introduction, you have to do what you can to differentiate yourself from the competition in an overcrowded genre, and this is one way that Silver Wish went about it. Axel and Pixel and other important NPCs always stand out from the generally murky backdrops courtesy of their pleasant shades.
If I had a criticism of the aesthetic, it would be just that- that the backgrounds are a little too dark for my liking. I get that, that may have been a thematic decision, and it certainly helps the characters pop-out, but I still feel a little more saturation would have gone a long way towards making things more pleasant. There were also times where the developers would throw in a 3D CG character, akin to those CGI atrocities you'd see in Courage the Cowardly Dog- like the scenery, I didn't have an issue, enjoyed them, and thought they served the purpose of giving a cool flavor to the AnP, but again, your mileage will vary.
The last thing I'll say on the graphics front is that, animation-wise, Silver Wish opted to go for a stop motion-style wherein characters move kind of jaggedly. This took me some getting used to, and I admittedly couldn't help but feel that it was partly done to alleviate programming more-fluid movements. But given the papery-ness of the visuals, it does fit in the end.
The sound is more of a mixed bag. The actual SFX is strong if a little repetitive, with sound cues corresponding anytime a character does an action or an NPC initiates something, though you will hear the same din each time they do. Unfortunately, the voice acting is a misfire. It's less voice acting and more just grunts given to Axel and barks to Pixel, but they are some of the most irate (for the former) and generic (for the latter) noises you will hear in a video game. I honestly wish they had gone full silent protagonist over this animalian sonance they opted for.
The music is tranquil and goes a long way towards establishing a calming atmosphere. You get a different track for each area, and the actiony parts have that appropriate adrenaline beat. It's not an OST you'll be humming after you've put down the title, but it works and supplements wherever needed.
So overall, Axel & Pixel was a nice diversion from the usual onslaught of AAA and indie madness. Here you get a smaller-scale title with a lot of love put into it, featuring some of the funniest environmental humor I have ever experienced. Solid PnC gameplay, easygoing puzzles, and an appropriately-priced runtime add up to a recommendation in my book. Just keep in mind the strange graphical mash-up, some annoying sound choices, and the lack of a real challenge.
2012
I've only played two Daedalic games (as of the posting of this review), but I don't think it'd be too forward of me to label the company the John Hughes of point-and-click adventure titles. For those who never watched a Hughes film, what I mean by the comparison is his movies were often filled with narrative flaws that were offset by the sheer amount of charm generated by the cast and his direction.
In Deponia's case, it's not so much narrative flaws as it is flaws relating to gameplay. However, I'd be danged if I didn't have a positive experience with the game, and that has to do with how comically-diverting everything is.
Storywise, Deponia isn't anything exceptional; it's set in a half-post-apocalyptic, half-steampunk, all-around lethargic world that main protagonist Rufus wants no part of. Having been abandoned by his father and believing his intellect to be unappreciated by the citizenry, he has spent the majority of his time attempting to escape to the orbiting haven of Elysium.
While I felt that the first Daedalic game I played, "The Night of the Rabbit," didn't have a fully-conceived outline for the fantasy setting it occupied, I can safely say that Deponia is much more fluidly thought-out. Granted, this was always going to be an easier task to do with a more grounded story than one that indulged in the supernatural, but it's still a testament to the writing team for understanding all the important facets of their speculative tale when it came to the job of world building. You get a lot of details about character histories and the general gist of the town, and outside of one, late-game scene relating to the bad guys’ motivation, there isn’t a single exposition dump. I don’t think people realize just how hard it is to pull off that kind of approach. You risk either being too vague or filling in every other conversation with some kind of data divulgence that is ultimately no different than an expo dump dispersed via Vines. Here, I learned a lot about a lot of things through mandatory and voluntary conversations with the townsfolk, as well as oral descriptions from Rufus himself.
This culminates in you, very quickly, realizing just how much of a jackass Rufus is. Selfish, egotistical, possibly psychopathic- throw the thesaurus at him and you wouldn’t find a word out of place from the selection I laid out. But if the guy is so bad, why continue playing as him? Why spend the next hours of your life in his shoes?
Well, it’s a delicate balancing act that, again, proves just how genius the writers are. When you have a protagonist who has done (and continues to do) horrible things, you have to make them likeable. At the same time, you have to have other characters consistently one-up them WHILE ALSO giving the protagonist a few counter-jabs of their own.
Let’s break down these components to explain why each is necessary: the likability factor is pretty self-explanatory; if you don’t find the person entertaining, you’re not going to want to spend time with them (Joe Pesci’s Tommy DeVito in "Goodfellas" is a prime example of this done right). The one-ups, executed in Deponia as primarily conversational, consistently check the character’s ego and remind players that they are not playing as a good guy. Often times, a story gets so caught-up in its hero’s journey that it either unintentionally forgets about its hero’s flaws or willfully does so for fear of hurting pacing, and that leads to inconsistencies harped on by astute viewers/readers; Deponia does not fall into that category with Rufus. And lastly, giving Rufus his own counter wit is necessary to avoid making him a consistent punching bag- no matter how much he may deserve it, having your protagonist get dicked on constantly without recourse will result in them coming off as pathetic. And that’s the last thing you want as a developer.
So to reiterate, the writers did a phenomenal job with Rufus. Like most PnCs, there is a ton of dialogue here, and seeing the back-and-forth banter between Rufus and co. leads to a lot of humorous moments courtesy of that delicate balance of verbal punches taken and thrown. It really helps that they manage to make Rufus an intelligent idiot- he does stupid things, but he’s also aware of his limitations, and isn’t afraid to stand up for himself when he’s called out on said limitations.
As I said before, the story isn’t anything special on the outset: Rufus hates his home-life and wants to go somewhere better via some crazy scheme. In the cusp of doing so, he encounters a female member of Elysium called Goal whom he falls head over heels for. However, Goal is caught up in a conspiracy involving members of the Elysian military; a conspiracy that Rufus will have to unravel over the course of his adventure.
Those who have been following my reviews know that I like to avoid giving away too much in the way of synopsis recap for fear of spoiling the experience, so what I’ll say here is that a lot of the plot focuses on Rufus’s shenanigans in his attempts to help Goal, and those shenanigans happen to involve almost every member of Deponia.
One thing worth noting is how much I ended up remembering every NPC I encountered; some are three-dimensional, most aren’t, but all have this endearing quality brought about by them being smart in some capacity. At the risk of scribing an absolute statement, you really don’t encounter an incompetent side character- they’re all miles ahead of Rufus in terms of their awareness about their society, but concurrently aren’t pretentious about it, which is a relief: often times, when you have a dumb protagonist in a large cast, the writers go out of their way to either make half their other characters idiots ("Spongebob") or arrogantly stubborn ("Ed, Edd n Eddy"). It’s not that either of those approaches can’t work (love both those shows), but it was nice to see a different approach taken wherein you have smarter, wittier NPCs who aren’t verbally humiliating Rufus every second sentence. That being said, one flaw with the dialogue is that there are numerous typos in the speech bubbles (as in, they don't match what the character is saying, not that they contain grammatical errors).
Alright, I’ve spoken enough about that- onto a new category, the graphics. I noted this in my review of The Night of the Rabbit (https://www.backloggd.com/u/RedBackLoggd/review/279054/), but Daedalic Entertainment has developed its own distinct art style since the Edna & Harvey days that is continued here, albeit with a thematic twist: characters have dark outlines with realistic body proportions and facial expressions; architecture is, as noted above, steampunky with wooden planks and iron paneling/pipes converging together to convey a DIY, scrapped-together aesthetic; and color grading is generally a medley of yellows and browns mixed with soft filters. The last area does transition to cooler hues like blue and teal, but everything remains industrialized and metallic regardless.
Overall, it is beautifully-rendered, but there are pitfalls to the schema. First and foremost is the hit-or-miss quality of the character models; most look fine, but there are a number of them (Gizmo [who looks like an older version of Jimmy from EEnE], the Mayor, the receptionist) that are downright hideous and brought back painful memories of Psychonauts. Secondly, the animation for walking feels out of place with the backdrops; I don’t quite know how to describe it, but it’s like Rufus and the others are moonwalking whenever they move from place-to-place, not actually making contact with the ground on them. The animation looks even more shoddy in the animated cutscenes, which honestly seem like they were made from Flash (i.e., they look cheap and out-of-place in this bigger budget video game, even with its comedic tone). Thirdly, there are only three facial expressions per a character, making their reactions repetitive. Fourth, the lip-syncing almost never matches the words being spoken on screen, more resembling warbling mouth movements from a bad ADR dub.
That critique makes a good transition to the sound, beginning with the voice acting, which is stellar. Kerry Shale is credited with voicing several characters in the game, the biggest one being Rufus, and he nails it. That balancing act I described in great detail above would not have mattered if the voice actor did not deliver on multiple fronts: conveying Rufus’s insecurities, superiority complex, intelligence, idiocy, and romantic confidence in one package. Shale does all that and more, giving Rufus a slight lisp and high-strung demeanor countered by an easygoing, cocky vocalization. My descriptions won’t do it any justice- you have to listen to his delivery yourself. Everyone else does a great job, and real kudos has to be given to the voice directors- in a lot of ways, Deponia feels like the opposite of Syberia. In that game, I felt that the voice actors recorded their lines in individual booths independent from the other, and then their performances were played side-by-side without any direction whatsoever. Here, it comes off like real interplay, which I doubt actually happened- instead, what you have is strong directors who successfully got their voice artists to get in the mindset that they were engaged in a conversation with the other actor, thereby making it all sound so natural. And keep in mind, there is a TON of dialogue in the title: that there are no lapses in this quality is something worth praising. Even Rufus’s item descriptions contain gems of amusement.
The sound design, on the other hand, is pretty weak. Nothing stands out, and things that do are blatantly stock noises triggered to play the exact same version every time it's initiated (i.e., the crane/gate/drawers make the same din). Like the snap of the Marquis de Hoto’s fingers in The Night of the Rabbit, the only stock noise I really enjoyed was the swapping whenever Rufus combines two items.
The music was mixed. Despite the steampunk vistas, you don’t get anything steampunk or industrial-sounding. Instead, you get pretty generic beats that delineate between screens to either another mediocre tune that sounds like it was made through some online music creator, or nothing at all. Props should be given to having multiple tracks per an area instead of one overarching motif, but I can’t say anything but the main theme was memorable (and that was for a different reason- I found it more grating than enjoyable). I hope I’m not sounding too harsh, especially since I can’t create music to save my life, but considering how good "The Night of the Rabbit’s" OST could be, I felt resident Daedalic composer Finn Seliger had the potential to do better here.
Finally, we get to the gameplay. Daedalic has pioneered a system wherein you can do everything (except save/load files) through the mouse. Left click interacts, right click observes, and the mouse wheel allows you to bring up your inventory easily.
In PnCs, gameplay is always going to be simplistic from a controller standpoint. What we need to examine is whether the exploration, item gathering, and puzzle solving is enjoyable or hair-ripping inducing. Compared to Night of the Rabbit and (especially) Grim Fandango, Deponia’s progression is a lot more palatable. Honestly, the thing that really helps is that most of the game’s sections are centered on a few areas, making the puzzles easier to get a grasp of since you have less areas and less interactable objects to use from your inventory overall. Not to keep drawing comparisons to it, but The Night of the Rabbit’s issue was that, for the most part, you had a large overworld to walk between. Deponia’s most aggravating section is the town of Kuvaq which, uncoincidentally, contains the most sub-areas of all the sections.
That being said, what I will say is that Deponia is not a title you can rush through, and I do feel that I would’ve enjoyed even Kuvaq more had I taken my time and not attempted to get through it quickly. There are some contrived solutions, but there were a lot that I know I would not have had to look up if I had just paid attention to the conversations or item observations or even visual cues (okay, that one was a bit too far). I say all this as a plea to those reading this review who are potentially interested in playing Deponia- take your time and really pay attention to what is being conveyed in text.
Now, the one gameplay element I won’t defend are the minigames strewn throughout that often have you solving some small-scale puzzle, ranging from putting together a jigsaw puzzle of stained glass to rearranging track circuits. Not a single one, let me repeat, not a single one of them was fun. They were tedious, boring, and pointless. I think the creators realized this halfway through because you are literally given the option to skip most of them instantly. I’m always up for a change in gameplay (as happened with Dark Room, see my review here: https://www.backloggd.com/u/RedBackLoggd/review/279158/), but that gameplay change needs to be enjoyable and it wasn’t here.
So, overall, what do you get with Deponia? You get a very charming release from Daedalic Entertainment, and the first entry in arguably their most popular franchise. The story is funny and keeps you jubilant through masterful direction and scripting that successfully gives you a jackass who is likeable and brought to life by a great performer. The gameplay has aged pretty well (minus a few parts that may require you to consult a walkthrough) and the graphical style is pleasant on the eyes (minus some ugly NPC models). The cast is great, but the sound design and score fail to live up to that standard. Finally, the pacing is strong and never drags out things unnecessarily.
There have been reports from gamers who played the game on Steam that there are bugs present. I personally did not experience any, but take it into consideration should you choose to purchase this. It took me over 7 hours to beat Deponia, which makes it a steal at a $10.00 price tag (even cheaper if you purchase it as part of the Daedalic Adventure Bundle). There are some growing pains, but the experience is agreeable for the most part.
In Deponia's case, it's not so much narrative flaws as it is flaws relating to gameplay. However, I'd be danged if I didn't have a positive experience with the game, and that has to do with how comically-diverting everything is.
Storywise, Deponia isn't anything exceptional; it's set in a half-post-apocalyptic, half-steampunk, all-around lethargic world that main protagonist Rufus wants no part of. Having been abandoned by his father and believing his intellect to be unappreciated by the citizenry, he has spent the majority of his time attempting to escape to the orbiting haven of Elysium.
While I felt that the first Daedalic game I played, "The Night of the Rabbit," didn't have a fully-conceived outline for the fantasy setting it occupied, I can safely say that Deponia is much more fluidly thought-out. Granted, this was always going to be an easier task to do with a more grounded story than one that indulged in the supernatural, but it's still a testament to the writing team for understanding all the important facets of their speculative tale when it came to the job of world building. You get a lot of details about character histories and the general gist of the town, and outside of one, late-game scene relating to the bad guys’ motivation, there isn’t a single exposition dump. I don’t think people realize just how hard it is to pull off that kind of approach. You risk either being too vague or filling in every other conversation with some kind of data divulgence that is ultimately no different than an expo dump dispersed via Vines. Here, I learned a lot about a lot of things through mandatory and voluntary conversations with the townsfolk, as well as oral descriptions from Rufus himself.
This culminates in you, very quickly, realizing just how much of a jackass Rufus is. Selfish, egotistical, possibly psychopathic- throw the thesaurus at him and you wouldn’t find a word out of place from the selection I laid out. But if the guy is so bad, why continue playing as him? Why spend the next hours of your life in his shoes?
Well, it’s a delicate balancing act that, again, proves just how genius the writers are. When you have a protagonist who has done (and continues to do) horrible things, you have to make them likeable. At the same time, you have to have other characters consistently one-up them WHILE ALSO giving the protagonist a few counter-jabs of their own.
Let’s break down these components to explain why each is necessary: the likability factor is pretty self-explanatory; if you don’t find the person entertaining, you’re not going to want to spend time with them (Joe Pesci’s Tommy DeVito in "Goodfellas" is a prime example of this done right). The one-ups, executed in Deponia as primarily conversational, consistently check the character’s ego and remind players that they are not playing as a good guy. Often times, a story gets so caught-up in its hero’s journey that it either unintentionally forgets about its hero’s flaws or willfully does so for fear of hurting pacing, and that leads to inconsistencies harped on by astute viewers/readers; Deponia does not fall into that category with Rufus. And lastly, giving Rufus his own counter wit is necessary to avoid making him a consistent punching bag- no matter how much he may deserve it, having your protagonist get dicked on constantly without recourse will result in them coming off as pathetic. And that’s the last thing you want as a developer.
So to reiterate, the writers did a phenomenal job with Rufus. Like most PnCs, there is a ton of dialogue here, and seeing the back-and-forth banter between Rufus and co. leads to a lot of humorous moments courtesy of that delicate balance of verbal punches taken and thrown. It really helps that they manage to make Rufus an intelligent idiot- he does stupid things, but he’s also aware of his limitations, and isn’t afraid to stand up for himself when he’s called out on said limitations.
As I said before, the story isn’t anything special on the outset: Rufus hates his home-life and wants to go somewhere better via some crazy scheme. In the cusp of doing so, he encounters a female member of Elysium called Goal whom he falls head over heels for. However, Goal is caught up in a conspiracy involving members of the Elysian military; a conspiracy that Rufus will have to unravel over the course of his adventure.
Those who have been following my reviews know that I like to avoid giving away too much in the way of synopsis recap for fear of spoiling the experience, so what I’ll say here is that a lot of the plot focuses on Rufus’s shenanigans in his attempts to help Goal, and those shenanigans happen to involve almost every member of Deponia.
One thing worth noting is how much I ended up remembering every NPC I encountered; some are three-dimensional, most aren’t, but all have this endearing quality brought about by them being smart in some capacity. At the risk of scribing an absolute statement, you really don’t encounter an incompetent side character- they’re all miles ahead of Rufus in terms of their awareness about their society, but concurrently aren’t pretentious about it, which is a relief: often times, when you have a dumb protagonist in a large cast, the writers go out of their way to either make half their other characters idiots ("Spongebob") or arrogantly stubborn ("Ed, Edd n Eddy"). It’s not that either of those approaches can’t work (love both those shows), but it was nice to see a different approach taken wherein you have smarter, wittier NPCs who aren’t verbally humiliating Rufus every second sentence. That being said, one flaw with the dialogue is that there are numerous typos in the speech bubbles (as in, they don't match what the character is saying, not that they contain grammatical errors).
Alright, I’ve spoken enough about that- onto a new category, the graphics. I noted this in my review of The Night of the Rabbit (https://www.backloggd.com/u/RedBackLoggd/review/279054/), but Daedalic Entertainment has developed its own distinct art style since the Edna & Harvey days that is continued here, albeit with a thematic twist: characters have dark outlines with realistic body proportions and facial expressions; architecture is, as noted above, steampunky with wooden planks and iron paneling/pipes converging together to convey a DIY, scrapped-together aesthetic; and color grading is generally a medley of yellows and browns mixed with soft filters. The last area does transition to cooler hues like blue and teal, but everything remains industrialized and metallic regardless.
Overall, it is beautifully-rendered, but there are pitfalls to the schema. First and foremost is the hit-or-miss quality of the character models; most look fine, but there are a number of them (Gizmo [who looks like an older version of Jimmy from EEnE], the Mayor, the receptionist) that are downright hideous and brought back painful memories of Psychonauts. Secondly, the animation for walking feels out of place with the backdrops; I don’t quite know how to describe it, but it’s like Rufus and the others are moonwalking whenever they move from place-to-place, not actually making contact with the ground on them. The animation looks even more shoddy in the animated cutscenes, which honestly seem like they were made from Flash (i.e., they look cheap and out-of-place in this bigger budget video game, even with its comedic tone). Thirdly, there are only three facial expressions per a character, making their reactions repetitive. Fourth, the lip-syncing almost never matches the words being spoken on screen, more resembling warbling mouth movements from a bad ADR dub.
That critique makes a good transition to the sound, beginning with the voice acting, which is stellar. Kerry Shale is credited with voicing several characters in the game, the biggest one being Rufus, and he nails it. That balancing act I described in great detail above would not have mattered if the voice actor did not deliver on multiple fronts: conveying Rufus’s insecurities, superiority complex, intelligence, idiocy, and romantic confidence in one package. Shale does all that and more, giving Rufus a slight lisp and high-strung demeanor countered by an easygoing, cocky vocalization. My descriptions won’t do it any justice- you have to listen to his delivery yourself. Everyone else does a great job, and real kudos has to be given to the voice directors- in a lot of ways, Deponia feels like the opposite of Syberia. In that game, I felt that the voice actors recorded their lines in individual booths independent from the other, and then their performances were played side-by-side without any direction whatsoever. Here, it comes off like real interplay, which I doubt actually happened- instead, what you have is strong directors who successfully got their voice artists to get in the mindset that they were engaged in a conversation with the other actor, thereby making it all sound so natural. And keep in mind, there is a TON of dialogue in the title: that there are no lapses in this quality is something worth praising. Even Rufus’s item descriptions contain gems of amusement.
The sound design, on the other hand, is pretty weak. Nothing stands out, and things that do are blatantly stock noises triggered to play the exact same version every time it's initiated (i.e., the crane/gate/drawers make the same din). Like the snap of the Marquis de Hoto’s fingers in The Night of the Rabbit, the only stock noise I really enjoyed was the swapping whenever Rufus combines two items.
The music was mixed. Despite the steampunk vistas, you don’t get anything steampunk or industrial-sounding. Instead, you get pretty generic beats that delineate between screens to either another mediocre tune that sounds like it was made through some online music creator, or nothing at all. Props should be given to having multiple tracks per an area instead of one overarching motif, but I can’t say anything but the main theme was memorable (and that was for a different reason- I found it more grating than enjoyable). I hope I’m not sounding too harsh, especially since I can’t create music to save my life, but considering how good "The Night of the Rabbit’s" OST could be, I felt resident Daedalic composer Finn Seliger had the potential to do better here.
Finally, we get to the gameplay. Daedalic has pioneered a system wherein you can do everything (except save/load files) through the mouse. Left click interacts, right click observes, and the mouse wheel allows you to bring up your inventory easily.
In PnCs, gameplay is always going to be simplistic from a controller standpoint. What we need to examine is whether the exploration, item gathering, and puzzle solving is enjoyable or hair-ripping inducing. Compared to Night of the Rabbit and (especially) Grim Fandango, Deponia’s progression is a lot more palatable. Honestly, the thing that really helps is that most of the game’s sections are centered on a few areas, making the puzzles easier to get a grasp of since you have less areas and less interactable objects to use from your inventory overall. Not to keep drawing comparisons to it, but The Night of the Rabbit’s issue was that, for the most part, you had a large overworld to walk between. Deponia’s most aggravating section is the town of Kuvaq which, uncoincidentally, contains the most sub-areas of all the sections.
That being said, what I will say is that Deponia is not a title you can rush through, and I do feel that I would’ve enjoyed even Kuvaq more had I taken my time and not attempted to get through it quickly. There are some contrived solutions, but there were a lot that I know I would not have had to look up if I had just paid attention to the conversations or item observations or even visual cues (okay, that one was a bit too far). I say all this as a plea to those reading this review who are potentially interested in playing Deponia- take your time and really pay attention to what is being conveyed in text.
Now, the one gameplay element I won’t defend are the minigames strewn throughout that often have you solving some small-scale puzzle, ranging from putting together a jigsaw puzzle of stained glass to rearranging track circuits. Not a single one, let me repeat, not a single one of them was fun. They were tedious, boring, and pointless. I think the creators realized this halfway through because you are literally given the option to skip most of them instantly. I’m always up for a change in gameplay (as happened with Dark Room, see my review here: https://www.backloggd.com/u/RedBackLoggd/review/279158/), but that gameplay change needs to be enjoyable and it wasn’t here.
So, overall, what do you get with Deponia? You get a very charming release from Daedalic Entertainment, and the first entry in arguably their most popular franchise. The story is funny and keeps you jubilant through masterful direction and scripting that successfully gives you a jackass who is likeable and brought to life by a great performer. The gameplay has aged pretty well (minus a few parts that may require you to consult a walkthrough) and the graphical style is pleasant on the eyes (minus some ugly NPC models). The cast is great, but the sound design and score fail to live up to that standard. Finally, the pacing is strong and never drags out things unnecessarily.
There have been reports from gamers who played the game on Steam that there are bugs present. I personally did not experience any, but take it into consideration should you choose to purchase this. It took me over 7 hours to beat Deponia, which makes it a steal at a $10.00 price tag (even cheaper if you purchase it as part of the Daedalic Adventure Bundle). There are some growing pains, but the experience is agreeable for the most part.
This review contains spoilers
When I reviewed The Long Halloween on GoodReads (https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2581443772?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1) I noted that it's one of those comics that every comic book fan is going to read at some point in their life, making pure reviews in the vein of a pre-release teaser pointless. After all, if I have major issues with the work, is that really going to deter you from wanting to formulate your own opinion, especially when said work is widely hailed as a masterpiece by the collective consciousness?
A similar issue arises with The Last of Us (henceforth to be referred to as TLOU), which is a game that I imagine everyone will plan on playing at some point in their life, regardless of the type of genre they prefer. Then again, to this day it has remained a Sony console exclusive, so perhaps that will prevent it from being experienced by a decent sect of the gaming populace (till emulation becomes feasible anyway for those who indulge in that).
No matter, the reason I bring this up is because this a title that has been covered extensively by mainstream and YouTube critics alike- it has been broken down, dissected, and analyzed six ways from Sunday, and so any general review I scribe will only fall into the overabundance of published material.
Instead, I want to focus primarily on the downsides of the game, which I feel were significantly overlooked because of the momentum provided by the strong narrative. I am not doing this for the sake of slinging mudballs, but rather to provide consumers with some tempered expectations when they take that inevitable step into playing it. That being said, I will also take this time to highlight some underrated facets of the game. Keep in mind that spoilers will be discussed, so you have been warned.
I have my issues with the story, but as those are minor I will reserve it to the very end (marked separately by spoiler tags, rest assured). Instead, we're going to delve into the graphics first, which for the most part are gorgeous. As this page indicates, I of course played the remastered version, and so a lot of visual updates were done from the vanilla release. What those specifics are, I cannot say without looking at comparison videos, but overall the end product is stunning. The post-apocalyptic genre has been done a bunch, but Naughty Dog managed to make their own mark through adopting a post-consumerist theme. I'm serious when I say that some of the most depressing moments in TLOU are not story beats but interior decorations: you take a look around your bedroom and you'll see that you have personalized it in some way, whether it be through posters on the walls, books/music you were digesting, the types of electronics you purchased, or even simply the color of your bedsheets. Those of us who live in developed countries have this luxury to really individualize our personal spaces, and Naughty Dog realized this when it went about with its art design.
I am not doing anywhere near a service to the effort put in by the artisans when I tell you that the level of detail in buildings is phenomenal. From pop culture paraphernalia to broken down items, you genuinely get a sense that a unique person lived and breathed in these rooms before having to haphazardly abandon it due to the outbreak. It's heartbreaking at times, seeing the lives of whole families upturned for the worse. Throw in skeletons and blood patches galore and you know there was a violent transitionary period between the two time frames.
This goes a long way towards saying that Naughty Dog has excelled at environmental storytelling. One of the issues that comes with creating an alternate future is how you go about conveying those historical differentiations to your audience- the easiest choice is adopt the exposition route wherein some character (or characters) drops long tidbits of knowledge about how things came to be. This, of course, has the downside of generally killing the pacing via what is known as the "exposition dump" in writing circles.
Another option is to be vague to a fault, leaving it to the audience to determine what happened on their own. This has the downside of leading to plot holes and frustrations since you are not aware of the explanations behind why certain things are the way they are (and consequently why certain characters act the way they act).
In TLOU, the developers took a middle approach- after a radio broadcast title credits that gives a general overview of what happened over the past 20 years, you're left with four main sources of information: offhand remarks from characters, optional conversations, collectible pieces of stationary that tell small tales about the lives of people who lived through the outbreak, and finally the aforementioned environmental storytelling.
Those first three are also done incredibly well. It's a delicate balancing act that writers and game designers indulging in this tactic need to handle, and I can proudly say that Naughty Dog achieved this. They're spaced out and condensed well-enough that they never feel extraneous, nor are they ever lacking in info; what you know, you know, and what you don't know you get a strong sense of. Even small bits of monologue like Joel remarking how he misses coffee go a long way towards providing depth to the discrepant future you are in.
Another graphical feat I observed and enjoyed was the depiction of falling water on character models. Usually, video games tend to just have liquid generically envelop a character, with maybe the screen getting blurry. Here, though, whenever you stand under a cascade of water, it actually bends around the model, as it would in real life, with Joel throwing his hand up to stymie the mini torrent.
The only graphical criticism I have for the remaster is the draw distance. There were one too many instances where foliage and other small pieces of the environ in the horizon would fail to render in time. It wasn't enough to be immersion breaking like with the first Witcher, but as this was apparently an issue that the remaster sought to address, I thought I'd bring it up.
With the gameplay, I can begin indulging in some of my more negative criticisms, beginning with the melee. TLOU has way too simple a combat system for the amount of mandatory fighting you are required to do throughout. It literally consists of a single attack button that you hit consecutive times to trigger a combo. There is no dodging, no blocking, no countering, no variations of attacks (i.e., heavy, light), no incorporation of firearms into combos, and the only time you can grapple is when a prompt presents itself during a melee barrage. It's barebones to a fault, and I say that because things can get frustrating when you're in a fight with many infected. The camera is heavily focused on 1v1 combat, snuggling up to Joel's shoulder as you batter down an enemy, yet you're often placed in situations that result in you being swarmed from all sides, which is realistic as far as zombies attacks go (assuming we consider zombies to be realistic) but annoying when you're not given a system of movement to tag alongside the mano-y-mano.
What this means is you're often forced to either bolt in the opposite direction and reconfigure yourself against the AI, or to utilize your firearms during these segments, particularly when they involve Infected called Clickers that are capable of one-shotting you at close-range. In the easier modes, this is fine, but for harder difficulties that emphasize ammo conservation, this can make such fights very irate, forcing you to do frequent resets to ensure you don't waste too many bullets.
The lack of ammunition in the world serves as a good transition point to talk about the scavenging apparatus Naughty Dog has put in place here, which has flaws. TLOU, to be fair, is not a full-fledged survival horror, meaning it didn't have to be elaborate in its survivalist aspects since you don't live or die by it (at least on the easy-hard difficulties). That being said, it still deserves scrutiny for lacking basic aspects. For starters, you can't loot bodies: you kill an enemy, there is a 95% chance that that gun they were using to fire at you magically disappears. I get that they probably didn't want players to acquire an abundance of ammo, but that could have easily been absolved by simply providing goons without firearms, having thugs possess little ammunition on them, or lowering the clip capacity of all your weapons in general so that you couldn't hoard bullets. Heck, one of my problems with the game was that I felt it gave you way too many weapons, with Naughty Dog wasting time programming all these items. Guns like the pistol, shorty, and El Diablo feel like redundant variations of the revolver, shotgun, and rifle respectively. Even the flamethrower, while very useful, didn't really have to be added given the availability of Molotov cocktails.
Cocktails are one of several offensive and defensive tools at your disposal that you can craft through gathering the requisite materials throughout the world. Finding these is as simple as pressing a corresponding button across a drawer or cupboard flap, but one of the biggest issues I had with TLOU had to do with the narrative often moving faster than the time given to explore and ransack a place for goodies. What I mean by this is there are a number of instances wherein it would naturally make sense for Joel to continue walking forward with an NPC as they are in the midst of a conversation, only for you to miss vital looting opportunities should you choose to play as such. On the other hand, if you do do the latter, what you end up with is awkward pauses wherein the NPC will stop talking, turn around, and wait for you to be done before continuing the discussion as though nothing happened.
By no means are any of these heavily impactful on the narrative, but for me personally, they did briefly rupture the immersion. It would've been very easy to fix too by simply programming conversations around gathering things before pressing forward, which the writers DO at parts, indicating that they knew this was something that should have been provided to the player.
That aside, TLOU does throw in an upgrade system for its weapons, which you can improve and/or add attachments to via another resource called "gears" that are gathered like everything else. The problem is, you can only upgrade weapons through these in-game locations called workbenches that are strewn throughout the four chapters, which in turn require the acquirement of toolboxes to successfully access all upgrade tiers. It's not that they're hard to find, it just made no sense to limit player craftsmanship to these two facets when creating other items can be done at any place and anytime in the game. Perhaps it was an attempt at making things more difficult, but the limited amount of gears prevents you from constantly upgrading anyway. I have a feeling it was only done as a way of encouraging a NG+ playthrough (and thereby, padding out game worth).
Finally, I can talk about the last major facet of the gameplay, which is the stealth. It's a very simple system, consisting of crouch-walking to "silence" your footsteps while you work your way around a field, silently taking down enemies. Stealth areas are reminiscent of Arkham's predator rooms in the sense that they're very spacious, and while Joel obviously can't brood on top of gargoyles, there is plenty of debris to kneel behind. Honestly, one of my more favorite subtle aspects to TLOU is how Joel will cover Ellie as the two of you hide behind such structures.
When I said the stealth is simple, I meant it- you can create noise distractions with adjacent bricks and bottles that lead distraught enemies elsewhere, but that's really it. The only silent weapon at your disposal is a bow you get during the first chapter, and the limited ammo it has (despite arrows having a chance of retrievability) ensures that you can't even use that that much. Enemies rarely clump together, so as long as you have a little patience, you will always find an opportunity to isolate someone and take them out. There're no non-lethal options, though I guess it wouldn't have made sense in this setting.
One of the lazier aspects is how TLOU rehashes the same kill animation for every individual enemy. Considering the amount of different takedowns the melee had, it would've been nice to have more variety here than the same generic chokehold. Also, considering these strangulations are slow, some environmental or quicker kills could've been implemented at the cost of creating noise (much like the Arkham series did beginning with City). To be clear, you do have the option to use a shiv (makeshift knives you can craft in-game) as a way of quickly taking down someone (and the ONLY way to silently kill a Clicker), but these are treated as noiseless regardless.
Honestly, my only objective issue with the stealth has to be the lack of corner take downs. An enemy will come around a corner that you're leaning up against, and the game will not allow you to grab them unless you move directly behind them, which, as you can imagine, instantly alerts them and sets off the rest of the hooligans onto you. Your best bet is to hope they don't see you as they walk past said corner, and then do a standard back grapple.
Ellie's AI is, for the most part, solid, and really brings to shame AC Syndicate, which, despite coming out 2 years later, claimed it could not put Jacob and Evie in more missions together because it was too difficult to program a secondary NPC (note- I don't doubt that it was difficult to program, but a game company as revered and lucrative as Ubisoft could've and should've dedicated the time to see this through). If you are caught, Ellie springs into action, throwing items at goons (later shooting them when she is given a gun) and stabbing guys who manage to grapple you during a fisticuff. The only issue is the game seems to be very hit-or-miss in determining whether enemies can detect Ellie as an individual- there were times where she ran right in front them without worry as they went around a corner she was at, and others where they got alerted and started firing. It's inconsistent, and can lead to occasional frustrations.
There are two two pet peeves I had with Naughty Dog's way of achieving a higher difficulty that I want to talk about real quick. Normally, games make things harder for players on higher difficulties by increasing enemy health and decreasing player resistance to attacks. That latter trait is applied here alongside the removal of listening mode, and those are fine, but two additional facets pissed me off to no end and caused me to revert to a lower difficulty- the first is that they make the already limited scavenging even MORE limited by having you gather SMALLER PARTS of materials when you manage to find them. It was like, why do this when it's already luck-or-chance to find any resource for crafting?
The second was increasing the detection range of Runners. In theory, I'm guessing they were trying to essentially make them like Clickers by requiring you to slowly approach them, but the programming wasn't efficient because it makes their detection very inconsistent: sometimes they'll be like regular-difficulty runners, other times like clickers, and still other times (more-often-than-not) like Infected with Spider Sense that spot you no matter how slowly you approach them or from what angle. The capriciousness that I experienced was frustrating.
Now, to move onto the narrative, of which explicit spoilers will be discussed! Much has been made about the story- indeed, given the above flaws I presented in the gameplay, it stands to reason that the basis behind the numerous 10/10s from publications comes from the impact reviewers felt. And I'll add to that applause: this is a very well-written game. If you're reading this critique, you know all about it resting on the burgeoning bond between Joel and Ellie, who meet as strangers and end up as a surrogate father/daughter pairing. The development is great- the only part I didn't necessarily get was why Joel haphazardly changed his opinion on taking Ellie to the Fireflies over letting her go with Tommy when he previously intended on doing just that (and don't say that interaction with Ellie in the house changed him, because he explicitly states that he doesn't see her as his daughter [though this can viewed as him lying to himself, it doesn't deviate from the fact that he wouldn't want to get hurt again]).
On that note, I do think TLOU could have benefitted from having some flashbacks of Sarah, Joel's daughter. The opening was superbly done, and I wouldn't change a single aspect of it (besides maybe making the gate Tommy opens a little easier to see apart from the crowd!), but these memories could've been interwoven throughout the game (worth noting that TLOU 2 would go on to do just this with its own flashbacks). The reason I say this is because the game goes a long way towards impressing on us (and outright stating in that aforementioned part in the house) that Joel is starting to view Ellie as Sarah, yet because we never got any characterization of her (besides knowing she likes movies), those comparison don't work as strongly as Druckmann and his team intended. I also felt, at times in the early game, they made Ellie act too much like 10-12 year-old, which didn't fit considering she is 1) 14 and 2) has grown up in a world that requires her to grow up fast.
Besides those small quibbles, there are other issues I had: there seem to have been abandoned concepts like the use of maps for areas (which you can collect that serve no function) and Joel receiving an engine starter from Bill only for him to never bring it up again; the ending; while I appreciate it when a video game makes me question if I'm doing the right thing, I did not like that the writers indulged in the whole "the hero has to die" trope common in apocalyptic fiction with Ellie having to die from the surgery - it just felt so out-of-the-blue and done purely to justify Joel's actions (I feel it would've been a lot better had Ellie been presented with an odds of dying over an absolute certainty); and finally, the short length of the three seasons in comparison to the first (Summer) is noticeable. There are significantly less "missions" in Fall, Winter, and Spring. This is an issue I also noticed in Darksiders wherein the Bat Queen section was noticeably longer than the others. While some might claim it was done for storytelling reasons, I'm under the impression that, like Darksiders, it was more because of developmental constraints (Naughty Dog's horrible record of crunch-time is pretty infamous). I say this because there were scenes that could have been added to the latter chapters that would have contributed to them without impacting pacing (of course, that latter aspect depends on execution, which I know Naughty Dog could have pulled off). For example, have Joel and Ellie spend more time at Tommy's encampment, getting to know the individuals there; have Ellie actually go to the cannibal village instead of David revealing his hand so early; have the abandoned Salt Lake City QZ in the Spring section be occupied by a new group of stragglers/hunters different from one's we have encountered before. I'm just spitballing here, and I'm sure stuff was left on the cutting room floor from the writers themselves. If the rumored remake comes to fruition, I'd definitely like to see more flesh added to this skeleton.
Regarding the sound design, there are inconsistencies with regards to the doppler effect and interiors (going inside a building doesn't quite provide a smooth transitionary decline in volume to outside mumblings (thug talk) and rumblings (particularly inclement weather). I also wasn't a fan of them rehashing the exact same tone of voice and warble for every enemy variation- these are all different citizens being infected across the country, so why would they all sound the same? Maybe I can understand for the fully infected ones like stalkers, clickers, and bloaters, but not the drowners who still physically resemble their hosts.
A lot of praise has gone to Gustavo Santaolalla's score, but outside of the main theme I honestly wasn't a huge fan. I thought the string solos he employed didn't quite carry the emotional impact he intended them to, though I acknowledge I'm in the minority here. In general, he nails the atmospheric vibes for each area, so that's always a plus in these long video games with diverse locales.
Overall, you'll definitely enjoy your time with The Last of Us. This critique isn't meant to diminish the game's achievements (in fact, I went out of my way to highly underrated aspects of it), and it has firmly established its place as a piece of high art in video game storytelling. However, there were detriments that I feel reviewers and fans have deliberately overlooked, particularly in the realm of gameplay, and hopefully people glean something decent from this write-up!
As TLOU Remastered comes with Left Behind, I will be copy/pasting my review of it here. But for those who want a quick link to it because you want to get to the spoiler bit I asterisked above, here is one: https://www.backloggd.com/games/the-last-of-us-left-behind
TLOU: Left Behind is an example of a retroactive story DLC done right. What I mean by this is, narrative-focused add-ons tend to be either small sequels to the main game or side stories focusing on another character besides the protagonist. A retroactive one, on the other hand, is set at some point during the main storyline, and these are generally harder to pull off in non-open world titles because you have to avoid creating continuity issues.
With Left Behind, not only do you get a release that avoids that pitfall, but you also get two additional facets: narrative context to major events in the main game, minor plot holes repaired, and significant background characterization for Ellie that adds emotional depth to her final speech at the end of TLOU.
Obviously, there is no way to talk about any of these without spoiling the main game, so I'll instead address the question of whether or not you should play Left Behind during your playthrough of TLOU or after. Having done the former during my replay of TLOU 1, I would recommend doing so. It takes place perfectly before Winter begins, meaning you have a natural transition point to begin it (compared to most DLCs), and, as I said above, it adds significant context to both that chapter and Ellie as a whole. The one downside is that it will cause some pacing issues in the sense that it slows down the momentum of the main game's narrative, but that's a small price for the payoff you get.
Now, onto the spoilers- Left Behind has two simultaneous stories going on: first is a continuation of the present wherein Ellie is trying to treat Joel after he suffered a life-threatening injury at the end of Spring; second is an exploration of Ellie's past, specifically her relationship with a soldier trainee-turned-Firefly named Riley.
There's not much I can really say on the story front because most of it consists of character moments that you just have to experience. Druckmann and his writing team do a good job of not only showcasing the history between these two girls, but the continued friendship they sport despite fractures having erupted in it. Scenes like playing with water guns, telling jokes, and exploring a Halloween-themed store may not seem like fun in a post-apocalyptic game on the outset, but become subtly engaging when you experience it through dialogue conveying the pure joy these characters are having, all helped by fantastic chemistry between the actresses Ashley Johnson and Yaani King. King, in particular, gives a phenomenal performance, and was honestly robbed of a nomination (let alone win) at the BAFTAs in 2014.
It may seem like there are tonal inconsistencies given that this seemingly-innocent past conflicts with the harsh winter story of Ellie struggling against Infected and Bandits to save Joel from the brink of death, but I never felt anything of the sort. Part of this could be the short nature of the DLC, but I feel it has more to do with the past parts not forgetting that you're in a dystopian setting. Despite the lighter-tone, you are regularly reminded of the oppressive nature of life in the Quarantine Zone and of tragedies that have occurred. The mall you spend most of your time exploring, while lit-up, is ultimately abandoned, and strewn with the same level of depressing decrepit detail I raved about in my review of the main game (heck, in some ways it hit a little close to home considering malls are becoming less and less frequented with the advent of online shopping services!).
Perhaps ironic, perhaps intentionally-designed, you're also exploring a desolate shopping complex in the present, albeit one cloaked in moonlight and snow courtesy of an impending ice storm. I'm a sucker for winter-themed locales, so seeing Naughty Dog return to this format a year after their game was released AND successfully bring it to fruition is a testament to their capabilities as artisans.
I believe I enjoyed the score here more than in the main game due to those lighter chords matching the more optimistic atmosphere of yesteryear. And I have no criticisms/praises of the sound design that I didn't/did have with the main game.
My only critiques overall would be the following: first is that the switches between the two halves are not naturalistic enough for my liking. I was hoping for something akin to the final fight in Arrow season 2 wherein you have mirrored instances for the transitions to occur, but instead what you usually get are hard cuts that aren't really tied to cliffhangers.
The second is, just like with TLOU, you have collectible vignettes detailing small stories that occurred in the location you're at. The thing is, whereas Joel would have reactions to every other one, Ellie is completely silent, even when hearing recordings.
But overall, Left Behind is solid storytelling and definitely worth doing during your playthrough of TLOU (or after, if you chose to beat it straight through). I cannot emphasize just how much it adds to the base game, both in terms of character progression, character arcs, and explaining small details like how Ellie had a bow if Joel still had his.
+The part where Henry is leading Joel through the apartments to their secret hideout, Joel going into other rooms when they need to hole up; the part where Tommy is giving a tour of Jackson, it makes no sense for Joel to be walking off to the side grabbing stuff off the shelves while his brother escorting him; the part where Joel finally arrives at the house Ellie is in, Joel's immediate reaction would be to rush up the stairs to make sure she's fine, not scavenge the house (which you don't get the opportunity to do as you are immediately attacked by bandits after the cutscene with Ellie), etc....I could go on and list more examples.
A similar issue arises with The Last of Us (henceforth to be referred to as TLOU), which is a game that I imagine everyone will plan on playing at some point in their life, regardless of the type of genre they prefer. Then again, to this day it has remained a Sony console exclusive, so perhaps that will prevent it from being experienced by a decent sect of the gaming populace (till emulation becomes feasible anyway for those who indulge in that).
No matter, the reason I bring this up is because this a title that has been covered extensively by mainstream and YouTube critics alike- it has been broken down, dissected, and analyzed six ways from Sunday, and so any general review I scribe will only fall into the overabundance of published material.
Instead, I want to focus primarily on the downsides of the game, which I feel were significantly overlooked because of the momentum provided by the strong narrative. I am not doing this for the sake of slinging mudballs, but rather to provide consumers with some tempered expectations when they take that inevitable step into playing it. That being said, I will also take this time to highlight some underrated facets of the game. Keep in mind that spoilers will be discussed, so you have been warned.
I have my issues with the story, but as those are minor I will reserve it to the very end (marked separately by spoiler tags, rest assured). Instead, we're going to delve into the graphics first, which for the most part are gorgeous. As this page indicates, I of course played the remastered version, and so a lot of visual updates were done from the vanilla release. What those specifics are, I cannot say without looking at comparison videos, but overall the end product is stunning. The post-apocalyptic genre has been done a bunch, but Naughty Dog managed to make their own mark through adopting a post-consumerist theme. I'm serious when I say that some of the most depressing moments in TLOU are not story beats but interior decorations: you take a look around your bedroom and you'll see that you have personalized it in some way, whether it be through posters on the walls, books/music you were digesting, the types of electronics you purchased, or even simply the color of your bedsheets. Those of us who live in developed countries have this luxury to really individualize our personal spaces, and Naughty Dog realized this when it went about with its art design.
I am not doing anywhere near a service to the effort put in by the artisans when I tell you that the level of detail in buildings is phenomenal. From pop culture paraphernalia to broken down items, you genuinely get a sense that a unique person lived and breathed in these rooms before having to haphazardly abandon it due to the outbreak. It's heartbreaking at times, seeing the lives of whole families upturned for the worse. Throw in skeletons and blood patches galore and you know there was a violent transitionary period between the two time frames.
This goes a long way towards saying that Naughty Dog has excelled at environmental storytelling. One of the issues that comes with creating an alternate future is how you go about conveying those historical differentiations to your audience- the easiest choice is adopt the exposition route wherein some character (or characters) drops long tidbits of knowledge about how things came to be. This, of course, has the downside of generally killing the pacing via what is known as the "exposition dump" in writing circles.
Another option is to be vague to a fault, leaving it to the audience to determine what happened on their own. This has the downside of leading to plot holes and frustrations since you are not aware of the explanations behind why certain things are the way they are (and consequently why certain characters act the way they act).
In TLOU, the developers took a middle approach- after a radio broadcast title credits that gives a general overview of what happened over the past 20 years, you're left with four main sources of information: offhand remarks from characters, optional conversations, collectible pieces of stationary that tell small tales about the lives of people who lived through the outbreak, and finally the aforementioned environmental storytelling.
Those first three are also done incredibly well. It's a delicate balancing act that writers and game designers indulging in this tactic need to handle, and I can proudly say that Naughty Dog achieved this. They're spaced out and condensed well-enough that they never feel extraneous, nor are they ever lacking in info; what you know, you know, and what you don't know you get a strong sense of. Even small bits of monologue like Joel remarking how he misses coffee go a long way towards providing depth to the discrepant future you are in.
Another graphical feat I observed and enjoyed was the depiction of falling water on character models. Usually, video games tend to just have liquid generically envelop a character, with maybe the screen getting blurry. Here, though, whenever you stand under a cascade of water, it actually bends around the model, as it would in real life, with Joel throwing his hand up to stymie the mini torrent.
The only graphical criticism I have for the remaster is the draw distance. There were one too many instances where foliage and other small pieces of the environ in the horizon would fail to render in time. It wasn't enough to be immersion breaking like with the first Witcher, but as this was apparently an issue that the remaster sought to address, I thought I'd bring it up.
With the gameplay, I can begin indulging in some of my more negative criticisms, beginning with the melee. TLOU has way too simple a combat system for the amount of mandatory fighting you are required to do throughout. It literally consists of a single attack button that you hit consecutive times to trigger a combo. There is no dodging, no blocking, no countering, no variations of attacks (i.e., heavy, light), no incorporation of firearms into combos, and the only time you can grapple is when a prompt presents itself during a melee barrage. It's barebones to a fault, and I say that because things can get frustrating when you're in a fight with many infected. The camera is heavily focused on 1v1 combat, snuggling up to Joel's shoulder as you batter down an enemy, yet you're often placed in situations that result in you being swarmed from all sides, which is realistic as far as zombies attacks go (assuming we consider zombies to be realistic) but annoying when you're not given a system of movement to tag alongside the mano-y-mano.
What this means is you're often forced to either bolt in the opposite direction and reconfigure yourself against the AI, or to utilize your firearms during these segments, particularly when they involve Infected called Clickers that are capable of one-shotting you at close-range. In the easier modes, this is fine, but for harder difficulties that emphasize ammo conservation, this can make such fights very irate, forcing you to do frequent resets to ensure you don't waste too many bullets.
The lack of ammunition in the world serves as a good transition point to talk about the scavenging apparatus Naughty Dog has put in place here, which has flaws. TLOU, to be fair, is not a full-fledged survival horror, meaning it didn't have to be elaborate in its survivalist aspects since you don't live or die by it (at least on the easy-hard difficulties). That being said, it still deserves scrutiny for lacking basic aspects. For starters, you can't loot bodies: you kill an enemy, there is a 95% chance that that gun they were using to fire at you magically disappears. I get that they probably didn't want players to acquire an abundance of ammo, but that could have easily been absolved by simply providing goons without firearms, having thugs possess little ammunition on them, or lowering the clip capacity of all your weapons in general so that you couldn't hoard bullets. Heck, one of my problems with the game was that I felt it gave you way too many weapons, with Naughty Dog wasting time programming all these items. Guns like the pistol, shorty, and El Diablo feel like redundant variations of the revolver, shotgun, and rifle respectively. Even the flamethrower, while very useful, didn't really have to be added given the availability of Molotov cocktails.
Cocktails are one of several offensive and defensive tools at your disposal that you can craft through gathering the requisite materials throughout the world. Finding these is as simple as pressing a corresponding button across a drawer or cupboard flap, but one of the biggest issues I had with TLOU had to do with the narrative often moving faster than the time given to explore and ransack a place for goodies. What I mean by this is there are a number of instances wherein it would naturally make sense for Joel to continue walking forward with an NPC as they are in the midst of a conversation, only for you to miss vital looting opportunities should you choose to play as such. On the other hand, if you do do the latter, what you end up with is awkward pauses wherein the NPC will stop talking, turn around, and wait for you to be done before continuing the discussion as though nothing happened.
By no means are any of these heavily impactful on the narrative, but for me personally, they did briefly rupture the immersion. It would've been very easy to fix too by simply programming conversations around gathering things before pressing forward, which the writers DO at parts, indicating that they knew this was something that should have been provided to the player.
That aside, TLOU does throw in an upgrade system for its weapons, which you can improve and/or add attachments to via another resource called "gears" that are gathered like everything else. The problem is, you can only upgrade weapons through these in-game locations called workbenches that are strewn throughout the four chapters, which in turn require the acquirement of toolboxes to successfully access all upgrade tiers. It's not that they're hard to find, it just made no sense to limit player craftsmanship to these two facets when creating other items can be done at any place and anytime in the game. Perhaps it was an attempt at making things more difficult, but the limited amount of gears prevents you from constantly upgrading anyway. I have a feeling it was only done as a way of encouraging a NG+ playthrough (and thereby, padding out game worth).
Finally, I can talk about the last major facet of the gameplay, which is the stealth. It's a very simple system, consisting of crouch-walking to "silence" your footsteps while you work your way around a field, silently taking down enemies. Stealth areas are reminiscent of Arkham's predator rooms in the sense that they're very spacious, and while Joel obviously can't brood on top of gargoyles, there is plenty of debris to kneel behind. Honestly, one of my more favorite subtle aspects to TLOU is how Joel will cover Ellie as the two of you hide behind such structures.
When I said the stealth is simple, I meant it- you can create noise distractions with adjacent bricks and bottles that lead distraught enemies elsewhere, but that's really it. The only silent weapon at your disposal is a bow you get during the first chapter, and the limited ammo it has (despite arrows having a chance of retrievability) ensures that you can't even use that that much. Enemies rarely clump together, so as long as you have a little patience, you will always find an opportunity to isolate someone and take them out. There're no non-lethal options, though I guess it wouldn't have made sense in this setting.
One of the lazier aspects is how TLOU rehashes the same kill animation for every individual enemy. Considering the amount of different takedowns the melee had, it would've been nice to have more variety here than the same generic chokehold. Also, considering these strangulations are slow, some environmental or quicker kills could've been implemented at the cost of creating noise (much like the Arkham series did beginning with City). To be clear, you do have the option to use a shiv (makeshift knives you can craft in-game) as a way of quickly taking down someone (and the ONLY way to silently kill a Clicker), but these are treated as noiseless regardless.
Honestly, my only objective issue with the stealth has to be the lack of corner take downs. An enemy will come around a corner that you're leaning up against, and the game will not allow you to grab them unless you move directly behind them, which, as you can imagine, instantly alerts them and sets off the rest of the hooligans onto you. Your best bet is to hope they don't see you as they walk past said corner, and then do a standard back grapple.
Ellie's AI is, for the most part, solid, and really brings to shame AC Syndicate, which, despite coming out 2 years later, claimed it could not put Jacob and Evie in more missions together because it was too difficult to program a secondary NPC (note- I don't doubt that it was difficult to program, but a game company as revered and lucrative as Ubisoft could've and should've dedicated the time to see this through). If you are caught, Ellie springs into action, throwing items at goons (later shooting them when she is given a gun) and stabbing guys who manage to grapple you during a fisticuff. The only issue is the game seems to be very hit-or-miss in determining whether enemies can detect Ellie as an individual- there were times where she ran right in front them without worry as they went around a corner she was at, and others where they got alerted and started firing. It's inconsistent, and can lead to occasional frustrations.
There are two two pet peeves I had with Naughty Dog's way of achieving a higher difficulty that I want to talk about real quick. Normally, games make things harder for players on higher difficulties by increasing enemy health and decreasing player resistance to attacks. That latter trait is applied here alongside the removal of listening mode, and those are fine, but two additional facets pissed me off to no end and caused me to revert to a lower difficulty- the first is that they make the already limited scavenging even MORE limited by having you gather SMALLER PARTS of materials when you manage to find them. It was like, why do this when it's already luck-or-chance to find any resource for crafting?
The second was increasing the detection range of Runners. In theory, I'm guessing they were trying to essentially make them like Clickers by requiring you to slowly approach them, but the programming wasn't efficient because it makes their detection very inconsistent: sometimes they'll be like regular-difficulty runners, other times like clickers, and still other times (more-often-than-not) like Infected with Spider Sense that spot you no matter how slowly you approach them or from what angle. The capriciousness that I experienced was frustrating.
Now, to move onto the narrative, of which explicit spoilers will be discussed! Much has been made about the story- indeed, given the above flaws I presented in the gameplay, it stands to reason that the basis behind the numerous 10/10s from publications comes from the impact reviewers felt. And I'll add to that applause: this is a very well-written game. If you're reading this critique, you know all about it resting on the burgeoning bond between Joel and Ellie, who meet as strangers and end up as a surrogate father/daughter pairing. The development is great- the only part I didn't necessarily get was why Joel haphazardly changed his opinion on taking Ellie to the Fireflies over letting her go with Tommy when he previously intended on doing just that (and don't say that interaction with Ellie in the house changed him, because he explicitly states that he doesn't see her as his daughter [though this can viewed as him lying to himself, it doesn't deviate from the fact that he wouldn't want to get hurt again]).
On that note, I do think TLOU could have benefitted from having some flashbacks of Sarah, Joel's daughter. The opening was superbly done, and I wouldn't change a single aspect of it (besides maybe making the gate Tommy opens a little easier to see apart from the crowd!), but these memories could've been interwoven throughout the game (worth noting that TLOU 2 would go on to do just this with its own flashbacks). The reason I say this is because the game goes a long way towards impressing on us (and outright stating in that aforementioned part in the house) that Joel is starting to view Ellie as Sarah, yet because we never got any characterization of her (besides knowing she likes movies), those comparison don't work as strongly as Druckmann and his team intended. I also felt, at times in the early game, they made Ellie act too much like 10-12 year-old, which didn't fit considering she is 1) 14 and 2) has grown up in a world that requires her to grow up fast.
Besides those small quibbles, there are other issues I had: there seem to have been abandoned concepts like the use of maps for areas (which you can collect that serve no function) and Joel receiving an engine starter from Bill only for him to never bring it up again; the ending; while I appreciate it when a video game makes me question if I'm doing the right thing, I did not like that the writers indulged in the whole "the hero has to die" trope common in apocalyptic fiction with Ellie having to die from the surgery - it just felt so out-of-the-blue and done purely to justify Joel's actions (I feel it would've been a lot better had Ellie been presented with an odds of dying over an absolute certainty); and finally, the short length of the three seasons in comparison to the first (Summer) is noticeable. There are significantly less "missions" in Fall, Winter, and Spring. This is an issue I also noticed in Darksiders wherein the Bat Queen section was noticeably longer than the others. While some might claim it was done for storytelling reasons, I'm under the impression that, like Darksiders, it was more because of developmental constraints (Naughty Dog's horrible record of crunch-time is pretty infamous). I say this because there were scenes that could have been added to the latter chapters that would have contributed to them without impacting pacing (of course, that latter aspect depends on execution, which I know Naughty Dog could have pulled off). For example, have Joel and Ellie spend more time at Tommy's encampment, getting to know the individuals there; have Ellie actually go to the cannibal village instead of David revealing his hand so early; have the abandoned Salt Lake City QZ in the Spring section be occupied by a new group of stragglers/hunters different from one's we have encountered before. I'm just spitballing here, and I'm sure stuff was left on the cutting room floor from the writers themselves. If the rumored remake comes to fruition, I'd definitely like to see more flesh added to this skeleton.
Regarding the sound design, there are inconsistencies with regards to the doppler effect and interiors (going inside a building doesn't quite provide a smooth transitionary decline in volume to outside mumblings (thug talk) and rumblings (particularly inclement weather). I also wasn't a fan of them rehashing the exact same tone of voice and warble for every enemy variation- these are all different citizens being infected across the country, so why would they all sound the same? Maybe I can understand for the fully infected ones like stalkers, clickers, and bloaters, but not the drowners who still physically resemble their hosts.
A lot of praise has gone to Gustavo Santaolalla's score, but outside of the main theme I honestly wasn't a huge fan. I thought the string solos he employed didn't quite carry the emotional impact he intended them to, though I acknowledge I'm in the minority here. In general, he nails the atmospheric vibes for each area, so that's always a plus in these long video games with diverse locales.
Overall, you'll definitely enjoy your time with The Last of Us. This critique isn't meant to diminish the game's achievements (in fact, I went out of my way to highly underrated aspects of it), and it has firmly established its place as a piece of high art in video game storytelling. However, there were detriments that I feel reviewers and fans have deliberately overlooked, particularly in the realm of gameplay, and hopefully people glean something decent from this write-up!
As TLOU Remastered comes with Left Behind, I will be copy/pasting my review of it here. But for those who want a quick link to it because you want to get to the spoiler bit I asterisked above, here is one: https://www.backloggd.com/games/the-last-of-us-left-behind
TLOU: Left Behind is an example of a retroactive story DLC done right. What I mean by this is, narrative-focused add-ons tend to be either small sequels to the main game or side stories focusing on another character besides the protagonist. A retroactive one, on the other hand, is set at some point during the main storyline, and these are generally harder to pull off in non-open world titles because you have to avoid creating continuity issues.
With Left Behind, not only do you get a release that avoids that pitfall, but you also get two additional facets: narrative context to major events in the main game, minor plot holes repaired, and significant background characterization for Ellie that adds emotional depth to her final speech at the end of TLOU.
Obviously, there is no way to talk about any of these without spoiling the main game, so I'll instead address the question of whether or not you should play Left Behind during your playthrough of TLOU or after. Having done the former during my replay of TLOU 1, I would recommend doing so. It takes place perfectly before Winter begins, meaning you have a natural transition point to begin it (compared to most DLCs), and, as I said above, it adds significant context to both that chapter and Ellie as a whole. The one downside is that it will cause some pacing issues in the sense that it slows down the momentum of the main game's narrative, but that's a small price for the payoff you get.
Now, onto the spoilers- Left Behind has two simultaneous stories going on: first is a continuation of the present wherein Ellie is trying to treat Joel after he suffered a life-threatening injury at the end of Spring; second is an exploration of Ellie's past, specifically her relationship with a soldier trainee-turned-Firefly named Riley.
There's not much I can really say on the story front because most of it consists of character moments that you just have to experience. Druckmann and his writing team do a good job of not only showcasing the history between these two girls, but the continued friendship they sport despite fractures having erupted in it. Scenes like playing with water guns, telling jokes, and exploring a Halloween-themed store may not seem like fun in a post-apocalyptic game on the outset, but become subtly engaging when you experience it through dialogue conveying the pure joy these characters are having, all helped by fantastic chemistry between the actresses Ashley Johnson and Yaani King. King, in particular, gives a phenomenal performance, and was honestly robbed of a nomination (let alone win) at the BAFTAs in 2014.
It may seem like there are tonal inconsistencies given that this seemingly-innocent past conflicts with the harsh winter story of Ellie struggling against Infected and Bandits to save Joel from the brink of death, but I never felt anything of the sort. Part of this could be the short nature of the DLC, but I feel it has more to do with the past parts not forgetting that you're in a dystopian setting. Despite the lighter-tone, you are regularly reminded of the oppressive nature of life in the Quarantine Zone and of tragedies that have occurred. The mall you spend most of your time exploring, while lit-up, is ultimately abandoned, and strewn with the same level of depressing decrepit detail I raved about in my review of the main game (heck, in some ways it hit a little close to home considering malls are becoming less and less frequented with the advent of online shopping services!).
Perhaps ironic, perhaps intentionally-designed, you're also exploring a desolate shopping complex in the present, albeit one cloaked in moonlight and snow courtesy of an impending ice storm. I'm a sucker for winter-themed locales, so seeing Naughty Dog return to this format a year after their game was released AND successfully bring it to fruition is a testament to their capabilities as artisans.
I believe I enjoyed the score here more than in the main game due to those lighter chords matching the more optimistic atmosphere of yesteryear. And I have no criticisms/praises of the sound design that I didn't/did have with the main game.
My only critiques overall would be the following: first is that the switches between the two halves are not naturalistic enough for my liking. I was hoping for something akin to the final fight in Arrow season 2 wherein you have mirrored instances for the transitions to occur, but instead what you usually get are hard cuts that aren't really tied to cliffhangers.
The second is, just like with TLOU, you have collectible vignettes detailing small stories that occurred in the location you're at. The thing is, whereas Joel would have reactions to every other one, Ellie is completely silent, even when hearing recordings.
But overall, Left Behind is solid storytelling and definitely worth doing during your playthrough of TLOU (or after, if you chose to beat it straight through). I cannot emphasize just how much it adds to the base game, both in terms of character progression, character arcs, and explaining small details like how Ellie had a bow if Joel still had his.
+The part where Henry is leading Joel through the apartments to their secret hideout, Joel going into other rooms when they need to hole up; the part where Tommy is giving a tour of Jackson, it makes no sense for Joel to be walking off to the side grabbing stuff off the shelves while his brother escorting him; the part where Joel finally arrives at the house Ellie is in, Joel's immediate reaction would be to rush up the stairs to make sure she's fine, not scavenge the house (which you don't get the opportunity to do as you are immediately attacked by bandits after the cutscene with Ellie), etc....I could go on and list more examples.
*Played as part of the Remaster. Link to that review here:
https://www.backloggd.com/u/RedBackLoggd/review/331510/
TLOU: Left Behind is an example of a retroactive story DLC done right. What I mean by this is, narrative-focused add-ons tend to be either small sequels to the main game or side stories focusing on another character besides the protagonist. A retroactive one, on the other hand, is set at some point during the main storyline, and these are generally harder to pull off in non-open world titles because you have to avoid creating continuity issues.
With Left Behind, not only do you get a release that avoids that pitfall, but you also get two additional facets: narrative context to major events in the main game, minor plot holes repaired, and significant background characterization for Ellie that adds emotional depth to her final speech at the end of TLOU.
Obviously, there is no way to talk about any of these without spoiling the main game, so I'll instead address the question of whether or not you should play Left Behind during your playthrough of TLOU or after. Having done the former during my replay of TLOU 1, I would recommend doing so. It takes place perfectly before Winter begins, meaning you have a natural transition point to begin it (compared to most DLCs), and, as I said above, it adds significant context to both that chapter and Ellie as a whole. The one downside is that it will cause some pacing issues in the sense that it slows down the momentum of the main game's narrative, but that's a small price for the payoff you get.
Now, onto the spoilers- Left Behind has two simultaneous stories going on: first is a continuation of the present wherein Ellie is trying to treat Joel after he suffered a life-threatening injury at the end of Spring; second is an exploration of Ellie's past, specifically her relationship with a soldier trainee-turned-Firefly named Riley.
There's not much I can really say on the story front because most of it consists of character moments that you just have to experience. Druckmann and his writing team do a good job of not only showcasing the history between these two girls, but the continued friendship they sport despite fractures having erupted in it. Scenes like playing with water guns, telling jokes, and exploring a Halloween-themed store may not seem like fun in a post-apocalyptic game on the outset, but become subtly engaging when you experience it through dialogue conveying the pure joy these characters are having, all helped by fantastic chemistry between the actresses Ashley Johnson and Yaani King. King, in particular, gives a phenomenal performance, and was honestly robbed of a nomination (let alone win) at the BAFTAs in 2014.
It may seem like there are tonal inconsistencies given that this seemingly-innocent past conflicts with the harsh winter story of Ellie struggling against Infected and Bandits to save Joel from the brink of death, but I never felt anything of the sort. Part of this could be the short nature of the DLC, but I feel it has more to do with the past parts not forgetting that you're in a dystopian setting. Despite the lighter-tone, you are regularly reminded of the oppressive nature of life in the Quarantine Zone and of tragedies that have occurred. The mall you spend most of your time exploring, while lit-up, is ultimately abandoned, and strewn with the same level of depressing decrepit detail I raved about in my review of the main game (heck, in some ways it hit a little close to home considering malls are becoming less and less frequented with the advent of online shopping services!).
Perhaps ironic, perhaps intentionally-designed, you're also exploring a desolate shopping complex in the present, albeit one cloaked in moonlight and snow courtesy of an impending ice storm. I'm a sucker for winter-themed locales, so seeing Naughty Dog return to this format a year after their game was released AND successfully bring it to fruition is a testament to their capabilities as artisans.
I believe I enjoyed the score here more than in the main game due to those lighter chords matching the more optimistic atmosphere of yesteryear. And I have no criticisms/praises of the sound design that I didn't/did have with the main game.
My only critiques overall would be the following: first is that the switches between the two halves are not naturalistic enough for my liking. I was hoping for something akin to the final fight in Arrow season 2 wherein you have mirrored instances for the transitions to occur, but instead what you usually get are hard cuts that aren't really tied to cliffhangers.
The second is, just like with TLOU, you have collectible vignettes detailing small stories that occurred in the location you're at. The thing is, whereas Joel would have reactions to every other one, Ellie is completely silent, even when hearing recordings.
But overall, Left Behind is solid storytelling and definitely worth doing during your playthrough of TLOU (or after, if you chose to beat it straight through). I cannot emphasize just how much it adds to the base game, both in terms of character progression, character arcs, and explaining small details like how Ellie had a bow if Joel still had his.
https://www.backloggd.com/u/RedBackLoggd/review/331510/
TLOU: Left Behind is an example of a retroactive story DLC done right. What I mean by this is, narrative-focused add-ons tend to be either small sequels to the main game or side stories focusing on another character besides the protagonist. A retroactive one, on the other hand, is set at some point during the main storyline, and these are generally harder to pull off in non-open world titles because you have to avoid creating continuity issues.
With Left Behind, not only do you get a release that avoids that pitfall, but you also get two additional facets: narrative context to major events in the main game, minor plot holes repaired, and significant background characterization for Ellie that adds emotional depth to her final speech at the end of TLOU.
Obviously, there is no way to talk about any of these without spoiling the main game, so I'll instead address the question of whether or not you should play Left Behind during your playthrough of TLOU or after. Having done the former during my replay of TLOU 1, I would recommend doing so. It takes place perfectly before Winter begins, meaning you have a natural transition point to begin it (compared to most DLCs), and, as I said above, it adds significant context to both that chapter and Ellie as a whole. The one downside is that it will cause some pacing issues in the sense that it slows down the momentum of the main game's narrative, but that's a small price for the payoff you get.
Now, onto the spoilers- Left Behind has two simultaneous stories going on: first is a continuation of the present wherein Ellie is trying to treat Joel after he suffered a life-threatening injury at the end of Spring; second is an exploration of Ellie's past, specifically her relationship with a soldier trainee-turned-Firefly named Riley.
There's not much I can really say on the story front because most of it consists of character moments that you just have to experience. Druckmann and his writing team do a good job of not only showcasing the history between these two girls, but the continued friendship they sport despite fractures having erupted in it. Scenes like playing with water guns, telling jokes, and exploring a Halloween-themed store may not seem like fun in a post-apocalyptic game on the outset, but become subtly engaging when you experience it through dialogue conveying the pure joy these characters are having, all helped by fantastic chemistry between the actresses Ashley Johnson and Yaani King. King, in particular, gives a phenomenal performance, and was honestly robbed of a nomination (let alone win) at the BAFTAs in 2014.
It may seem like there are tonal inconsistencies given that this seemingly-innocent past conflicts with the harsh winter story of Ellie struggling against Infected and Bandits to save Joel from the brink of death, but I never felt anything of the sort. Part of this could be the short nature of the DLC, but I feel it has more to do with the past parts not forgetting that you're in a dystopian setting. Despite the lighter-tone, you are regularly reminded of the oppressive nature of life in the Quarantine Zone and of tragedies that have occurred. The mall you spend most of your time exploring, while lit-up, is ultimately abandoned, and strewn with the same level of depressing decrepit detail I raved about in my review of the main game (heck, in some ways it hit a little close to home considering malls are becoming less and less frequented with the advent of online shopping services!).
Perhaps ironic, perhaps intentionally-designed, you're also exploring a desolate shopping complex in the present, albeit one cloaked in moonlight and snow courtesy of an impending ice storm. I'm a sucker for winter-themed locales, so seeing Naughty Dog return to this format a year after their game was released AND successfully bring it to fruition is a testament to their capabilities as artisans.
I believe I enjoyed the score here more than in the main game due to those lighter chords matching the more optimistic atmosphere of yesteryear. And I have no criticisms/praises of the sound design that I didn't/did have with the main game.
My only critiques overall would be the following: first is that the switches between the two halves are not naturalistic enough for my liking. I was hoping for something akin to the final fight in Arrow season 2 wherein you have mirrored instances for the transitions to occur, but instead what you usually get are hard cuts that aren't really tied to cliffhangers.
The second is, just like with TLOU, you have collectible vignettes detailing small stories that occurred in the location you're at. The thing is, whereas Joel would have reactions to every other one, Ellie is completely silent, even when hearing recordings.
But overall, Left Behind is solid storytelling and definitely worth doing during your playthrough of TLOU (or after, if you chose to beat it straight through). I cannot emphasize just how much it adds to the base game, both in terms of character progression, character arcs, and explaining small details like how Ellie had a bow if Joel still had his.
This review contains spoilers
Spoilers discussed at the very bottom
Not since the ending of Mass Effect 3 has a video game divided audiences as much as The Last of Us Part II. Based on reviews and audience reactions, I got the sense it was a lot like Zack Snyder's Watchmen in that it was very polarizing: you either loved it or hated it, and I was hoping to find myself somewhere in that binary. This is because I've always been an advocate for art that challenges over art that conforms- I would rather an artist or writer try to do something that is emotionally-evocative, even if they falter (and I end up disliking it) than to put out mediocre schlock that no one will care about come next year.
Well, unfortunately, after all the hype and negativity, I can only say that the end result is a mixed bag that clearly has higher aspirations, but ultimately falters in achieving them. It's not average by any means, and it does have moments of artistic daringness, but these are mostly held back by game design issues and faulty narrative premises.
Like its predecessor (https://www.backloggd.com/u/RedBackLoggd/review/331510/), TLOUII that has been extensively reviewed by mainstream and indie critics alike, and so I won't waste time going into detail about every technical facet, mainly because there are more-informed individuals out there who can articulate those aspects better (see ACG for example). Instead, I want to use this review space to do what I did with TLOU1- talk about underappreciated feats and underspoken problems.
I'll start with a brief overview of the graphics. Like Black Flag did with seventh generation consoles and Crysis did with PCs back in the day, TLOU2 has pushed the limits of the PS4's hardware, and the results speak for themselves. By no means do I endorse crunch-time (in fact, as a matter of principle, I refuse to buy games from companies that engage in extensive crunch-time like Naughty Dog and RockStar until they go on sale), but that sweat, blood, and tears culminated in a world that is mesmerizing with detail. Textures, manmade/natural, are consistent everywhere; little animations are programmed (ex. hair swaying with kinetic glee), and you even get some surprising moments of physics like destructible glass, movable objects, and realistically disproportioning body parts. Death respawn rates are quick, there's no draw distance issues like with the first, and the baked lighting exceeds AC Unity in terms of diversity and quality (not just morning/night, light/dark, inside/outside, but outright different colors). I KNOW I'm missing plenty of stuff, but hopefully this gives an idea of the effort that was put into conceiving this setting.
There are some downsides, however they are thankfully minor. For one, during the wintry opening, I noticed knocking snow clumps off trees resulted in them dissipating into thin air over collecting on the ground, and two, your horse's hoof impressions are more pre-rendered than naturally-conceived. I also experienced two crashes, but a solid autosave prevented them from causing significant setback.
Sound-wise, we have another huge improvement from the first. One of my biggest issues that was addressed was the Doppler Effect range being sudden whenever you entered a contained sonar space: you can hear a smooth transition this time around, which is saying something considering most of the game is engulfed in precipitation that beats on the surfaces around you.
Once again, though, we don't get any diversity in Infected noises. You can make a strong case that the more mutated variants have too many fungal growths around their esophagus to allow distinct accents and intonations to disperse, but the Runners are inexcusable given that they still resemble their original host.
That being said, TLOU2 makes up for this with the sheer variety of dialogue in the human enemy speech. Specifically, I am referring to them giving every NPC (both human and canine) a unique name that is explicitly stated whenever you off one- it's a small thing that goes a long way towards personalizing them and consequently making the enemies more than just generic baddies. You can tell from the delivery alone these guys had a history together, and that you have officially made things personal through your violent actions (which was no doubt intentional given the thematic threads, but more on that below). Of course, you still have your atypical lines like "I'm going to find you!" and "anyone have eyes?" and "report!" amongst others, but that's always going to be a constant in video games.
The performances are fantastic as usual, and standouts like Laura Bailey and Ashley Johnson have been praised to no end. Johnson, in particular, really impressed me with her ability to organically convey Ellie's vocal chord maturation from past to present. The sole voice I couldn't get over was the Asian character, Jessie, having a thick Southern accent. He reminded me a lot of Christopher Gist from AC Rogue in terms of being out-of-place, though the actor Stephen Chang does a good job.
Now, the point of a sequel is to rectify/improve upon the flaws of the original. Granted, flaws absent outright bugs/glitches, can be subjective complaints privy to variation depending on who you ask, but as this is my review, I will address whether or not II fixed my perceived issues with the first game's systems, beginning with the combat. In the first, you only had one attack button and no other options minus an occasional grapple prompt. This became problematic whenever you were engaged in scuffles with hordes of minions who could flank you, the camera and lack of responsive movement preventing you from doing much other than bolting in the opposite direction.
That has only been slightly changed here as the sole addition is a dodge button (quick tap makes you strafe a short beat, holding a longer distance). However, you'd be surprised by how much of a difference this makes in encounters. With the camera still shifting over-your-shoulder, the ability to evade turns 1v1 brawls into more dynamic skirmishes, and combined with your signature brutal takedowns, you will have fun. That being said, in all honesty, the real betterment here is the removal of most mandatory fight scenes. Bar bosses, I can only think of three instances where you were forced to engage openly with hordes, and lo and behold, they ended up being the most frustrating parts of the game for me (the first was alleviated by the presence of allies).+
So, if you're not fighting goons that means you're stealthing them. The first TLOU had a solid stealth system, my only reservations being the lack corner-grabbing, single takedown animation, and having a bow as your sole silent ranged weapon. Thankfully, corner-grabbing has been added in TLOU2, allowing Ellie/Abby to disperse any enemy (minus advanced Infected) who makes the fatal mistake of walking past a nook they are crouched behind! In addition, when an enemy detects you, throwing a brick at them and charging within their vicinity provides a grapple prompt allowing you to quietly disperse them (should there be no adjacent gremlins), thus maintaining your stealth quota.
There are new animations in the sense that Ellie, via her switchblade, kills each enemy with a varied stabbing, though it's still singular per the archetype. Likewise, there are no ways to quickly slice someone with the drawback of noise like in the Arkham series. In terms of silent weapons, your bow is still your best bet, though it is improved by the ability to craft arrows instead of purely collecting them. You can build a silencer for your pistol with limited shots, and Ellie is given trip-mines that, while obviously loud, allow you to booby-trap areas as you depart to a safe distance.
Stealth, as a whole, feels much more riveting courtesy of new avenues provided by the developer. First is the ability to go prone (and its accompanying environmental help, tall grass)- fans of clandestine franchises will find this to be a welcome addition since it allows you to move amidst enemy ranks while they wander menacingly about. Second, two new adversaries have been thrown in to things up: dogs for humans and stalkers for Infected (okay, technically not new since they were in the first, but they were pretty indistinguishable from Runners IMO). Dogs can catch your scent and consequently follow you, leading their owner to your location in real-time lest you throw them off in some way (if you’re playing with listening mode, you can even see your trail!). Stalkers, on the other hand, are immune to listening mode, forcing you to pay attention to visual and auditory cues in order to catch them red-handed before they strike you. The two contribute a lot and, unlike the first game, I didn’t detect any inconsistencies from your allied AI in terms of enemy detection.
Looting/scavenging is relatively unchanged. You still can’t move bodies, though at least those with a firearm tend to have ammunition on them. You gather resources in the world to build tools/items and upgrade weapons, the former able to be done anywhere, the latter restricted to tool benches scattered about (toolboxes have thankfully been removed at least). I will say, while this made no sense in the first game, benches are a lot more palatable here courtesy of Naughty Dog programming animations whenever you build a new mechanism or add-on for your weapon(s). Some are reused, but for the most part you have a lot of unique ones, and seeing Ellie utilize the tools on the table to craft these mechanisms went a long way towards signifying their significance as gameplay elements.
Skill trees are back, tied to training manuals strewn throughout the locales, and all cards on the table, I honestly found this system to be rather dumb- locking off an entire skillpath behind a collectible. It prevents you from strategizing which abilities you want to invest in until you reach the section of the story where that part of the world with the manual opens up. I’d buy this model if the new paths were tied to specific weapons you acquire around the same time Zelda-style, but no, these skills are mostly generic and appeal to the overall capabilities of your character (an aspect made all the worse by you having to find separate manuals for Abby when the game switches to her perspective). And since new upgrades are limited to pills, you already have a cap on which skills can be chosen.
I believe I’ve covered all the gameplay aspects save exploration. In the first TLOU, one recurring problem I had was that there were one-too-many instances of the narrative moving faster than the game allowedfor exploration- you'd get to an area prime for looting, only for an NPC to be simultaneously talking to you, making your constant "detours" immersion-breaking.
Ironically, I'd say TLOU 2 has the opposite issue here, where the exploration is much more abundant at the cost of the narrative's pacing, at least in Ellie's sections. You are provided a lot of buildings and settlements to explore and scavenge throughout your playthrough, and given the revenge thriller impetus driving the story, this often leads to a slow-down of urgency. I can't take the narrative's exigency seriously when Ellie is going to stop caring about the objective to go into a random place. Yes, technically most of these are "optional," but I use that term loosely because, as TLOU2 indulges in survival horror systems (more-so than its predecessor), and stows upgrade manuals/new weapons in these locales, they aren't really optional. In TLOU1, 9/10 buildings you went through were necessary to the story: here, I'd wager it's more like 5/10 for Ellie (I emphasize Ellie because Abby's sections thankfully don't have this problem, and that in many ways make her storyline more engaging, but more on that later).
Naughty Dog's penchant for environmental storytelling through interior decorations remains top notch, though some of the "wow" factor of the world's history has certainly been lost with the sequel. The bigger downgrade, IMO, were the personal tales divulged via stationary and recordings. I found these to be a lot less interesting than the first one's, mainly because they primarily concern an overarching conflict between three groups: the WLF insurgents, U.S. Military, and Seraphite cult. That kind of tale of a city being split apart by war and internal loyalties has already been done extensively (and continues to be a prevalent part of current events), thus making it lose the edge that smaller-scale, post-apocalyptic anecdotes carry. I'm not saying that there aren't any gems, just that they are less prevalent than in TLOU1 (on the upside, I did like how Ellie/Abby would instantly read them upon collection, compared to Joel immediately putting it away).
Now, I'll finally speak on the story, of which there is a ton to say. There is honestly no feasible way for me to do so without spoiling the game, so for those who want to stop reading, I'll just say I disagreed with Druckmann and co.'s take on stock themes and genuinely felt that they didn't have the guts to commit to an ending that would've made the most sense based on the pieces laid out (from my perspective anyways).
Notes:
+All involve Abby: first is the warehouse section, and the second/third involve her initial meeting with Lev and Yara, the second being the forest section with the stalkers and the third being trapped in the abandoned house structure.
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Now, spoilers galore:
TLOU2 primarily deals with the concept of retribution and vengeance. I noted earlier that this is a revenge game, and it is for those very reasons. To my delight, it deals with the aftermath of the first title wherein Joel went berserk and killed a bunch of Fireflies to prevent them from terminating Ellie during her surgery. The head surgeon's daughter is Abby, who dedicates the next four years of her life to tracking down and killing Joel. Through coincidental events, she happens to encounter the man, setting off the first of several controversial story decisions in which she tortures and murders him in front of Ellie.
I personally had no issue with this at all. I get a lot of people liked Joel, and I did as well (he would be an awful protagonist to play as if he wasn't likeable), but let's be clear- he's not a good person. Even if we ignore things he did in the past, the decision to massacre the Fireflies and execute Marlene, while subjectively understandable, is objectively a cruel and despicable move. There were going to be consequences from that, and Abby embodies that aftermath. People have brought up that Joel doesn't exercise caution when amidst all these new strangers (Abby and her friends) in comparison to the first game, and while I can see that, to me it made sense that living in Jackson for four years under a relatively safe roof tempered his survivalist instincts, especially after this group saved him from a horde of Infected.
But look, if you had an issue with Joel's death, by no means am I going to tell you to get over it. Different players bond with different characters, and the polarizing-negative response to Joel's death indicates it was unfavorable from a good sect of TLOU fanbase. What I hope such disagreeants (yes I made up that word) would at least assent to is that the death was well-executed. Listen, it was spoiled for me long before I played the game (not any details, just the event itself), yet, even knowing what was going to happen, my heart started racing. Adrenaline coursed through my veins as I sat through the entirety of the ordeal. When a game can elicit that kind of physiological reaction, you know it's done a good job on the execution front (compare this to a certain someone's death in The Force Awakens, which was also spoiled beforehand, and I had no such biological response when it transpired on-screen).
Now, there were other issues SURROUNDING this event that bear greater scrutiny. First and foremost is the introduction as a whole- this might be the cringiest intro to a AAA game I have ever had the misfortune to experience. Ellie's whole part literally consists of such YA cliches as "you kissed my girl after we just broke up?", "this guy is a bigot and serving us bigot sandwiches," "what did you think of our kiss?," and the discovery of a literal weed farm (was Druckmann high when he came up with that nonsense?). Seriously, it felt like a bad episode of Degrassi (or Arrow for that matter) and genuinely made me wonder if I was playing a post-apocalyptic title, let alone a sequel to The Last of Us (which, by contrast, had one of the greatest openings in the history of video games). This cringefest literally takes hours to get through, the occasional lapses to Abby actually being a relief. Why would people who could die any day on a patrol be caught up in this high school idiocy?
The second major issue has to do with Abby and co. opting to SPARE Tommy and Ellie after the death of Joel. What? Yes, the writers go out of their way to try and explain such a stupid decision, but their justifications are as lame as you can get. Three spring up: "we only came for him [Joel]," "we're better than [Joel]," and "we gave you a second chance [Ellie & Tommy]".
None of these hold-up under basic scrutiny. Even if you only came for Joel, you know these are allies of his with full-fledged killer capabilities who now have the motivation to TRACK YOU DOWN. Maybe Abby and co. thought that the two weren't aware of what Joel did, but if that was the case, they don't bother stating things to Tommy and Ellie. Even something as basic as "if you knew what he did, you would understand" or outright telling it would have gone a long way towards making this line of thought feasible.
Regarding whether they're better than him, the answer is no, they're not and they know that. It is widely implied throughout the game that the Fireflies and WLF committed war crimes during their respective conflicts, and Abby most definitely engaged in some such act (supported by her implied guilt down-the-line). You could counter and say that those were (or were perceived to be) enemy combatants, and that executing Tommy and Ellie would be akin to killing unarmed civilians. You could maybe make this case for Tommy, but Ellie literally comes into the room guns-ablazing and slices up one of the WLF crewmen. Also, how is restraining Joel and slowly killing him there any different from a principled standpoint?
And finally, if Abby really wanted them to comprehend this act of mercy as an opportunity to start afresh, she should've SAID something. How is knocking Ellie out as she's screaming "I'm going to f*cking kill you" leaving her to think on things? Especially when she now knows your name and logo?
It was an all-around moronic decision - the cliché "villain conveniently spares the hero" trope.
So overall, not a good opener to this game. But hey, slow starts have been experienced in other titles like Skyward Sword, and the subsequent odyssey can make-up for lost time. Only....that doesn't happen. See, rather than do the smart thing and have Ellie either go solo or team-up with Tommy to hunt down the WLF rogues, Druckmann decides to have Ellie team-up with Dina, the girl whom she had a romantic encounter with earlier, because of course what a revenge story needed was a dumb romantic subplot.
Look, I'm all for diversity and representation, but a romance of ANY KIND was going to be a distraction, especially with a character we barely spent time with and, who, more importantly, barely spent time with Ellie. Seriously, Dina has NO logical reason to tag along on this life-threatening excursion other than being horny for Ellie as she did not extensively interact with her prior to the events of the game. No one does that shit, especially when they have their loved ones back home (and ESPECIALLY when she finds out she's pregnant).
Also, on a side note, anyone else find it interesting how gay romances that feature some kind of sexual scene tend to almost always be depicted via lesbians? It's almost as if such writers have an odd predilection towards the female gender when it comes to "presenting" same-sex intercourse, but I can't for the love of me tell why....
I could've tolerated Dina had she at least presented something interesting to the plot, and you sometimes get that by way of her conversations with Ellie during their time riding together (the Synagogue scene, in particular, stands out). However, for the most part, it's your silly flirtatious convos that are at odds with the serious, foreboding tone of the plot. Perhaps Druckmann intended this as "levity," but it's so amateurish I would've preferred silence.
To make matters worse, the official beginning of Joel's avengement is thrown into a free roam world that sees the couple having to, get this, open locked gates! Yup, you literally and figuratively hit a stonewall in terms of the pacing, with Naughty Dog thinking it a smart idea to abandon their signature linear-driven craftsmanship in favor a semi-open world that is boring. Look, downtrodden Seattle is a stunning dystopia to gaze at, but it gets old fast. The amount of empty space between buildings, the lack of interesting things to do at said edifices, and subtle mandatoriness courtesy of new weapons being out there grinds the pacing to a slow throttle. And as I said before, the convos between Dina and Ellie just aren't engaging enough to fill-in the quiet moments, particularly when compared to the first game's. Even some of the action beats feel like rehashes of events we underwent back then (getting saved last minute by the secondary hero, escaping into the spore-filled sewers). The only praise I can give this chapter (Seattle Day 1) is that it has a map that's actually useful.
The story significantly starts to pick up during the second chapter due to the following changes: Dina is taken out of the picture, causing Ellie to go solo; the open-world is removed in favor of handcrafted linear environments again; and new enemy variants are introduced to spice things up. You still have too many instances of boring side buildings to explore, but at least it's a far cry from the amount in the first section.
One decision that has received mixed reviews from audiences is the incorporation of flashbacks, which start during Seattle Day 2. Critics have said that they hurt the delivery of the narrative; however, considering I thought that was ruined long before, I didn't think they made it better or worse. No, I instead liked them for the most part. They're set between the two main games and give more memories of Joel and Ellie for fans to digest on.
Unfortunately, one of the storytelling decisions I fundamentally didn't agree with is introduced during one of these, and it's the revelation that Joel confessed to Ellie, in turn causing her to become distant from him. Not only did this make Ellie kind of unlikable (and Tommy flat-out despisable) for choosing to pursue bloodthirsty vengeance despite having an understanding of where these people were coming from, but I also think the story could have gone in more fascinating directions had the writers opted to play with when Ellie finds out the truth and what her reaction (and consequent reflection on all the horrible things she's done in the name of a guy she thought was good) is. But look, at the end of the day, you can't criticize what you wanted, only what you got, so it is what it is.
The decision to make Abby a playable character was another big controversial commitment by Naughty Dog, and yet again I find myself on the side of the company. While I do understand people wanting to purely experience Ellie (and absolutely sympathize with those who didn't want to play as the killer of Joel), as stated before, I've always been an advocate for stories that push boundaries, especially in video games which, unlike movies, have an interactivity factor that makes them more potent avenues for morality tales. In my opinion, this was a great decision, and made TLOU2 more than just your typical revenge plot.
Abby is a great character, brought to life by the great Laura Bailey. She's three-dimensional, visually unique (how often do we see a woman rocking guns?), likeable, and relatable. Everything about her, from her motivations to her shifting character arc, is very well-executed, and it's a shame so many people went into her section without keeping an open mind. As I said before, Abby embodies the notion of actions having consequences- even if you had removed her connection with the surgeon and just made her an ex-Firefly out for blood, she still would've been gripping to follow.
What really helps her is her supporting cast and the game design surrounding her sections. In most vengeance narratives, the antagonists aren't given much characterization: they're either blanket evil or bland evil, and this has the effect of dehumanizing them, resulting in players completely empathizing with the wronged party. But, as we all know in real life, people have a tendency to be more complex than that, and Druckmann and company opted to follow that philosophy in conceiving Abby's crew. I'm not going to go into detail about all of them, but know that they end up feeling like realistic folks you could conceivably meet at a point in your life. Some of the hardest-hitting moments in the TLOUII come from realizing the horrific actions you committed as Ellie were done to actual people with hopes, dreams, and aspirations.
Regarding the game design, which I alluded to earlier in critiquing Ellie's comportments, Abby's story progresses at a sound gait, much more resembling the first TLOU in terms of limited exploration and story-driven linearity. It really does make a difference knowing that everything you're doing, every step you're taking, is moving the narrative forward.
Unfortunately, not all is sunshine and roses for Abby. The switch to her takes place after a major cliffhanger for Ellie, which will frustrate you. Part of me wonders how the game would've played out had it been edited differently- that is, have Abby's parts strewn throughout, taking place immediately after its associated Ellie parallel. But I understand this would've had more drawbacks than positives. You will also have to re-upgrade Abby, who is given a different arsenal from Ellie, but one that needs refurbishing regardless. Scouring for gears is already old at that point- doing it again will no doubt rub some people as an exercise in tedium.
Storywise, the two biggest downsides to Abby's yarn are the inclusion of a love triangle (It's as dumb and underdeveloped as you can imagine a side character's subplot being), and the game's attempt at trying to make her seem like this bad person; a bad person whom one of her compatriots outright declares a "piece of sh!t." Like I said, there is implied guilt behind Bailey's performance, but outside of that we're not given anything to deduce where these accusations are coming from. Was it making her friends help her murder Joel? No, because they explicitly state during flashbacks that they wanted to come of their own accord. Was it some atrocity she perpetrated during the war with the Seraphites? Nothing is stated to indicate such. I just didn't buy this line of argument, which in turn made her arc weak from a starting point.
Lastly, I absolutely hated how the game made you spend an inordinate amount of time getting the surgical instruments to save Yara's life, only to then kill her off. It's a pet peeve of mine whenever video games do this: have the player invest a lot of time into completing an activity only for that action to be undone later in the storyline. I hated it in Modern Warfare 3, I hated it in Fallout 3, I hated it in Life is Strange, and I hate it here.
There were more fundamental disagreements I had with the game, primarily with regards to its themes. Like too many postmodernist takes on revenge, it advocates that vengeance is wrong by way of creating a cycle of violence that hurts everyone, and I've always found this to be a simplistic view more interested in taking a holier-than-thou visage than genuinely exploring what revenge does to a society, let alone a person. Now, I understand that The Last of Us 2 was partly inspired by Druckmann's experiences growing up during the West Bank conflict between Israel and Palestine, and I don't mean to downplay the violence and trauma he no doubt witnessed. However, here he doesn't do a good job of dissecting things. TLOU2's biggest issue is that Ellie isn't acting on any semblance of reason, just pure emotion. She doesn't try to understand where these killers are coming from or why they would've been willing to travel across the country just to murder one man. The only thing we see is rage.
You might be thinking, well doesn't that fit right in with revenge being everlasting suffering? After all, since the involved parties are acting on passions instead of logic, they fail to realize how they're destroying themselves in the process of destroying the other. The thing is, the only way that story works is if both sides are sympathetic or both sides are unlikeable- you make one morally elevated above the other, and it creates an uneven playing field that throws a wrench in the mutual tragedy, which is exactly what happens here. Abby's side is inherently more pitiable because she was responding to a wrong Joel did; meanwhile, Ellie is not sympathizable because the developers make the boneheaded decision to have her aware of Joel's actions. If she was coming from a place of ignorance, then at least I would be able to understand her side- she lost a father figure who genuinely cared for her and wants payback for the seemingly senseless violence that befell him. But no, she knows, and despite that knowledge, there's no ethical dilemma on her part, no balancing of reasoning, not even an attempt at discussing things- the closest we get is when Nora asks Ellie in the hospital if she's aware of what he [Joel] did, to which Ellie responds by torturing her for information. Yeah, not likable in the slightest, making Abby's dedication all the more affirmable.
On the other hand, if you agreed with Joel's actions, then no amount of plaintive scenes from Abby's side will sway you, making the anti-vengeance theme even less impactful: you WANT to see Abby and her compatriots die at the hands of Ellie.
Now, what about Abby- she definitely loses all her friends as a result of getting revenge on Joel and setting off Ellie and Tommy (without stupidly killing them). Well, unfortunately, most of her pals get killed of their own accord- Nora, Mel, and Owen only die when they opt to attack Ellie instead of giving her the information she is seeking (Abby's location). In fact, not to go off on a tangent, but that speaks to another small issue I had with the game, which was its unwillingness to commit to Ellie's apparent moral degradation- if most of the WLF members she's assassinating are done in self-defense, how can this be seen as an infliction on her (you might say that this was deliberately done because Ellie recognizes Joel was in the wrong and only wants Abby dead; unfortunately, this is counteracted by the whole encounter with Nora, indicating that Ellie is willing to go far if she doesn't get what she wants).
In terms of the other negatives that befall Abby, they don't have anything to do with Ellie. Getting hung by the Seraphites? Occurs because she went out looking for Owen. Getting exiled from the WLF? Conducted because she decided to aid Yara and Lev. Getting captured by the Rattlers? Done because she was looking for the Fireflies. So basically revenge has nothing with most of the tragedies that befall her. And of the events that it did have an impact on (Nora, Mel, Owen, Manny, Alice's deaths), get this, Abby doesn't give a sh!t! She mourns them for a second before moving on, not reflecting or caring.
One may argue that Ellie does end up losing everything on her end: she's detached from her community, Dina has left her, and she's dehumanized. Except, the truth is none of this is permanent or even implied to be permanent- she can return to Jackson at any point and be welcomed with open arms (her leaving the farm at the end indicates just that); maybe Dina wouldn't take her back, but given how horny she was to risk her life on the trip in the first place, I doubt she'd hold a permanent grudge; and I don't see Ellie being anymore dehumanized than any other individual suffering from PTSD after all that's transpired in her life. If anything, her not having nightmares of Joel anymore is an indication she's getting better.
The truth is the game wants to have its cake and eat it too. You can't say traveling on this path won't lead to anything good if the consequences aren't that bad or the consequences have nothing to do with the act of revenge; and if the consequences aren't that bad or disassociated with the initiator, doesn't that make revenge worth pursuing in the end?
No, it seems the only decent interpretation you can make is Druckmann is saying you shouldn't have embarked on this excursion at all. This isn't supported by Abby's segments (since she almost dies despite sparing Ellie), but it IS supported by Ellie settling down into relative peace after returning to Jackson: she's got a farm, a family, and a future of happiness. It's only when she reneges on her abstinence that she suffers the aforestated aftereffects. And my problem with this take is what I alluded to above, which is that really comes off as a 'superior' person looking down on an 'inferior' person. Like, "oh, you should've known better than to give in to your feelings". What exactly was the alternative? To just suffer from nightmares? To silently forgive Abby? To move on as though nothing transpired? And what about from Abby's perspective- was she supposed to get over her dad having his guts blown out? Her mentor being executed? Her surrogate family and their lifelong mission destroyed in the span of an hour?
You'll notice that these kinds of stories NEVER provide the alternative answer to revenge because they don't know what it is- all they figure is that doing it is bad, which is so smug and simplistic. Tell someone who had a loved one who was murdered or beaten or assaulted in a world without proper law enforcement that they need to just sit on their ass and move on.
No, I'll be completely honest with you all- I have a conspiracy theory that the game had a very different ending initially, one that was much darker and much more controversial, yet that ended things much more succinctly than what we got. And that is that Abby kills Ellie.
I'm not going to waste a lot of time supporting this since it's circumstantial, but keep in mind this was one of the plot details in the pre-release leaks that plagued the title, and considering the vast majority of those other leaks turned out to be truthful, it maybe indicates it was contemplated at one point. Consider this: the showdown with Ellie is presented as a stealth fight akin to the one with David in TLOU1. And consider, more importantly, how tacked on and awful that whole final act is with the slave traders. Seriously, I haven't felt a game that padded in so long- it was convoluted (Ellie not bleeding out from that wound whilst strung upside down?), full of contrivances (Abby and Lev getting crucified THE EXACT DAY Ellie finds them?), and anticlimactic as an endgame compared to the theater scene.
Killing Ellie would've made complete sense. You have Abby rightfully motivated by the death of her friends; you have the element of surprise in the sense that she gets the drop on them; and you have a culmination of that whole anti-revenge spiel wherein you witness Ellie suffer the ultimate consequence for going after Abby.
It makes zero, let me repeat, ZERO sense for Abby to spare Ellie after everything the latter did to her. Zero. As Abby didn't learn from her mistake, so too do fictional writers not learn that the sparing the hero cliche is archetypal fatuity for a reason. Instead, we get a whole "don't ever let me see you again." Yeah, here's some advice- if you want to guarantee her not seeing you again, how about you kill her!
Look, I get that Naughty Dog was probably afraid of someone torching their headquarters to the ground if they had gone through with such a decision (considering the death threats they and Bailey received just for axing Joel, this isn't even out of the realm of possibility), but then they shouldn't have written the narrative to lead up to this moment. It was dumb planning from the get-go (and it begs the question of how tf Ellie got a wounded pregnant Dina and a gunshot-to-the-head Tommy all the way back to Seattle with a broken arm - now there's an idea for a Left Behind-type DLC!).
So yeah, those are all my reasons for eventually finding TLOU2 to be on the lower side of the quality spectrum. It has a lot of great artistic, technical, and even storytelling feats, and I absolutely recommend a playthrough on those merits alone but these are countered by cons in the narrative department. That being said, don't listen to the mainstream critiques that have occupied the discourse from disgruntled fans; there are legitimate flaws with this game that critics conveniently overlooked, but they're more complicated than you would believe.
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Not since the ending of Mass Effect 3 has a video game divided audiences as much as The Last of Us Part II. Based on reviews and audience reactions, I got the sense it was a lot like Zack Snyder's Watchmen in that it was very polarizing: you either loved it or hated it, and I was hoping to find myself somewhere in that binary. This is because I've always been an advocate for art that challenges over art that conforms- I would rather an artist or writer try to do something that is emotionally-evocative, even if they falter (and I end up disliking it) than to put out mediocre schlock that no one will care about come next year.
Well, unfortunately, after all the hype and negativity, I can only say that the end result is a mixed bag that clearly has higher aspirations, but ultimately falters in achieving them. It's not average by any means, and it does have moments of artistic daringness, but these are mostly held back by game design issues and faulty narrative premises.
Like its predecessor (https://www.backloggd.com/u/RedBackLoggd/review/331510/), TLOUII that has been extensively reviewed by mainstream and indie critics alike, and so I won't waste time going into detail about every technical facet, mainly because there are more-informed individuals out there who can articulate those aspects better (see ACG for example). Instead, I want to use this review space to do what I did with TLOU1- talk about underappreciated feats and underspoken problems.
I'll start with a brief overview of the graphics. Like Black Flag did with seventh generation consoles and Crysis did with PCs back in the day, TLOU2 has pushed the limits of the PS4's hardware, and the results speak for themselves. By no means do I endorse crunch-time (in fact, as a matter of principle, I refuse to buy games from companies that engage in extensive crunch-time like Naughty Dog and RockStar until they go on sale), but that sweat, blood, and tears culminated in a world that is mesmerizing with detail. Textures, manmade/natural, are consistent everywhere; little animations are programmed (ex. hair swaying with kinetic glee), and you even get some surprising moments of physics like destructible glass, movable objects, and realistically disproportioning body parts. Death respawn rates are quick, there's no draw distance issues like with the first, and the baked lighting exceeds AC Unity in terms of diversity and quality (not just morning/night, light/dark, inside/outside, but outright different colors). I KNOW I'm missing plenty of stuff, but hopefully this gives an idea of the effort that was put into conceiving this setting.
There are some downsides, however they are thankfully minor. For one, during the wintry opening, I noticed knocking snow clumps off trees resulted in them dissipating into thin air over collecting on the ground, and two, your horse's hoof impressions are more pre-rendered than naturally-conceived. I also experienced two crashes, but a solid autosave prevented them from causing significant setback.
Sound-wise, we have another huge improvement from the first. One of my biggest issues that was addressed was the Doppler Effect range being sudden whenever you entered a contained sonar space: you can hear a smooth transition this time around, which is saying something considering most of the game is engulfed in precipitation that beats on the surfaces around you.
Once again, though, we don't get any diversity in Infected noises. You can make a strong case that the more mutated variants have too many fungal growths around their esophagus to allow distinct accents and intonations to disperse, but the Runners are inexcusable given that they still resemble their original host.
That being said, TLOU2 makes up for this with the sheer variety of dialogue in the human enemy speech. Specifically, I am referring to them giving every NPC (both human and canine) a unique name that is explicitly stated whenever you off one- it's a small thing that goes a long way towards personalizing them and consequently making the enemies more than just generic baddies. You can tell from the delivery alone these guys had a history together, and that you have officially made things personal through your violent actions (which was no doubt intentional given the thematic threads, but more on that below). Of course, you still have your atypical lines like "I'm going to find you!" and "anyone have eyes?" and "report!" amongst others, but that's always going to be a constant in video games.
The performances are fantastic as usual, and standouts like Laura Bailey and Ashley Johnson have been praised to no end. Johnson, in particular, really impressed me with her ability to organically convey Ellie's vocal chord maturation from past to present. The sole voice I couldn't get over was the Asian character, Jessie, having a thick Southern accent. He reminded me a lot of Christopher Gist from AC Rogue in terms of being out-of-place, though the actor Stephen Chang does a good job.
Now, the point of a sequel is to rectify/improve upon the flaws of the original. Granted, flaws absent outright bugs/glitches, can be subjective complaints privy to variation depending on who you ask, but as this is my review, I will address whether or not II fixed my perceived issues with the first game's systems, beginning with the combat. In the first, you only had one attack button and no other options minus an occasional grapple prompt. This became problematic whenever you were engaged in scuffles with hordes of minions who could flank you, the camera and lack of responsive movement preventing you from doing much other than bolting in the opposite direction.
That has only been slightly changed here as the sole addition is a dodge button (quick tap makes you strafe a short beat, holding a longer distance). However, you'd be surprised by how much of a difference this makes in encounters. With the camera still shifting over-your-shoulder, the ability to evade turns 1v1 brawls into more dynamic skirmishes, and combined with your signature brutal takedowns, you will have fun. That being said, in all honesty, the real betterment here is the removal of most mandatory fight scenes. Bar bosses, I can only think of three instances where you were forced to engage openly with hordes, and lo and behold, they ended up being the most frustrating parts of the game for me (the first was alleviated by the presence of allies).+
So, if you're not fighting goons that means you're stealthing them. The first TLOU had a solid stealth system, my only reservations being the lack corner-grabbing, single takedown animation, and having a bow as your sole silent ranged weapon. Thankfully, corner-grabbing has been added in TLOU2, allowing Ellie/Abby to disperse any enemy (minus advanced Infected) who makes the fatal mistake of walking past a nook they are crouched behind! In addition, when an enemy detects you, throwing a brick at them and charging within their vicinity provides a grapple prompt allowing you to quietly disperse them (should there be no adjacent gremlins), thus maintaining your stealth quota.
There are new animations in the sense that Ellie, via her switchblade, kills each enemy with a varied stabbing, though it's still singular per the archetype. Likewise, there are no ways to quickly slice someone with the drawback of noise like in the Arkham series. In terms of silent weapons, your bow is still your best bet, though it is improved by the ability to craft arrows instead of purely collecting them. You can build a silencer for your pistol with limited shots, and Ellie is given trip-mines that, while obviously loud, allow you to booby-trap areas as you depart to a safe distance.
Stealth, as a whole, feels much more riveting courtesy of new avenues provided by the developer. First is the ability to go prone (and its accompanying environmental help, tall grass)- fans of clandestine franchises will find this to be a welcome addition since it allows you to move amidst enemy ranks while they wander menacingly about. Second, two new adversaries have been thrown in to things up: dogs for humans and stalkers for Infected (okay, technically not new since they were in the first, but they were pretty indistinguishable from Runners IMO). Dogs can catch your scent and consequently follow you, leading their owner to your location in real-time lest you throw them off in some way (if you’re playing with listening mode, you can even see your trail!). Stalkers, on the other hand, are immune to listening mode, forcing you to pay attention to visual and auditory cues in order to catch them red-handed before they strike you. The two contribute a lot and, unlike the first game, I didn’t detect any inconsistencies from your allied AI in terms of enemy detection.
Looting/scavenging is relatively unchanged. You still can’t move bodies, though at least those with a firearm tend to have ammunition on them. You gather resources in the world to build tools/items and upgrade weapons, the former able to be done anywhere, the latter restricted to tool benches scattered about (toolboxes have thankfully been removed at least). I will say, while this made no sense in the first game, benches are a lot more palatable here courtesy of Naughty Dog programming animations whenever you build a new mechanism or add-on for your weapon(s). Some are reused, but for the most part you have a lot of unique ones, and seeing Ellie utilize the tools on the table to craft these mechanisms went a long way towards signifying their significance as gameplay elements.
Skill trees are back, tied to training manuals strewn throughout the locales, and all cards on the table, I honestly found this system to be rather dumb- locking off an entire skillpath behind a collectible. It prevents you from strategizing which abilities you want to invest in until you reach the section of the story where that part of the world with the manual opens up. I’d buy this model if the new paths were tied to specific weapons you acquire around the same time Zelda-style, but no, these skills are mostly generic and appeal to the overall capabilities of your character (an aspect made all the worse by you having to find separate manuals for Abby when the game switches to her perspective). And since new upgrades are limited to pills, you already have a cap on which skills can be chosen.
I believe I’ve covered all the gameplay aspects save exploration. In the first TLOU, one recurring problem I had was that there were one-too-many instances of the narrative moving faster than the game allowedfor exploration- you'd get to an area prime for looting, only for an NPC to be simultaneously talking to you, making your constant "detours" immersion-breaking.
Ironically, I'd say TLOU 2 has the opposite issue here, where the exploration is much more abundant at the cost of the narrative's pacing, at least in Ellie's sections. You are provided a lot of buildings and settlements to explore and scavenge throughout your playthrough, and given the revenge thriller impetus driving the story, this often leads to a slow-down of urgency. I can't take the narrative's exigency seriously when Ellie is going to stop caring about the objective to go into a random place. Yes, technically most of these are "optional," but I use that term loosely because, as TLOU2 indulges in survival horror systems (more-so than its predecessor), and stows upgrade manuals/new weapons in these locales, they aren't really optional. In TLOU1, 9/10 buildings you went through were necessary to the story: here, I'd wager it's more like 5/10 for Ellie (I emphasize Ellie because Abby's sections thankfully don't have this problem, and that in many ways make her storyline more engaging, but more on that later).
Naughty Dog's penchant for environmental storytelling through interior decorations remains top notch, though some of the "wow" factor of the world's history has certainly been lost with the sequel. The bigger downgrade, IMO, were the personal tales divulged via stationary and recordings. I found these to be a lot less interesting than the first one's, mainly because they primarily concern an overarching conflict between three groups: the WLF insurgents, U.S. Military, and Seraphite cult. That kind of tale of a city being split apart by war and internal loyalties has already been done extensively (and continues to be a prevalent part of current events), thus making it lose the edge that smaller-scale, post-apocalyptic anecdotes carry. I'm not saying that there aren't any gems, just that they are less prevalent than in TLOU1 (on the upside, I did like how Ellie/Abby would instantly read them upon collection, compared to Joel immediately putting it away).
Now, I'll finally speak on the story, of which there is a ton to say. There is honestly no feasible way for me to do so without spoiling the game, so for those who want to stop reading, I'll just say I disagreed with Druckmann and co.'s take on stock themes and genuinely felt that they didn't have the guts to commit to an ending that would've made the most sense based on the pieces laid out (from my perspective anyways).
Notes:
+All involve Abby: first is the warehouse section, and the second/third involve her initial meeting with Lev and Yara, the second being the forest section with the stalkers and the third being trapped in the abandoned house structure.
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Now, spoilers galore:
TLOU2 primarily deals with the concept of retribution and vengeance. I noted earlier that this is a revenge game, and it is for those very reasons. To my delight, it deals with the aftermath of the first title wherein Joel went berserk and killed a bunch of Fireflies to prevent them from terminating Ellie during her surgery. The head surgeon's daughter is Abby, who dedicates the next four years of her life to tracking down and killing Joel. Through coincidental events, she happens to encounter the man, setting off the first of several controversial story decisions in which she tortures and murders him in front of Ellie.
I personally had no issue with this at all. I get a lot of people liked Joel, and I did as well (he would be an awful protagonist to play as if he wasn't likeable), but let's be clear- he's not a good person. Even if we ignore things he did in the past, the decision to massacre the Fireflies and execute Marlene, while subjectively understandable, is objectively a cruel and despicable move. There were going to be consequences from that, and Abby embodies that aftermath. People have brought up that Joel doesn't exercise caution when amidst all these new strangers (Abby and her friends) in comparison to the first game, and while I can see that, to me it made sense that living in Jackson for four years under a relatively safe roof tempered his survivalist instincts, especially after this group saved him from a horde of Infected.
But look, if you had an issue with Joel's death, by no means am I going to tell you to get over it. Different players bond with different characters, and the polarizing-negative response to Joel's death indicates it was unfavorable from a good sect of TLOU fanbase. What I hope such disagreeants (yes I made up that word) would at least assent to is that the death was well-executed. Listen, it was spoiled for me long before I played the game (not any details, just the event itself), yet, even knowing what was going to happen, my heart started racing. Adrenaline coursed through my veins as I sat through the entirety of the ordeal. When a game can elicit that kind of physiological reaction, you know it's done a good job on the execution front (compare this to a certain someone's death in The Force Awakens, which was also spoiled beforehand, and I had no such biological response when it transpired on-screen).
Now, there were other issues SURROUNDING this event that bear greater scrutiny. First and foremost is the introduction as a whole- this might be the cringiest intro to a AAA game I have ever had the misfortune to experience. Ellie's whole part literally consists of such YA cliches as "you kissed my girl after we just broke up?", "this guy is a bigot and serving us bigot sandwiches," "what did you think of our kiss?," and the discovery of a literal weed farm (was Druckmann high when he came up with that nonsense?). Seriously, it felt like a bad episode of Degrassi (or Arrow for that matter) and genuinely made me wonder if I was playing a post-apocalyptic title, let alone a sequel to The Last of Us (which, by contrast, had one of the greatest openings in the history of video games). This cringefest literally takes hours to get through, the occasional lapses to Abby actually being a relief. Why would people who could die any day on a patrol be caught up in this high school idiocy?
The second major issue has to do with Abby and co. opting to SPARE Tommy and Ellie after the death of Joel. What? Yes, the writers go out of their way to try and explain such a stupid decision, but their justifications are as lame as you can get. Three spring up: "we only came for him [Joel]," "we're better than [Joel]," and "we gave you a second chance [Ellie & Tommy]".
None of these hold-up under basic scrutiny. Even if you only came for Joel, you know these are allies of his with full-fledged killer capabilities who now have the motivation to TRACK YOU DOWN. Maybe Abby and co. thought that the two weren't aware of what Joel did, but if that was the case, they don't bother stating things to Tommy and Ellie. Even something as basic as "if you knew what he did, you would understand" or outright telling it would have gone a long way towards making this line of thought feasible.
Regarding whether they're better than him, the answer is no, they're not and they know that. It is widely implied throughout the game that the Fireflies and WLF committed war crimes during their respective conflicts, and Abby most definitely engaged in some such act (supported by her implied guilt down-the-line). You could counter and say that those were (or were perceived to be) enemy combatants, and that executing Tommy and Ellie would be akin to killing unarmed civilians. You could maybe make this case for Tommy, but Ellie literally comes into the room guns-ablazing and slices up one of the WLF crewmen. Also, how is restraining Joel and slowly killing him there any different from a principled standpoint?
And finally, if Abby really wanted them to comprehend this act of mercy as an opportunity to start afresh, she should've SAID something. How is knocking Ellie out as she's screaming "I'm going to f*cking kill you" leaving her to think on things? Especially when she now knows your name and logo?
It was an all-around moronic decision - the cliché "villain conveniently spares the hero" trope.
So overall, not a good opener to this game. But hey, slow starts have been experienced in other titles like Skyward Sword, and the subsequent odyssey can make-up for lost time. Only....that doesn't happen. See, rather than do the smart thing and have Ellie either go solo or team-up with Tommy to hunt down the WLF rogues, Druckmann decides to have Ellie team-up with Dina, the girl whom she had a romantic encounter with earlier, because of course what a revenge story needed was a dumb romantic subplot.
Look, I'm all for diversity and representation, but a romance of ANY KIND was going to be a distraction, especially with a character we barely spent time with and, who, more importantly, barely spent time with Ellie. Seriously, Dina has NO logical reason to tag along on this life-threatening excursion other than being horny for Ellie as she did not extensively interact with her prior to the events of the game. No one does that shit, especially when they have their loved ones back home (and ESPECIALLY when she finds out she's pregnant).
Also, on a side note, anyone else find it interesting how gay romances that feature some kind of sexual scene tend to almost always be depicted via lesbians? It's almost as if such writers have an odd predilection towards the female gender when it comes to "presenting" same-sex intercourse, but I can't for the love of me tell why....
I could've tolerated Dina had she at least presented something interesting to the plot, and you sometimes get that by way of her conversations with Ellie during their time riding together (the Synagogue scene, in particular, stands out). However, for the most part, it's your silly flirtatious convos that are at odds with the serious, foreboding tone of the plot. Perhaps Druckmann intended this as "levity," but it's so amateurish I would've preferred silence.
To make matters worse, the official beginning of Joel's avengement is thrown into a free roam world that sees the couple having to, get this, open locked gates! Yup, you literally and figuratively hit a stonewall in terms of the pacing, with Naughty Dog thinking it a smart idea to abandon their signature linear-driven craftsmanship in favor a semi-open world that is boring. Look, downtrodden Seattle is a stunning dystopia to gaze at, but it gets old fast. The amount of empty space between buildings, the lack of interesting things to do at said edifices, and subtle mandatoriness courtesy of new weapons being out there grinds the pacing to a slow throttle. And as I said before, the convos between Dina and Ellie just aren't engaging enough to fill-in the quiet moments, particularly when compared to the first game's. Even some of the action beats feel like rehashes of events we underwent back then (getting saved last minute by the secondary hero, escaping into the spore-filled sewers). The only praise I can give this chapter (Seattle Day 1) is that it has a map that's actually useful.
The story significantly starts to pick up during the second chapter due to the following changes: Dina is taken out of the picture, causing Ellie to go solo; the open-world is removed in favor of handcrafted linear environments again; and new enemy variants are introduced to spice things up. You still have too many instances of boring side buildings to explore, but at least it's a far cry from the amount in the first section.
One decision that has received mixed reviews from audiences is the incorporation of flashbacks, which start during Seattle Day 2. Critics have said that they hurt the delivery of the narrative; however, considering I thought that was ruined long before, I didn't think they made it better or worse. No, I instead liked them for the most part. They're set between the two main games and give more memories of Joel and Ellie for fans to digest on.
Unfortunately, one of the storytelling decisions I fundamentally didn't agree with is introduced during one of these, and it's the revelation that Joel confessed to Ellie, in turn causing her to become distant from him. Not only did this make Ellie kind of unlikable (and Tommy flat-out despisable) for choosing to pursue bloodthirsty vengeance despite having an understanding of where these people were coming from, but I also think the story could have gone in more fascinating directions had the writers opted to play with when Ellie finds out the truth and what her reaction (and consequent reflection on all the horrible things she's done in the name of a guy she thought was good) is. But look, at the end of the day, you can't criticize what you wanted, only what you got, so it is what it is.
The decision to make Abby a playable character was another big controversial commitment by Naughty Dog, and yet again I find myself on the side of the company. While I do understand people wanting to purely experience Ellie (and absolutely sympathize with those who didn't want to play as the killer of Joel), as stated before, I've always been an advocate for stories that push boundaries, especially in video games which, unlike movies, have an interactivity factor that makes them more potent avenues for morality tales. In my opinion, this was a great decision, and made TLOU2 more than just your typical revenge plot.
Abby is a great character, brought to life by the great Laura Bailey. She's three-dimensional, visually unique (how often do we see a woman rocking guns?), likeable, and relatable. Everything about her, from her motivations to her shifting character arc, is very well-executed, and it's a shame so many people went into her section without keeping an open mind. As I said before, Abby embodies the notion of actions having consequences- even if you had removed her connection with the surgeon and just made her an ex-Firefly out for blood, she still would've been gripping to follow.
What really helps her is her supporting cast and the game design surrounding her sections. In most vengeance narratives, the antagonists aren't given much characterization: they're either blanket evil or bland evil, and this has the effect of dehumanizing them, resulting in players completely empathizing with the wronged party. But, as we all know in real life, people have a tendency to be more complex than that, and Druckmann and company opted to follow that philosophy in conceiving Abby's crew. I'm not going to go into detail about all of them, but know that they end up feeling like realistic folks you could conceivably meet at a point in your life. Some of the hardest-hitting moments in the TLOUII come from realizing the horrific actions you committed as Ellie were done to actual people with hopes, dreams, and aspirations.
Regarding the game design, which I alluded to earlier in critiquing Ellie's comportments, Abby's story progresses at a sound gait, much more resembling the first TLOU in terms of limited exploration and story-driven linearity. It really does make a difference knowing that everything you're doing, every step you're taking, is moving the narrative forward.
Unfortunately, not all is sunshine and roses for Abby. The switch to her takes place after a major cliffhanger for Ellie, which will frustrate you. Part of me wonders how the game would've played out had it been edited differently- that is, have Abby's parts strewn throughout, taking place immediately after its associated Ellie parallel. But I understand this would've had more drawbacks than positives. You will also have to re-upgrade Abby, who is given a different arsenal from Ellie, but one that needs refurbishing regardless. Scouring for gears is already old at that point- doing it again will no doubt rub some people as an exercise in tedium.
Storywise, the two biggest downsides to Abby's yarn are the inclusion of a love triangle (It's as dumb and underdeveloped as you can imagine a side character's subplot being), and the game's attempt at trying to make her seem like this bad person; a bad person whom one of her compatriots outright declares a "piece of sh!t." Like I said, there is implied guilt behind Bailey's performance, but outside of that we're not given anything to deduce where these accusations are coming from. Was it making her friends help her murder Joel? No, because they explicitly state during flashbacks that they wanted to come of their own accord. Was it some atrocity she perpetrated during the war with the Seraphites? Nothing is stated to indicate such. I just didn't buy this line of argument, which in turn made her arc weak from a starting point.
Lastly, I absolutely hated how the game made you spend an inordinate amount of time getting the surgical instruments to save Yara's life, only to then kill her off. It's a pet peeve of mine whenever video games do this: have the player invest a lot of time into completing an activity only for that action to be undone later in the storyline. I hated it in Modern Warfare 3, I hated it in Fallout 3, I hated it in Life is Strange, and I hate it here.
There were more fundamental disagreements I had with the game, primarily with regards to its themes. Like too many postmodernist takes on revenge, it advocates that vengeance is wrong by way of creating a cycle of violence that hurts everyone, and I've always found this to be a simplistic view more interested in taking a holier-than-thou visage than genuinely exploring what revenge does to a society, let alone a person. Now, I understand that The Last of Us 2 was partly inspired by Druckmann's experiences growing up during the West Bank conflict between Israel and Palestine, and I don't mean to downplay the violence and trauma he no doubt witnessed. However, here he doesn't do a good job of dissecting things. TLOU2's biggest issue is that Ellie isn't acting on any semblance of reason, just pure emotion. She doesn't try to understand where these killers are coming from or why they would've been willing to travel across the country just to murder one man. The only thing we see is rage.
You might be thinking, well doesn't that fit right in with revenge being everlasting suffering? After all, since the involved parties are acting on passions instead of logic, they fail to realize how they're destroying themselves in the process of destroying the other. The thing is, the only way that story works is if both sides are sympathetic or both sides are unlikeable- you make one morally elevated above the other, and it creates an uneven playing field that throws a wrench in the mutual tragedy, which is exactly what happens here. Abby's side is inherently more pitiable because she was responding to a wrong Joel did; meanwhile, Ellie is not sympathizable because the developers make the boneheaded decision to have her aware of Joel's actions. If she was coming from a place of ignorance, then at least I would be able to understand her side- she lost a father figure who genuinely cared for her and wants payback for the seemingly senseless violence that befell him. But no, she knows, and despite that knowledge, there's no ethical dilemma on her part, no balancing of reasoning, not even an attempt at discussing things- the closest we get is when Nora asks Ellie in the hospital if she's aware of what he [Joel] did, to which Ellie responds by torturing her for information. Yeah, not likable in the slightest, making Abby's dedication all the more affirmable.
On the other hand, if you agreed with Joel's actions, then no amount of plaintive scenes from Abby's side will sway you, making the anti-vengeance theme even less impactful: you WANT to see Abby and her compatriots die at the hands of Ellie.
Now, what about Abby- she definitely loses all her friends as a result of getting revenge on Joel and setting off Ellie and Tommy (without stupidly killing them). Well, unfortunately, most of her pals get killed of their own accord- Nora, Mel, and Owen only die when they opt to attack Ellie instead of giving her the information she is seeking (Abby's location). In fact, not to go off on a tangent, but that speaks to another small issue I had with the game, which was its unwillingness to commit to Ellie's apparent moral degradation- if most of the WLF members she's assassinating are done in self-defense, how can this be seen as an infliction on her (you might say that this was deliberately done because Ellie recognizes Joel was in the wrong and only wants Abby dead; unfortunately, this is counteracted by the whole encounter with Nora, indicating that Ellie is willing to go far if she doesn't get what she wants).
In terms of the other negatives that befall Abby, they don't have anything to do with Ellie. Getting hung by the Seraphites? Occurs because she went out looking for Owen. Getting exiled from the WLF? Conducted because she decided to aid Yara and Lev. Getting captured by the Rattlers? Done because she was looking for the Fireflies. So basically revenge has nothing with most of the tragedies that befall her. And of the events that it did have an impact on (Nora, Mel, Owen, Manny, Alice's deaths), get this, Abby doesn't give a sh!t! She mourns them for a second before moving on, not reflecting or caring.
One may argue that Ellie does end up losing everything on her end: she's detached from her community, Dina has left her, and she's dehumanized. Except, the truth is none of this is permanent or even implied to be permanent- she can return to Jackson at any point and be welcomed with open arms (her leaving the farm at the end indicates just that); maybe Dina wouldn't take her back, but given how horny she was to risk her life on the trip in the first place, I doubt she'd hold a permanent grudge; and I don't see Ellie being anymore dehumanized than any other individual suffering from PTSD after all that's transpired in her life. If anything, her not having nightmares of Joel anymore is an indication she's getting better.
The truth is the game wants to have its cake and eat it too. You can't say traveling on this path won't lead to anything good if the consequences aren't that bad or the consequences have nothing to do with the act of revenge; and if the consequences aren't that bad or disassociated with the initiator, doesn't that make revenge worth pursuing in the end?
No, it seems the only decent interpretation you can make is Druckmann is saying you shouldn't have embarked on this excursion at all. This isn't supported by Abby's segments (since she almost dies despite sparing Ellie), but it IS supported by Ellie settling down into relative peace after returning to Jackson: she's got a farm, a family, and a future of happiness. It's only when she reneges on her abstinence that she suffers the aforestated aftereffects. And my problem with this take is what I alluded to above, which is that really comes off as a 'superior' person looking down on an 'inferior' person. Like, "oh, you should've known better than to give in to your feelings". What exactly was the alternative? To just suffer from nightmares? To silently forgive Abby? To move on as though nothing transpired? And what about from Abby's perspective- was she supposed to get over her dad having his guts blown out? Her mentor being executed? Her surrogate family and their lifelong mission destroyed in the span of an hour?
You'll notice that these kinds of stories NEVER provide the alternative answer to revenge because they don't know what it is- all they figure is that doing it is bad, which is so smug and simplistic. Tell someone who had a loved one who was murdered or beaten or assaulted in a world without proper law enforcement that they need to just sit on their ass and move on.
No, I'll be completely honest with you all- I have a conspiracy theory that the game had a very different ending initially, one that was much darker and much more controversial, yet that ended things much more succinctly than what we got. And that is that Abby kills Ellie.
I'm not going to waste a lot of time supporting this since it's circumstantial, but keep in mind this was one of the plot details in the pre-release leaks that plagued the title, and considering the vast majority of those other leaks turned out to be truthful, it maybe indicates it was contemplated at one point. Consider this: the showdown with Ellie is presented as a stealth fight akin to the one with David in TLOU1. And consider, more importantly, how tacked on and awful that whole final act is with the slave traders. Seriously, I haven't felt a game that padded in so long- it was convoluted (Ellie not bleeding out from that wound whilst strung upside down?), full of contrivances (Abby and Lev getting crucified THE EXACT DAY Ellie finds them?), and anticlimactic as an endgame compared to the theater scene.
Killing Ellie would've made complete sense. You have Abby rightfully motivated by the death of her friends; you have the element of surprise in the sense that she gets the drop on them; and you have a culmination of that whole anti-revenge spiel wherein you witness Ellie suffer the ultimate consequence for going after Abby.
It makes zero, let me repeat, ZERO sense for Abby to spare Ellie after everything the latter did to her. Zero. As Abby didn't learn from her mistake, so too do fictional writers not learn that the sparing the hero cliche is archetypal fatuity for a reason. Instead, we get a whole "don't ever let me see you again." Yeah, here's some advice- if you want to guarantee her not seeing you again, how about you kill her!
Look, I get that Naughty Dog was probably afraid of someone torching their headquarters to the ground if they had gone through with such a decision (considering the death threats they and Bailey received just for axing Joel, this isn't even out of the realm of possibility), but then they shouldn't have written the narrative to lead up to this moment. It was dumb planning from the get-go (and it begs the question of how tf Ellie got a wounded pregnant Dina and a gunshot-to-the-head Tommy all the way back to Seattle with a broken arm - now there's an idea for a Left Behind-type DLC!).
So yeah, those are all my reasons for eventually finding TLOU2 to be on the lower side of the quality spectrum. It has a lot of great artistic, technical, and even storytelling feats, and I absolutely recommend a playthrough on those merits alone but these are countered by cons in the narrative department. That being said, don't listen to the mainstream critiques that have occupied the discourse from disgruntled fans; there are legitimate flaws with this game that critics conveniently overlooked, but they're more complicated than you would believe.
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2015
The Order: 1886 was a game I really wanted to defend. Many of the pre and post-release criticisms seemed to boil down to two things: the overly-cinematic nature of the gameplay and the short length, and I couldn't help but find both of these odd as, back in the day, they were actually quite common in AAA/AA titles. By cinematicness, I mean the use of pre-rendered or in-game cutscenes to showcase some action beat transpiring; by shorter runtime, outside of RPGs and multiplayer titles, single-player campaigns tended to be between 8-15 hours max. The former died as player choice became the dictating paradigm behind game design, but the latter continued well into the early years of the sixth generation: such classics as the Metroid Prime Trilogy, BioShock, Arkham Asylum, Ratchet & Clank, and Uncharted could be completed within that range, yet you never once heard any complaining from consumers. Everyone was fine dolling out the cash full-price.
So what changed? Well, my theory is most gamers grew up. We were relying on our parents’ credit cards to finance our gaming lives, and since our folks rarely played things, they didn’t care about the price-to-gametime ratio. When we finally started to have to finance things ourselves, value turned into a dilutable variable contingent on hard measurements: that is, we needed more bang for our buck. Now, if a game is charging a large sum of money, it is expected to deliver a set amount of content.
And look, I’m not trying to ding that unofficial rule, especially with the economy the way that it is- heck, those who follow my reviews know that I tend to incorporate a $1.00-to-30-minute game-time ratio expectation for any product. However, I don’t believe you should inherently dismiss something based on that singular facet alone, which is what happened with The Order: 1886 the second its runtime got unintentionally disclosed to the public.
I understand I’m spending all this time laying out a defense for a product I ultimately did not enjoy; the reason I'm doing so to make it clear to prospective readers that the basis for this critique doesn't derive purely from the playtime, but from other factoids related to the story and game progression.
Before we get into that, let's talk about the graphics, which have been raved about extensively, even by those who did not like the game. Indeed, that everything was (seemingly) done in-engine is a testament to the power of the RAD 4.0 that developer Ready at Dawn utilized. Despite indulging in Victorian fantasy tropes, artistically The Order: 1886 takes on a photorealistic scheme, and every texture gleams quality to this day. Cloth physics are on point, smoke from firearms disperses naturally, and, most impressive of all, facial animations are phenomenal. This genuinely might be the best example of countenance motion-capture successfully rendered on screen, exceeding even the likes of LA Noire and The Last of Us. If this title had been more profitable, I swear it would have been an influence on AAA gaming the way most acclaimed works like The Witcher 3 and Ghost of Tsushima are.
There really aren’t any downsides I can think of outside of the baked lighting being too dim during the darker sections of the game (to clarify- not the parts where you’re given a lamp). Maybe the environments could have had more personalized artifacts thrown on them; however, considering how little time you spend anywhere, this was the smarter decision as it prevented the artisans from wasting time on something 99% of players wouldn't notice.
One aspect of The Order that doesn’t get enough credit is the textile design. The characters you play as are steampunk incarnations of the Knights of the Round Table, and so the concept artists were tasked with combining three vastly different aesthetics: Victorian garbs, 19th century-looking body armor, and your typical metal plates associated with steampunk. Whoever designed these must have been a closet tailor as, not only do we get a successful polymorphization of the three, but a unique coat variation is provided for each Knight.
Soundwise, I honestly wasn't as impressed. There's a diversity of weapons at your disposal, but their discharging and reloading noises had the same steel-clasp click, which you hear frequently given the amount of ammo you have expunge during shootouts. In addition, the game has a severe lack of atmospheric noises- you never get a sense that you're in a metropolis populated by millions. There's no city bustle, no dins from working-class toils, nor any nightlife during the evening sections. It's disappointingly sparse.
Thankfully, this facet is somewhat offset by Jason Graves's score, which evokes a steampunk cinema extravaganza, and the voice acting, which is stellar (save for the French guy- could not stand the way he spoke).
Unfortunately, the performances are wasted in a story that is mired in hackneyed writing. The Order: 1886 follows Sir Galahad, a member of an immortal Sect of Knights dedicated to protecting England from rebels and supernatural creatures. Over the course of the story, Galahad comes to learn that things are not as they seem, with more secrets brewing underfoot than he initially believed.
If you've played Deus Ex, Alien: Isolation or any other cyberpunk game, then you've seen this story a dozen times over of a hero realizing their organization may not be as noble as he/she originally thought. And I hate to say it, but 1886 doesn't do anything different with the concept. It's the same old schtick albeit with a Gothic horror coat.
This wouldn't inherently be a bad thing were it not for the mediocre way the writers go about telling their tale. You're thrown into this setting without any backstory or history; the different factions, the different loyalties, the characters and their relationships with one another, you have to put a lot of things together on your own based on stringy pieces of dialogue, and even then you may be wrong. It's not overly complicated by any means, but for a title that was supposed to introduce gamers to this new IP crafted by Ready at Dawn, it's surprising how vague it can be. By the end, I still didn't understand how the conflict between the Rebels and Government even arose in the first place or where the vampires and lycans were coming from (was it another dimension or a scape on Earth?) amongst other questions.
The dumber aspect has to be how the story progresses: most of the time Galahad and his compatriots act in defiance of the Head Council, making some backend deal with a lower member to justify their shadow operation. Not only was this so cliche (characters going rogue because of bureaucratic constraints), but it also undermined what little lore was set-up propping up the Knights of the Round Table as this powerful, longstanding institution protecting mankind- not so strong if it can be easily subverted, is it? Worse still is whenever the writers engage in one of my pet peeves, which is the protagonist refusing to explain themselves to another character whenever they’re about to do something that seems unorthodox. This is usually done under the guise of “there isn’t enough time to explain” when the truth is there was plenty of time, and using that time to do just that would’ve prevented complications from arising down the road fast.+
Galahad, in general, I found to be an unlikable character. He frequently kills innocent guards, and another part sees him murder a guy for slapping around a woman rightfully suspected of being associated with Jack the Ripper. For an immortal who’s been around for hundreds of years, he acts on emotion over logic, and combined with his tendency to be ambiguous with his close friends, I didn’t enjoy my time with him.
The other characters are solid overall. They usually have some small quirk or moment of alternate thinking that gives them a three-dimensional edge around their otherwise plain-stated depiction. Igraine, in particular, stood out as the best of the bunch, while the French Marquis was the worst due to being more annoying than entertaining.
Cast aside, let’s talk about the cinematic facets of 1886. I was more than willing to defend them when I believed they were going to be implemented the way mid-2000s games did, which is consistent enough to keep things entertaining, but sporadic enough to not overwhelm the gameplay. Unfortunately, the latter is what you get as tons upon tons of cutscenes were filmed for the game, and they’re thrown in ad nauseam for the sake of divulging exposition and moving the story forward- heck, two of 1886's chapters are just long cutscenes! There are times when the whole experience reminded me of Virginia in the sense that there wasn’t much opportunity for movement before you were thrown into a cutscene, though thankfully this isn’t automatic or as prevalent as it was there. Still, the fact that I was reminded of it is a critique in its own way- see, a secondary pet peeve I have in gaming is when a cutscene ends, you proceed to walk a few steps or do a single action, and then ANOTHER scene plays out. It’s like, why even bother providing players that moment of control if you were going to rip it away immediately afterwards? More often than not, I also felt that that transition from gameplay to cutscene wasn't smooth, which is bizarre considering these scenes were rendered in-engine.
TO does this a lot, but worse still has to be how even the times you’re placed in control don’t really feel meaningful. Your walking speed, your ability to draw your weapon, entering/exiting stealth mode: all these are dictated by what the game wants you to be doing in a particular level. You have no autonomy unless you’re given permission, which is one of the biggest pitfalls you can create in contemporary gaming. Even actions like climbing, jumping, and assassinating- when you trigger them, you don’t feel like you’re initiating a movement on the part of your character, but more so that you’re triggering a pre-arranged animation that your character does independent of you (yes, I know technically all character tacticity is pre-programmed, but you get what I mean).
The only parts where you truly have control are the cover shooter sections. These have been criticized as being generic, but I honestly disagree and had a lot of fun with them. While generic thugs have typical hide-and-peek AI that makes them easy to kill (three shots anywhere or one to the head), there are some variants that have smarter AI, including grenadiers and snipers. My favorite types had to be the armored ones: these guys frequently try to flank you, have a unique weapon on them, and can take a lot of damage before succumbing. Adding additional variety to these shootouts is the presence of a dodge prompt whenever a grenade lands near you (wish you could throw it back) and the number of weapons at your disposal- while you’ll mostly be using automatic weapons and shotguns, TO crafts some unique steampunk gear for you to (literally) give a shot, including a flare-igniting fume sprayer and electric plasma rifle.
There are some boss fights in the game, but they’re as lame as the ones in Arkham Asylum and Far Cry 3, either a repetitive bullet sponge or a QTE knife fight. A shame considering there was so much potential with werewolves.
The last thing I have to criticize is the horrible narrative direction. What I mean by this is, we’ve all played free roam games wherein you’re walking through a place and your protagonist or an NPC will audibly react to something going on in the environment, whether it’s something someone else is doing or an object or so forth. Obviously, the voice actors are not seeing a prototype of the visual landscape that will be available to the player, so it’s up to the narrative director to provide that context for the actors to respond to. The Last of Us 1 was one of the best examples of this, though there are other games out there that do something similar.
In TO, you barely get that. You can walk past or intrude on an NPC’s personal space and they won’t react or even acknowledge you, and vice-versa for your character. There are times where you have to search through a place for an item of interest, but Galahad says nothing from finding nothing. There’s a lot of stationary strewn throughout the world for you to examine, but 70% doesn’t prompt any kind of comment from Galahad. There are even collectible sound cylinders that play some historical or character audio; another thing that Galahad has no reaction to. It’s as though the narrative directors weren’t even sure of what would be available to players in any given area minus the direct story objectives, and so they opted to keep things hidden from the actors, making their roles subsequently mostly silent outside of scripted beats.
And with that concludes my review of The Order: 1886. I wish I could go more into detail about the story, but the truth is what you get is relatively barebones in comparison to the amazing world and history that surrounds you. The graphical feats, specifically with regards to facial expressions, are superb, but too much moviemaking takes the place of proper gameplay. And when you have neither a fun story nor fun gameplay, you don’t have a fun time.
Can a game provide an experience that is so evocative it warrants being played no matter the cost? Maybe, but The Order: 1886 isn't one of those.
So what changed? Well, my theory is most gamers grew up. We were relying on our parents’ credit cards to finance our gaming lives, and since our folks rarely played things, they didn’t care about the price-to-gametime ratio. When we finally started to have to finance things ourselves, value turned into a dilutable variable contingent on hard measurements: that is, we needed more bang for our buck. Now, if a game is charging a large sum of money, it is expected to deliver a set amount of content.
And look, I’m not trying to ding that unofficial rule, especially with the economy the way that it is- heck, those who follow my reviews know that I tend to incorporate a $1.00-to-30-minute game-time ratio expectation for any product. However, I don’t believe you should inherently dismiss something based on that singular facet alone, which is what happened with The Order: 1886 the second its runtime got unintentionally disclosed to the public.
I understand I’m spending all this time laying out a defense for a product I ultimately did not enjoy; the reason I'm doing so to make it clear to prospective readers that the basis for this critique doesn't derive purely from the playtime, but from other factoids related to the story and game progression.
Before we get into that, let's talk about the graphics, which have been raved about extensively, even by those who did not like the game. Indeed, that everything was (seemingly) done in-engine is a testament to the power of the RAD 4.0 that developer Ready at Dawn utilized. Despite indulging in Victorian fantasy tropes, artistically The Order: 1886 takes on a photorealistic scheme, and every texture gleams quality to this day. Cloth physics are on point, smoke from firearms disperses naturally, and, most impressive of all, facial animations are phenomenal. This genuinely might be the best example of countenance motion-capture successfully rendered on screen, exceeding even the likes of LA Noire and The Last of Us. If this title had been more profitable, I swear it would have been an influence on AAA gaming the way most acclaimed works like The Witcher 3 and Ghost of Tsushima are.
There really aren’t any downsides I can think of outside of the baked lighting being too dim during the darker sections of the game (to clarify- not the parts where you’re given a lamp). Maybe the environments could have had more personalized artifacts thrown on them; however, considering how little time you spend anywhere, this was the smarter decision as it prevented the artisans from wasting time on something 99% of players wouldn't notice.
One aspect of The Order that doesn’t get enough credit is the textile design. The characters you play as are steampunk incarnations of the Knights of the Round Table, and so the concept artists were tasked with combining three vastly different aesthetics: Victorian garbs, 19th century-looking body armor, and your typical metal plates associated with steampunk. Whoever designed these must have been a closet tailor as, not only do we get a successful polymorphization of the three, but a unique coat variation is provided for each Knight.
Soundwise, I honestly wasn't as impressed. There's a diversity of weapons at your disposal, but their discharging and reloading noises had the same steel-clasp click, which you hear frequently given the amount of ammo you have expunge during shootouts. In addition, the game has a severe lack of atmospheric noises- you never get a sense that you're in a metropolis populated by millions. There's no city bustle, no dins from working-class toils, nor any nightlife during the evening sections. It's disappointingly sparse.
Thankfully, this facet is somewhat offset by Jason Graves's score, which evokes a steampunk cinema extravaganza, and the voice acting, which is stellar (save for the French guy- could not stand the way he spoke).
Unfortunately, the performances are wasted in a story that is mired in hackneyed writing. The Order: 1886 follows Sir Galahad, a member of an immortal Sect of Knights dedicated to protecting England from rebels and supernatural creatures. Over the course of the story, Galahad comes to learn that things are not as they seem, with more secrets brewing underfoot than he initially believed.
If you've played Deus Ex, Alien: Isolation or any other cyberpunk game, then you've seen this story a dozen times over of a hero realizing their organization may not be as noble as he/she originally thought. And I hate to say it, but 1886 doesn't do anything different with the concept. It's the same old schtick albeit with a Gothic horror coat.
This wouldn't inherently be a bad thing were it not for the mediocre way the writers go about telling their tale. You're thrown into this setting without any backstory or history; the different factions, the different loyalties, the characters and their relationships with one another, you have to put a lot of things together on your own based on stringy pieces of dialogue, and even then you may be wrong. It's not overly complicated by any means, but for a title that was supposed to introduce gamers to this new IP crafted by Ready at Dawn, it's surprising how vague it can be. By the end, I still didn't understand how the conflict between the Rebels and Government even arose in the first place or where the vampires and lycans were coming from (was it another dimension or a scape on Earth?) amongst other questions.
The dumber aspect has to be how the story progresses: most of the time Galahad and his compatriots act in defiance of the Head Council, making some backend deal with a lower member to justify their shadow operation. Not only was this so cliche (characters going rogue because of bureaucratic constraints), but it also undermined what little lore was set-up propping up the Knights of the Round Table as this powerful, longstanding institution protecting mankind- not so strong if it can be easily subverted, is it? Worse still is whenever the writers engage in one of my pet peeves, which is the protagonist refusing to explain themselves to another character whenever they’re about to do something that seems unorthodox. This is usually done under the guise of “there isn’t enough time to explain” when the truth is there was plenty of time, and using that time to do just that would’ve prevented complications from arising down the road fast.+
Galahad, in general, I found to be an unlikable character. He frequently kills innocent guards, and another part sees him murder a guy for slapping around a woman rightfully suspected of being associated with Jack the Ripper. For an immortal who’s been around for hundreds of years, he acts on emotion over logic, and combined with his tendency to be ambiguous with his close friends, I didn’t enjoy my time with him.
The other characters are solid overall. They usually have some small quirk or moment of alternate thinking that gives them a three-dimensional edge around their otherwise plain-stated depiction. Igraine, in particular, stood out as the best of the bunch, while the French Marquis was the worst due to being more annoying than entertaining.
Cast aside, let’s talk about the cinematic facets of 1886. I was more than willing to defend them when I believed they were going to be implemented the way mid-2000s games did, which is consistent enough to keep things entertaining, but sporadic enough to not overwhelm the gameplay. Unfortunately, the latter is what you get as tons upon tons of cutscenes were filmed for the game, and they’re thrown in ad nauseam for the sake of divulging exposition and moving the story forward- heck, two of 1886's chapters are just long cutscenes! There are times when the whole experience reminded me of Virginia in the sense that there wasn’t much opportunity for movement before you were thrown into a cutscene, though thankfully this isn’t automatic or as prevalent as it was there. Still, the fact that I was reminded of it is a critique in its own way- see, a secondary pet peeve I have in gaming is when a cutscene ends, you proceed to walk a few steps or do a single action, and then ANOTHER scene plays out. It’s like, why even bother providing players that moment of control if you were going to rip it away immediately afterwards? More often than not, I also felt that that transition from gameplay to cutscene wasn't smooth, which is bizarre considering these scenes were rendered in-engine.
TO does this a lot, but worse still has to be how even the times you’re placed in control don’t really feel meaningful. Your walking speed, your ability to draw your weapon, entering/exiting stealth mode: all these are dictated by what the game wants you to be doing in a particular level. You have no autonomy unless you’re given permission, which is one of the biggest pitfalls you can create in contemporary gaming. Even actions like climbing, jumping, and assassinating- when you trigger them, you don’t feel like you’re initiating a movement on the part of your character, but more so that you’re triggering a pre-arranged animation that your character does independent of you (yes, I know technically all character tacticity is pre-programmed, but you get what I mean).
The only parts where you truly have control are the cover shooter sections. These have been criticized as being generic, but I honestly disagree and had a lot of fun with them. While generic thugs have typical hide-and-peek AI that makes them easy to kill (three shots anywhere or one to the head), there are some variants that have smarter AI, including grenadiers and snipers. My favorite types had to be the armored ones: these guys frequently try to flank you, have a unique weapon on them, and can take a lot of damage before succumbing. Adding additional variety to these shootouts is the presence of a dodge prompt whenever a grenade lands near you (wish you could throw it back) and the number of weapons at your disposal- while you’ll mostly be using automatic weapons and shotguns, TO crafts some unique steampunk gear for you to (literally) give a shot, including a flare-igniting fume sprayer and electric plasma rifle.
There are some boss fights in the game, but they’re as lame as the ones in Arkham Asylum and Far Cry 3, either a repetitive bullet sponge or a QTE knife fight. A shame considering there was so much potential with werewolves.
The last thing I have to criticize is the horrible narrative direction. What I mean by this is, we’ve all played free roam games wherein you’re walking through a place and your protagonist or an NPC will audibly react to something going on in the environment, whether it’s something someone else is doing or an object or so forth. Obviously, the voice actors are not seeing a prototype of the visual landscape that will be available to the player, so it’s up to the narrative director to provide that context for the actors to respond to. The Last of Us 1 was one of the best examples of this, though there are other games out there that do something similar.
In TO, you barely get that. You can walk past or intrude on an NPC’s personal space and they won’t react or even acknowledge you, and vice-versa for your character. There are times where you have to search through a place for an item of interest, but Galahad says nothing from finding nothing. There’s a lot of stationary strewn throughout the world for you to examine, but 70% doesn’t prompt any kind of comment from Galahad. There are even collectible sound cylinders that play some historical or character audio; another thing that Galahad has no reaction to. It’s as though the narrative directors weren’t even sure of what would be available to players in any given area minus the direct story objectives, and so they opted to keep things hidden from the actors, making their roles subsequently mostly silent outside of scripted beats.
And with that concludes my review of The Order: 1886. I wish I could go more into detail about the story, but the truth is what you get is relatively barebones in comparison to the amazing world and history that surrounds you. The graphical feats, specifically with regards to facial expressions, are superb, but too much moviemaking takes the place of proper gameplay. And when you have neither a fun story nor fun gameplay, you don’t have a fun time.
Can a game provide an experience that is so evocative it warrants being played no matter the cost? Maybe, but The Order: 1886 isn't one of those.
Grody streets, towering skyscrapers, smog-filled airways, glaring neon signs. THIS is moral decay, THIS is a world without principles, THIS is cyberpunk.
Ever since the 80s, Ridley Scott and William Gibson's dystopian vision has been seen as the defacto depiction of a cyberpunk setting, and it should come as no surprise that I relish such renditions of lowlife and high-tech. Some may claim it's overly-done, cliched, and perhaps even outdated (LED signs have replaced neon ones after all). Valid points for sure, but I can't bring myself to agree. There's always been something inside me that goes silent with awe whenever I see a gritty metropolis drenched in the effulgent glaze of corporate ads and human vice.
Dex's Harbor Prime is another great addition in a long-line of cyberpunk cityscapes, and while I haven't played the original release, any brush-ups in the Enhanced Version were evidently done for the better. Despite being 2D, Harbor Prime feels as lived in as any 3D urban sprawl: working-class people trudge about the roads, wandering mechanically like cogs in a machine; shady NPCs stroll or stand-about in the back, not bothering you so long as you don't bother them; signposts glower on high, touting small businesses to conglomerate enterprises, each seeking to earn a quick buck from anyone with the cash on hand. Multiple districts make-up Harbor Prime, depicting a technical socioeconomic range offset by the grunge- it doesn't matter if you're living in the slums or a high-rise apartment: everything is filthy.
All this raving about the visuals, and I still feel I haven't done justice to the work of art conceived by developer Dreadlocks. Dex operates in a style reminiscent of older computer games from the 64-bit era. Models are full-fledged humans adorned in an impressive variety of clothing that still feels in-vogue despite the eternally dusk capital: no matter how late it is, the nightlife roams free. And occasionally intermingling your excursions are limited cutscenes drawn in a beautiful painted aesthetic.
That old-school flair does hit the game negatively in a few ways though. Animations are a bit stilted for kinetic characters and their textiles, and downright awkward for those stuck in a stationary pose, shuffling and shrugging as though they're constantly adjusting a loose jacket. Additionally, the lack of a walk option prevents you from ambling about the semi-open world like a regular citizen. Lastly, those cutscenes I cheered on have this strange stutter to them. Granted, this could've just been my laptop, but looking up other playthroughs showed framerate drops regardless, indicating this was either a coding issue on their part or a strange stylistic decision that doesn't quite work.
But overall, Dex's graphics more than serve their purpose, situating Harbor Prime alongside other great cyberpunk settings as Blade Runner's L.A., Neuromancer's Chiba, and 2077's Night City.
So excited was I about the optical splendour, I haven't even talked about what Dex is. It's a 2D, side-scroller that takes inspiration from the RPG and beat 'em-up genres, focusing on a young woman named Dex who finds herself on the run from a corporate monstrosity called The Complex. I wish I could say Dex's other aspects are as strong as its vistas, but that isn't the case beginning with this narrative. Archetypal cyberpunk environs may be fine in my book; however, storylines don't get the same break, and that's where Dex stumbles. Think of every trope and archetype from cyberpunk works and you'll have a good chance at guessing the tale Dreadlocks wanted to spin. Harbor Prime is your typical capitalist cesspit, officially and unofficially run by a consortium of sociopathic megacorps up to no good. Your eponymous protagonist happens to be the only one who holds the key to bringing them down, and with guidance from a grizzled veteran and mysterious digital figure, she has the tools necessary to complete her destiny.
Nothing new is really done here; if you've played Deus Ex, read Neuromancer, or partook in some form of cyberpunk media, you'll recognize the tropes off the bat. This would've been fine if it weren't for the storytellers evidently not wanting to spend time exploring the characters they crafted. Dex is a strange case of a pre-conceived protagonist with customizable personality sets: it's like the writers couldn't decide whether they wanted to give players a blank slate to fill in with their choices or a full-fledged individual with her own thoughts and emotions (nor could they decide whether she's a fresh face in this Brave New World or a person capable of handling herself). Dex comes across as a scared little girl afraid of meeting new cats, entering cyberspace, and augmenting herself, yet is also quite literally able to kick ass and traverse a downtrodden municipality. Choices further expand this confusion by giving you the option to come-off as a straight-shooter, empath, smart-ass, or a mix of the above.
In games that indulge in RPG elements, narrative decisionmaking of course matters and consequently deserves a degree of visible diversity. But too many concrete storybeats, that have their own ideas in mind of what Dex is, inherently limit the scope of this facet (further not helped by your judgments in side missions not causing any impact on the main path, either by branching spiderwebs or a flexible morality meter).The writers know who they want Dex to be, and throwing in an arbitrary dialogue system was a mistake in my book (further not helped by 1. most of the choices resulting in the same pre-rendered response from your conversationist and 2. Dex's personal journal subtly chastising you for making wrong decisions).
That aside, the main narrative suffers from the additional writer's ailment of being too interested in moving forward with major notion after major notion without giving its protagonist time to stop, breathe, and soak in the neon glare. What I mean by this is not that you don't have any opportunities to branch away, explore, and do other things, but that when you do get back on track, everyone is more interested in just going forward with the next major initiative or next major exposition dump. There’s no time for everyone to breathe or relationships to form. For a cyberpunk game focused on free will, you spend an inordinate amount of time following someone's instructions blindly. I also had an issue with the ending, marked by a spoiler tag here to be read at the end at your discretion+
Side quests are handled better, mostly because they tend to give you free reign in terms of when you're compelled to do their objective from a narrative sense, as well as the presence of impactful decisions. A number of them tend to focus on some aspect of Harbor Prime's degeneracy, such as a corporation or individual in the system, and examine why they are emitting moral (and in some cases physical!) corruption.
They aren't as fleshed out as they could have been, and an amount of them are essentially fetch quests, but I found the majority enjoyable and memorable, and you'd be surprised by some of the end results that come your decisions (or lack thereof).
And just to clarify, for all my slam-banging of the main campaign, I still had fun with it. Cyberpunk is one of my favorite subgenres, and any game that competently tells a story set in it is bound to hit enough right notes, which is what Dex does.
Sound is a mixed bag, but before delving into it, I want to praise Dreadlocks for giving the options to adjust the three different aural aspects: sound effects, voices, and music. Usually smaller titles restrict you to just music and every other sound, so it was nice to see individual volume controls.
The voice acting is pretty mediocre- the main cast like Decker, Raycast, Tony, and one of the villains named Hammond are solid, but everyone else, particularly in the side missions are too hit-or-miss. They don't intonate as though they have lived and breathed in this crime-ridden world, instead sounding like stereotypical street urchins with a delivery reminiscent of an attempted mimicry of old noir movies. A number of them also have sound editing issues wherein they speak much softer than the other characters despite having the VA sound turned all the way up. And in general, everyone speaks so slow to the point where I often skipped through convos because I was reading the dialogue faster than it was being said! I do appreciate the devs for assembling an array of voice artists for all the different NPCs, but quantity sometimes takes precedence over quality.
One of the more bizarre facets of the voice acting is Dex herself- in the animated scenes she’s brought to life by actress Jessica Boone, but during EVERY OTHER part of the game, her communications are depicted purely through text. Could they not afford to hire her for the entire game or something?
SFX is severely lacking. You can turn up atmospheric noises to hear the occasional bird flutter, and footsteps (out of sync) opt to make themselves known on different surfaces on an inconsistent basis, but there's no sense of city-life. The sound does not match up with the look of Harbor Prime: there's no crunch of dirt as NPCs pace back-and-forth, no inhalation of drugs, no buzzing of electronic billboards, no churning of machinery, no honking of cars in traffic, none of that.
Combat is given a little bit more due. I admittedly didn't use the firearms much, but looking up other playthroughs indicates that effort went into making them aurally distinct from the other. And while I've heard other reviewers criticize the mano-y-mano for sounding like old-school arcade punches, I personally really enjoyed it: the noises combined with the slight shake of the screen gave off a sense of impact. That being said, even these are limited to a singular din, no matter who or what you're shooting, and every bad guy who can be silently taken down emits the same grumble.
The score though....ohhh man, have I got some praise to weave. Synth-based electronica has been the de facto basis for cyberpunk-music for a while now, and composer Karel Antonín adds his flair to this rich history. If the soundscape failed to properly convey the life of the city, the OST makes up for it, delivering a pulsating rhythm that adjusts its warble depending on the quietness or liveliness of the section that you’re in. The main theme, in particular, is the hallmark of techno-thrillers everywhere.
Finally, we come to gameplay. Earlier, I mentioned the two parent groups that Dex draws inspiration from: beat ‘em-ups and RPGs, and I wish Dreadlocks had taken more from the former than the latter. See, when you’re just going around, knocking around goons, it’s all good fun- the addition of blocks and dodge rolls, plus decent enemy variety in attack patterns turns these encounters into enjoyable scraps. Areas are technically constructed to give you multiple ways of approaching a situation (vents/tunnels that allow you get behind thugs for example), but these places are generally too small and lacking in sufficient enemies to make anything but the linear path worth doing.
To make things worse, combat is made broken by an interface competence called AR, which enables you to freeze time, hover over any enemy, and hack into them to cause temporary paralysis. For smaller enemies, this means you can easily take them out by way of immobilizing them, rolling behind, and choking them. For larger enemies with guns, it means being able to stop them while you move in close to engage in a barrage of hits, during which time they lose the willpower to just pull the trigger on their firearm. Temporarily disabling enemies also gives you an opportunity to quickly restore lost health. Staying in the AR realm (and initiating hacks) attracts viruses that can quickly knock down your AR meter (called focus); however, every time you leave, you can instantaneously reenter it, causing a reset of all viruses and allowing you to take out people one-by-one. An easy fix would obviously have been including a cooldown meter, preventing players from spamming AR. There’s also a severe lack of environmental opportunities to manipulate with AR- outside of altering the targeting system of turrets, there’s nothing else you can do to give yourself an edge in battle: overheating guns, randomly opening panels underneath guards, causing them to fight each other, and so forth were some additions I can think of that would have expanded upon the untapped potential here.
Role-playing elements come in the form of an experience system, as well as augmentations called implants that give you perks. Gaining enough experience (or purchasing a canister) lands you a point that you can invest in one of many skills that increase your proficiency, from extra combat moves to bartering.
Unfortunately, like so many games, some of these abilities are mandatory and others are pointless. Lockpicking, for example, is near-essential for getting through areas and finding hidden goodies, while you can honestly do without acquiring new weapon proficiencies since your magnum is enough to dispel 99% of enemies. If you want to ensure you get the best dialogue choices in talks with NPCs, you’d better put early skills into charisma, while extra melee movies are arbitrary at best. For most of these, it’s less about specific playstyles and more about convenience, which doesn’t really make it an enjoyable system. It’s worth pointing out also that leveling up doesn’t give you increased attack power, defense, or HP like other games have occur.
Implants kind of fall into the same boat, with some like poison/electricity immunity being necessary for side quests, and others (health regeneration) more about convenience than encouraging playstyles. There really was a missed opportunity, though part of me wonders if they deliberately dialed it back in light of the environmental designers not being able to give large playpens that enticed different avenues for success.
Hacking is the last major gameplay system you’ll take part in, and your mileage will honestly vary depending on how much you enjoy arcade-esque shooters. Entering cyberspace puts Dex in a computerized plane of existence that sees her mind represented by a blue sphere that must navigate whilst avoiding other circles: most of these shoot lasers, but others have alternate methods of attack to them. The whole minigame is akin to Space Invader or Galaga if you had more freedom of movement in those titles, hence my insistence on your enjoyment depending on your appreciation for cabinet classics of yonder. Shops sells power-ups that can be employed during your trips into cyberspace, like a screen-clearing shockwave or a deployable shield, but otherwise the gameplay is standard shmup.
Overall, Dex is a worthy entry in the cyberpunk field. Yes, I had a number of issues with it, technically, narratively, and gameplay-wise, but you’ll still get strong satisfaction from the typical corporate conspiracy yarn the writers spin. More importantly, wandering through Harbor Prime is such a rich delight, an excursion that rewards exploration with secret areas, stationary that gives historical/anecdotal details, and more. Dex also doesn’t outstay its welcome, providing 11-12 hours of content total which, at a $15.00 price range, is a steal.
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+In addition to having a pointless binary ending that rips off Deus Ex 1, the main finale is way too clean, with Dex turning in evidence of The Complex to the authorities and everyone going to jail while the news airs this to the public. Like what? In a world that was set-up on the basis of corporate hegemonic control over all sociopolioeconomic aspects of the country, you mean to tell me the federal government turned on them like a dime and prosecuted them to the fullest extent of the law? It was out-of-line with what had been set-up before.
Ever since the 80s, Ridley Scott and William Gibson's dystopian vision has been seen as the defacto depiction of a cyberpunk setting, and it should come as no surprise that I relish such renditions of lowlife and high-tech. Some may claim it's overly-done, cliched, and perhaps even outdated (LED signs have replaced neon ones after all). Valid points for sure, but I can't bring myself to agree. There's always been something inside me that goes silent with awe whenever I see a gritty metropolis drenched in the effulgent glaze of corporate ads and human vice.
Dex's Harbor Prime is another great addition in a long-line of cyberpunk cityscapes, and while I haven't played the original release, any brush-ups in the Enhanced Version were evidently done for the better. Despite being 2D, Harbor Prime feels as lived in as any 3D urban sprawl: working-class people trudge about the roads, wandering mechanically like cogs in a machine; shady NPCs stroll or stand-about in the back, not bothering you so long as you don't bother them; signposts glower on high, touting small businesses to conglomerate enterprises, each seeking to earn a quick buck from anyone with the cash on hand. Multiple districts make-up Harbor Prime, depicting a technical socioeconomic range offset by the grunge- it doesn't matter if you're living in the slums or a high-rise apartment: everything is filthy.
All this raving about the visuals, and I still feel I haven't done justice to the work of art conceived by developer Dreadlocks. Dex operates in a style reminiscent of older computer games from the 64-bit era. Models are full-fledged humans adorned in an impressive variety of clothing that still feels in-vogue despite the eternally dusk capital: no matter how late it is, the nightlife roams free. And occasionally intermingling your excursions are limited cutscenes drawn in a beautiful painted aesthetic.
That old-school flair does hit the game negatively in a few ways though. Animations are a bit stilted for kinetic characters and their textiles, and downright awkward for those stuck in a stationary pose, shuffling and shrugging as though they're constantly adjusting a loose jacket. Additionally, the lack of a walk option prevents you from ambling about the semi-open world like a regular citizen. Lastly, those cutscenes I cheered on have this strange stutter to them. Granted, this could've just been my laptop, but looking up other playthroughs showed framerate drops regardless, indicating this was either a coding issue on their part or a strange stylistic decision that doesn't quite work.
But overall, Dex's graphics more than serve their purpose, situating Harbor Prime alongside other great cyberpunk settings as Blade Runner's L.A., Neuromancer's Chiba, and 2077's Night City.
So excited was I about the optical splendour, I haven't even talked about what Dex is. It's a 2D, side-scroller that takes inspiration from the RPG and beat 'em-up genres, focusing on a young woman named Dex who finds herself on the run from a corporate monstrosity called The Complex. I wish I could say Dex's other aspects are as strong as its vistas, but that isn't the case beginning with this narrative. Archetypal cyberpunk environs may be fine in my book; however, storylines don't get the same break, and that's where Dex stumbles. Think of every trope and archetype from cyberpunk works and you'll have a good chance at guessing the tale Dreadlocks wanted to spin. Harbor Prime is your typical capitalist cesspit, officially and unofficially run by a consortium of sociopathic megacorps up to no good. Your eponymous protagonist happens to be the only one who holds the key to bringing them down, and with guidance from a grizzled veteran and mysterious digital figure, she has the tools necessary to complete her destiny.
Nothing new is really done here; if you've played Deus Ex, read Neuromancer, or partook in some form of cyberpunk media, you'll recognize the tropes off the bat. This would've been fine if it weren't for the storytellers evidently not wanting to spend time exploring the characters they crafted. Dex is a strange case of a pre-conceived protagonist with customizable personality sets: it's like the writers couldn't decide whether they wanted to give players a blank slate to fill in with their choices or a full-fledged individual with her own thoughts and emotions (nor could they decide whether she's a fresh face in this Brave New World or a person capable of handling herself). Dex comes across as a scared little girl afraid of meeting new cats, entering cyberspace, and augmenting herself, yet is also quite literally able to kick ass and traverse a downtrodden municipality. Choices further expand this confusion by giving you the option to come-off as a straight-shooter, empath, smart-ass, or a mix of the above.
In games that indulge in RPG elements, narrative decisionmaking of course matters and consequently deserves a degree of visible diversity. But too many concrete storybeats, that have their own ideas in mind of what Dex is, inherently limit the scope of this facet (further not helped by your judgments in side missions not causing any impact on the main path, either by branching spiderwebs or a flexible morality meter).The writers know who they want Dex to be, and throwing in an arbitrary dialogue system was a mistake in my book (further not helped by 1. most of the choices resulting in the same pre-rendered response from your conversationist and 2. Dex's personal journal subtly chastising you for making wrong decisions).
That aside, the main narrative suffers from the additional writer's ailment of being too interested in moving forward with major notion after major notion without giving its protagonist time to stop, breathe, and soak in the neon glare. What I mean by this is not that you don't have any opportunities to branch away, explore, and do other things, but that when you do get back on track, everyone is more interested in just going forward with the next major initiative or next major exposition dump. There’s no time for everyone to breathe or relationships to form. For a cyberpunk game focused on free will, you spend an inordinate amount of time following someone's instructions blindly. I also had an issue with the ending, marked by a spoiler tag here to be read at the end at your discretion+
Side quests are handled better, mostly because they tend to give you free reign in terms of when you're compelled to do their objective from a narrative sense, as well as the presence of impactful decisions. A number of them tend to focus on some aspect of Harbor Prime's degeneracy, such as a corporation or individual in the system, and examine why they are emitting moral (and in some cases physical!) corruption.
They aren't as fleshed out as they could have been, and an amount of them are essentially fetch quests, but I found the majority enjoyable and memorable, and you'd be surprised by some of the end results that come your decisions (or lack thereof).
And just to clarify, for all my slam-banging of the main campaign, I still had fun with it. Cyberpunk is one of my favorite subgenres, and any game that competently tells a story set in it is bound to hit enough right notes, which is what Dex does.
Sound is a mixed bag, but before delving into it, I want to praise Dreadlocks for giving the options to adjust the three different aural aspects: sound effects, voices, and music. Usually smaller titles restrict you to just music and every other sound, so it was nice to see individual volume controls.
The voice acting is pretty mediocre- the main cast like Decker, Raycast, Tony, and one of the villains named Hammond are solid, but everyone else, particularly in the side missions are too hit-or-miss. They don't intonate as though they have lived and breathed in this crime-ridden world, instead sounding like stereotypical street urchins with a delivery reminiscent of an attempted mimicry of old noir movies. A number of them also have sound editing issues wherein they speak much softer than the other characters despite having the VA sound turned all the way up. And in general, everyone speaks so slow to the point where I often skipped through convos because I was reading the dialogue faster than it was being said! I do appreciate the devs for assembling an array of voice artists for all the different NPCs, but quantity sometimes takes precedence over quality.
One of the more bizarre facets of the voice acting is Dex herself- in the animated scenes she’s brought to life by actress Jessica Boone, but during EVERY OTHER part of the game, her communications are depicted purely through text. Could they not afford to hire her for the entire game or something?
SFX is severely lacking. You can turn up atmospheric noises to hear the occasional bird flutter, and footsteps (out of sync) opt to make themselves known on different surfaces on an inconsistent basis, but there's no sense of city-life. The sound does not match up with the look of Harbor Prime: there's no crunch of dirt as NPCs pace back-and-forth, no inhalation of drugs, no buzzing of electronic billboards, no churning of machinery, no honking of cars in traffic, none of that.
Combat is given a little bit more due. I admittedly didn't use the firearms much, but looking up other playthroughs indicates that effort went into making them aurally distinct from the other. And while I've heard other reviewers criticize the mano-y-mano for sounding like old-school arcade punches, I personally really enjoyed it: the noises combined with the slight shake of the screen gave off a sense of impact. That being said, even these are limited to a singular din, no matter who or what you're shooting, and every bad guy who can be silently taken down emits the same grumble.
The score though....ohhh man, have I got some praise to weave. Synth-based electronica has been the de facto basis for cyberpunk-music for a while now, and composer Karel Antonín adds his flair to this rich history. If the soundscape failed to properly convey the life of the city, the OST makes up for it, delivering a pulsating rhythm that adjusts its warble depending on the quietness or liveliness of the section that you’re in. The main theme, in particular, is the hallmark of techno-thrillers everywhere.
Finally, we come to gameplay. Earlier, I mentioned the two parent groups that Dex draws inspiration from: beat ‘em-ups and RPGs, and I wish Dreadlocks had taken more from the former than the latter. See, when you’re just going around, knocking around goons, it’s all good fun- the addition of blocks and dodge rolls, plus decent enemy variety in attack patterns turns these encounters into enjoyable scraps. Areas are technically constructed to give you multiple ways of approaching a situation (vents/tunnels that allow you get behind thugs for example), but these places are generally too small and lacking in sufficient enemies to make anything but the linear path worth doing.
To make things worse, combat is made broken by an interface competence called AR, which enables you to freeze time, hover over any enemy, and hack into them to cause temporary paralysis. For smaller enemies, this means you can easily take them out by way of immobilizing them, rolling behind, and choking them. For larger enemies with guns, it means being able to stop them while you move in close to engage in a barrage of hits, during which time they lose the willpower to just pull the trigger on their firearm. Temporarily disabling enemies also gives you an opportunity to quickly restore lost health. Staying in the AR realm (and initiating hacks) attracts viruses that can quickly knock down your AR meter (called focus); however, every time you leave, you can instantaneously reenter it, causing a reset of all viruses and allowing you to take out people one-by-one. An easy fix would obviously have been including a cooldown meter, preventing players from spamming AR. There’s also a severe lack of environmental opportunities to manipulate with AR- outside of altering the targeting system of turrets, there’s nothing else you can do to give yourself an edge in battle: overheating guns, randomly opening panels underneath guards, causing them to fight each other, and so forth were some additions I can think of that would have expanded upon the untapped potential here.
Role-playing elements come in the form of an experience system, as well as augmentations called implants that give you perks. Gaining enough experience (or purchasing a canister) lands you a point that you can invest in one of many skills that increase your proficiency, from extra combat moves to bartering.
Unfortunately, like so many games, some of these abilities are mandatory and others are pointless. Lockpicking, for example, is near-essential for getting through areas and finding hidden goodies, while you can honestly do without acquiring new weapon proficiencies since your magnum is enough to dispel 99% of enemies. If you want to ensure you get the best dialogue choices in talks with NPCs, you’d better put early skills into charisma, while extra melee movies are arbitrary at best. For most of these, it’s less about specific playstyles and more about convenience, which doesn’t really make it an enjoyable system. It’s worth pointing out also that leveling up doesn’t give you increased attack power, defense, or HP like other games have occur.
Implants kind of fall into the same boat, with some like poison/electricity immunity being necessary for side quests, and others (health regeneration) more about convenience than encouraging playstyles. There really was a missed opportunity, though part of me wonders if they deliberately dialed it back in light of the environmental designers not being able to give large playpens that enticed different avenues for success.
Hacking is the last major gameplay system you’ll take part in, and your mileage will honestly vary depending on how much you enjoy arcade-esque shooters. Entering cyberspace puts Dex in a computerized plane of existence that sees her mind represented by a blue sphere that must navigate whilst avoiding other circles: most of these shoot lasers, but others have alternate methods of attack to them. The whole minigame is akin to Space Invader or Galaga if you had more freedom of movement in those titles, hence my insistence on your enjoyment depending on your appreciation for cabinet classics of yonder. Shops sells power-ups that can be employed during your trips into cyberspace, like a screen-clearing shockwave or a deployable shield, but otherwise the gameplay is standard shmup.
Overall, Dex is a worthy entry in the cyberpunk field. Yes, I had a number of issues with it, technically, narratively, and gameplay-wise, but you’ll still get strong satisfaction from the typical corporate conspiracy yarn the writers spin. More importantly, wandering through Harbor Prime is such a rich delight, an excursion that rewards exploration with secret areas, stationary that gives historical/anecdotal details, and more. Dex also doesn’t outstay its welcome, providing 11-12 hours of content total which, at a $15.00 price range, is a steal.
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+In addition to having a pointless binary ending that rips off Deus Ex 1, the main finale is way too clean, with Dex turning in evidence of The Complex to the authorities and everyone going to jail while the news airs this to the public. Like what? In a world that was set-up on the basis of corporate hegemonic control over all sociopolioeconomic aspects of the country, you mean to tell me the federal government turned on them like a dime and prosecuted them to the fullest extent of the law? It was out-of-line with what had been set-up before.
This review contains spoilers
Spoilers only discussed at the very bottom
When it first came out, Dear Esther gained fame for pioneering what would eventually be labeled the walking simulator. Having played a couple of these in my time as a gamer, I can definitely see the appeal in them: after all, the idea of purely exploring a beautifully-rendered environment as you slowly unravel its narrative is the heart of mystery novels. And with video games offering visual treats to accompany the story, such a combination can be an emotional experience.
Unfortunately, Dear Esther has been significantly outclassed by later entries in the genre it inspired, not because they did anything particularly innovative with the concept so much as they avoided the basic pitfalls that render Dear Esther an example of what not to do.
I don’t want to be too harsh since The Chinese Room put a lot of thought into their project, so I’ll begin on some positive notes- graphically, Dear Esther is solid. I played the Landmark Edition, which reportedly rebuilt the game in the Unity Engine, and while I’m unable to pinpoint any specific differences from the original, the end result is splendid. The isle is essentially restricted to muted verdant coverings, tall cliff-faces, and streaming water, the three looking as though they were taken from a pictorialized Hemingway novel. What I mean is the art style isn’t pure realism, instead dialing back to a more storybook-esque format that provides aesthetic elements simultaneously minimalist and enriching in appearance. Overlooking the oceanic horizon with the wind bellowing about you as waves crash below evokes a peace of mind; seeing derelict houses or abandoned trawlers in the distance imbues melancholy. At times, it really does feel like you’ve stepped into an old fisherman’s recollection of events from yore.
Rocks, in particular, are incredibly well done from a texturing and variety perspective. Usually these are the facets that get skimped over by developers since, well, let’s be honest, who truly cares about stone? Well, here The Chinese Room evidently did, and you get a lot of diversity, from the granite bluffs above sea to the ore boulders laden with gold veins to even the slightly-damp speleothems adorning the subterranean depths. There are enlarged pebbles on the coastlines, cairn-like monuments on the mainland, quartz crystals on cavern walls, and more I’m sure I’m missing. I wouldn’t be surprised if someone in the art department was a geologist because they really took their time to throw in more motifs than your typical sedimentary limestone.
Unfortunately, that same thought wasn’t put into the grass, which is literally the same weed clusters copy/pasted ad nauseam. This wouldn’t be inherently ugly were it not for them being noticeably spaced apart from each other and having this 2D visage that stands at odds with the overall 3D landscape. I also wasn’t a big fan of how dust, as kicked up by the breeze, was rendered, with such clouds looking more like yellow brown will-o-the-wisps than particles of dirt. In addition, the vast majority of consumerist paraphernalia you find strewn about have significantly-less work done on them than anything else (the sole exception being paint cans), with papyrus-based items like magazines, books, and pages being particularly blurry. Any lettering, in general, was hard to read, even those illustrated with bright white pigments, to the point where I stopped making an effort to decipher such messages towards the end of my playthrough.
I’ll end this section on a positive note: the use of colored lighting. This takes place primarily in the final two chapters during your descent into the grottos, though you can see it beforehand in the sky where clouds float past the sun, emitting pink/gray shades. Tons of static hues are thrown at you, from reds to blues to greens, and it varnishes nicely on the craggy and watery surfaces, creating a mesmerizing climate.
Soundwise, Dear Esther isn’t quite where it needs to be. You only have a single voice actor for the protagonist, a man named Nigel Carrington (not to be confused with the knight lawyer of the same name), but he was clearly directed to just be a stereotypical, monotone narrator. With the exception of his last two entries, he recounts his story with unwavering intonations and inflections, no matter the subject matter or emotional context. Then again, maybe this was for the better, given that his attempts at infusing passion in those aforestated final entries falter as mediocre.
Music comes up at specific cues, primarily whenever the Narrator speaks, and it generally occupies a dismal tone played through classical instruments like pianos and fiddles. Towards the endgame, it switches to a slightly-more upbeat melody that’s less about happiness and more about acceptance. Overall, the score by Jessica Curry is befitting to the story beats, its sole drawback being its constant reinsertion into the game whenever you trigger a voice over prompt that feels more abrupt than natural. Gone Home had a similar issue, but because the diary entries were linear, it actually felt cinematic compared to Dear Esther, where it tends to be akin to a jumpscare in terms of its suddenness.
The SFX is adequate, yet limited in scope. You technically have all the noises you would associate with an uninhabited island: birds cawing, gales booming, riverheads trickling, and water descending (either partially or wholly), but they’re not synchronized well with their associated strata. You’ll hear the sonar of a brewing gust, but it happens at intervals rather than operating on a constant (which would make sense given that you’re in a constant air pressure zone). Approaching a shoreline yields the appropriate gurgle of a stream; however, it seems more like a stock din given that there isn’t strong flow. Drips fall from holes above onto the ground below, but a quick glance will show almost none of them resonate concurrently with their aural counterpart.
To put it bluntly, all of this is me saying that the sound feels like it was implemented secondhand, which doesn’t help the ambience that a walking sim is meant to generate (and what the devs of all people should have known given that their intention was to strip a game down to its bare components).
On that note, we can move onto the gameplay and story, which shall be talked about simultaneously since there isn’t much gameplay. Dear Esther is built around ambling along an unnamed holm, setting off monologues from the aforementioned speaker as you enter designated catalyst points. Theoretically, those pieces of dialogue are meant to unveil the truth behind what is going on and build-up to a major (and hopefully satisfying) finale. Sadly, though, the story takes on one of those non-linear, unreliable narrator motifs wherein you’re given pieces from different points of the Narrator’s life and essentially forced to draw your own conclusions. What makes things slightly more complicated is the presence of two other characters that the Narrator is chronicling about: an author that he was following who had previously led an expedition to the island, and the Narrator’s wife Esther.
Look, it’s not like you’re dealing with a Memento-type fragmentation here: things can be put together, and an overall picture assembled. But regardless of how you interpret things, the end result is honestly not very entertaining and, at worse, exploitative of serious subject matter. You don’t end up caring about the Narrator, his past, or his present situation because not enough time is spent fleshing out who he is as an individual. In terms of exploitation, see my footnote at the end because it deals with spoilers.
A further thing that might make the narrative unappealing to prospective gamers is the syntax. William S. Burroughs was reportedly an influence on the script, with the writing taking on a poetic feel that integrates feelings and memories with powerful, flowery prose. As an English Major, I actually really enjoyed this, but I fully contend this use of language will not be appealing to a decent sect of the gaming populace that just wants to hear a tale unfold.
As I said before, there isn’t much gameplay- the developers wanted to cut a video game down to its core essence (though if you were really digging deep, wouldn’t you just go back to old-fashioned text-based adventures?), but what’s baffling is how basic features weren’t inputted. You can’t run, you can’t pick up objects to examine them further, you can’t climb over ledges, nothing. All you have is a zoom-in option (literally keyed to every button), which does help with reading some of the murky lettering, but is otherwise pointless. Really, though, the absence of a run function is just pitiful. Maybe the developers were worried it would result in players speeding through the world, resulting in conversations being cut-short. However, there was a simple solution to this: put a brake on the jog until the dialogue completes, in which case the original velocity resumes (consider the fact that Dear Esther LITERALLY does this in the last part).
What’s worse is how the game impedes exploration. Despite being set on a modest, beautiful island, you are very limited in terms of where you can go: fence posts, unclimbable bluff sides, and deepwater pools all prevent you from going wherever your heart may desire, and none of it is for story reasons since the transitions between the four portions is handled through definitive moments of falling to a lower plane.
There was no reason for this- tons of gorgeous sights are missed out on because you are literally unable to get there. What’s worse is when the game throws in objects or environs that look like they should be searchable, only for you to waste time getting as close as possible and realizing that you can’t touch them. Exploration is the one aspect of walking sims that should be unadulterated, yet Dear Esther decided even that needed to be hampered. And even when you can go somewhere, the developers don’t reward you for it. You might unlock a secret oration (though I can attest there are only three off the beaten path), and the game reportedly has four urns you can collect (though I never found them despite [trying] to navigate everywhere), but as you can tell from my parentheticals, those are sparse, meaning 9 times out of 10, you’ll literally hit a wall or another one of those natural barriers, making the excursion feel annoying and downright misleading (if you weren’t going to give anything here, not even a secret message, why even have it present as a space for investigating? Why not just close-it off entirely?).
Then again, considering the explorable parts of the game (abandoned huts, shipwrecks) literally don’t have anything of value in them (lacking sufficient belongings and detail outside of the occasional novel), maybe this was to be expected.
So yeah, Dear Esther fundamentally fails at even its sole mission of telling a story while a player roams around freely. You are restricted in what you can do and where you can go, and the story being told isn’t particularly intriguing enough to offset these flaws. And while the game stands out visually, eliciting a calming atmosphere brought about by a windy cliff in the middle of the sea, it lacks robust audio to truly capitalize on this evocative foundation. While I can look back at other genre pioneers like Super Mario Bros. and GoldenEye and still find enjoyment in them despite their mechanics being elaborated on by their followers, I can’t say the same for Dear Esther. Combined with a $10.00 price tag for not even two hours of content and you’re better off playing any one of its many successors over it.
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*One thing that is consistent is that the main character is dying. I don’t know how I feel about the game taking on this notion of a guy deciding to isolate himself away from society so that he can wither away- it strikes me as engaging too much in a romanticized vision of death that glorifies the quiet vanishing motif that you see in other fictional works like Star Wars, albeit here it is more disturbing given the realist tone of everything. We should always work to prevent the elderly from being viewed as burdens that need to just disappear.
The worst part is that it literally ends with the Narrator committing (or implied to be committing) suicide (on a side note, is it just me, or did The Witness rip-off the ending to this game with the whole floating around the island?).
When it first came out, Dear Esther gained fame for pioneering what would eventually be labeled the walking simulator. Having played a couple of these in my time as a gamer, I can definitely see the appeal in them: after all, the idea of purely exploring a beautifully-rendered environment as you slowly unravel its narrative is the heart of mystery novels. And with video games offering visual treats to accompany the story, such a combination can be an emotional experience.
Unfortunately, Dear Esther has been significantly outclassed by later entries in the genre it inspired, not because they did anything particularly innovative with the concept so much as they avoided the basic pitfalls that render Dear Esther an example of what not to do.
I don’t want to be too harsh since The Chinese Room put a lot of thought into their project, so I’ll begin on some positive notes- graphically, Dear Esther is solid. I played the Landmark Edition, which reportedly rebuilt the game in the Unity Engine, and while I’m unable to pinpoint any specific differences from the original, the end result is splendid. The isle is essentially restricted to muted verdant coverings, tall cliff-faces, and streaming water, the three looking as though they were taken from a pictorialized Hemingway novel. What I mean is the art style isn’t pure realism, instead dialing back to a more storybook-esque format that provides aesthetic elements simultaneously minimalist and enriching in appearance. Overlooking the oceanic horizon with the wind bellowing about you as waves crash below evokes a peace of mind; seeing derelict houses or abandoned trawlers in the distance imbues melancholy. At times, it really does feel like you’ve stepped into an old fisherman’s recollection of events from yore.
Rocks, in particular, are incredibly well done from a texturing and variety perspective. Usually these are the facets that get skimped over by developers since, well, let’s be honest, who truly cares about stone? Well, here The Chinese Room evidently did, and you get a lot of diversity, from the granite bluffs above sea to the ore boulders laden with gold veins to even the slightly-damp speleothems adorning the subterranean depths. There are enlarged pebbles on the coastlines, cairn-like monuments on the mainland, quartz crystals on cavern walls, and more I’m sure I’m missing. I wouldn’t be surprised if someone in the art department was a geologist because they really took their time to throw in more motifs than your typical sedimentary limestone.
Unfortunately, that same thought wasn’t put into the grass, which is literally the same weed clusters copy/pasted ad nauseam. This wouldn’t be inherently ugly were it not for them being noticeably spaced apart from each other and having this 2D visage that stands at odds with the overall 3D landscape. I also wasn’t a big fan of how dust, as kicked up by the breeze, was rendered, with such clouds looking more like yellow brown will-o-the-wisps than particles of dirt. In addition, the vast majority of consumerist paraphernalia you find strewn about have significantly-less work done on them than anything else (the sole exception being paint cans), with papyrus-based items like magazines, books, and pages being particularly blurry. Any lettering, in general, was hard to read, even those illustrated with bright white pigments, to the point where I stopped making an effort to decipher such messages towards the end of my playthrough.
I’ll end this section on a positive note: the use of colored lighting. This takes place primarily in the final two chapters during your descent into the grottos, though you can see it beforehand in the sky where clouds float past the sun, emitting pink/gray shades. Tons of static hues are thrown at you, from reds to blues to greens, and it varnishes nicely on the craggy and watery surfaces, creating a mesmerizing climate.
Soundwise, Dear Esther isn’t quite where it needs to be. You only have a single voice actor for the protagonist, a man named Nigel Carrington (not to be confused with the knight lawyer of the same name), but he was clearly directed to just be a stereotypical, monotone narrator. With the exception of his last two entries, he recounts his story with unwavering intonations and inflections, no matter the subject matter or emotional context. Then again, maybe this was for the better, given that his attempts at infusing passion in those aforestated final entries falter as mediocre.
Music comes up at specific cues, primarily whenever the Narrator speaks, and it generally occupies a dismal tone played through classical instruments like pianos and fiddles. Towards the endgame, it switches to a slightly-more upbeat melody that’s less about happiness and more about acceptance. Overall, the score by Jessica Curry is befitting to the story beats, its sole drawback being its constant reinsertion into the game whenever you trigger a voice over prompt that feels more abrupt than natural. Gone Home had a similar issue, but because the diary entries were linear, it actually felt cinematic compared to Dear Esther, where it tends to be akin to a jumpscare in terms of its suddenness.
The SFX is adequate, yet limited in scope. You technically have all the noises you would associate with an uninhabited island: birds cawing, gales booming, riverheads trickling, and water descending (either partially or wholly), but they’re not synchronized well with their associated strata. You’ll hear the sonar of a brewing gust, but it happens at intervals rather than operating on a constant (which would make sense given that you’re in a constant air pressure zone). Approaching a shoreline yields the appropriate gurgle of a stream; however, it seems more like a stock din given that there isn’t strong flow. Drips fall from holes above onto the ground below, but a quick glance will show almost none of them resonate concurrently with their aural counterpart.
To put it bluntly, all of this is me saying that the sound feels like it was implemented secondhand, which doesn’t help the ambience that a walking sim is meant to generate (and what the devs of all people should have known given that their intention was to strip a game down to its bare components).
On that note, we can move onto the gameplay and story, which shall be talked about simultaneously since there isn’t much gameplay. Dear Esther is built around ambling along an unnamed holm, setting off monologues from the aforementioned speaker as you enter designated catalyst points. Theoretically, those pieces of dialogue are meant to unveil the truth behind what is going on and build-up to a major (and hopefully satisfying) finale. Sadly, though, the story takes on one of those non-linear, unreliable narrator motifs wherein you’re given pieces from different points of the Narrator’s life and essentially forced to draw your own conclusions. What makes things slightly more complicated is the presence of two other characters that the Narrator is chronicling about: an author that he was following who had previously led an expedition to the island, and the Narrator’s wife Esther.
Look, it’s not like you’re dealing with a Memento-type fragmentation here: things can be put together, and an overall picture assembled. But regardless of how you interpret things, the end result is honestly not very entertaining and, at worse, exploitative of serious subject matter. You don’t end up caring about the Narrator, his past, or his present situation because not enough time is spent fleshing out who he is as an individual. In terms of exploitation, see my footnote at the end because it deals with spoilers.
A further thing that might make the narrative unappealing to prospective gamers is the syntax. William S. Burroughs was reportedly an influence on the script, with the writing taking on a poetic feel that integrates feelings and memories with powerful, flowery prose. As an English Major, I actually really enjoyed this, but I fully contend this use of language will not be appealing to a decent sect of the gaming populace that just wants to hear a tale unfold.
As I said before, there isn’t much gameplay- the developers wanted to cut a video game down to its core essence (though if you were really digging deep, wouldn’t you just go back to old-fashioned text-based adventures?), but what’s baffling is how basic features weren’t inputted. You can’t run, you can’t pick up objects to examine them further, you can’t climb over ledges, nothing. All you have is a zoom-in option (literally keyed to every button), which does help with reading some of the murky lettering, but is otherwise pointless. Really, though, the absence of a run function is just pitiful. Maybe the developers were worried it would result in players speeding through the world, resulting in conversations being cut-short. However, there was a simple solution to this: put a brake on the jog until the dialogue completes, in which case the original velocity resumes (consider the fact that Dear Esther LITERALLY does this in the last part).
What’s worse is how the game impedes exploration. Despite being set on a modest, beautiful island, you are very limited in terms of where you can go: fence posts, unclimbable bluff sides, and deepwater pools all prevent you from going wherever your heart may desire, and none of it is for story reasons since the transitions between the four portions is handled through definitive moments of falling to a lower plane.
There was no reason for this- tons of gorgeous sights are missed out on because you are literally unable to get there. What’s worse is when the game throws in objects or environs that look like they should be searchable, only for you to waste time getting as close as possible and realizing that you can’t touch them. Exploration is the one aspect of walking sims that should be unadulterated, yet Dear Esther decided even that needed to be hampered. And even when you can go somewhere, the developers don’t reward you for it. You might unlock a secret oration (though I can attest there are only three off the beaten path), and the game reportedly has four urns you can collect (though I never found them despite [trying] to navigate everywhere), but as you can tell from my parentheticals, those are sparse, meaning 9 times out of 10, you’ll literally hit a wall or another one of those natural barriers, making the excursion feel annoying and downright misleading (if you weren’t going to give anything here, not even a secret message, why even have it present as a space for investigating? Why not just close-it off entirely?).
Then again, considering the explorable parts of the game (abandoned huts, shipwrecks) literally don’t have anything of value in them (lacking sufficient belongings and detail outside of the occasional novel), maybe this was to be expected.
So yeah, Dear Esther fundamentally fails at even its sole mission of telling a story while a player roams around freely. You are restricted in what you can do and where you can go, and the story being told isn’t particularly intriguing enough to offset these flaws. And while the game stands out visually, eliciting a calming atmosphere brought about by a windy cliff in the middle of the sea, it lacks robust audio to truly capitalize on this evocative foundation. While I can look back at other genre pioneers like Super Mario Bros. and GoldenEye and still find enjoyment in them despite their mechanics being elaborated on by their followers, I can’t say the same for Dear Esther. Combined with a $10.00 price tag for not even two hours of content and you’re better off playing any one of its many successors over it.
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*One thing that is consistent is that the main character is dying. I don’t know how I feel about the game taking on this notion of a guy deciding to isolate himself away from society so that he can wither away- it strikes me as engaging too much in a romanticized vision of death that glorifies the quiet vanishing motif that you see in other fictional works like Star Wars, albeit here it is more disturbing given the realist tone of everything. We should always work to prevent the elderly from being viewed as burdens that need to just disappear.
The worst part is that it literally ends with the Narrator committing (or implied to be committing) suicide (on a side note, is it just me, or did The Witness rip-off the ending to this game with the whole floating around the island?).
This review contains spoilers
Spoilers only discussed at the very bottom
You couldn’t tell from the lack of recorded activity on my Backloggd account, but Assassin’s Creed is arguably my favorite video game franchise of all time. It took that title from the Donkey Kong Country series, which was no small feat given the latter’s presence in my childhood, but took it, it did. Every kid with too much time on their hands has that one piece of media that they’ve become heavily immersed in the mythology of, from Lord of the Rings to Mass Effect to Star Wars to Game of Thrones, etc.... And AC is that for me. I know the lore and history of this series like the back of my hand, and that has made me look forward to digesting every entry, mainline or side.
That being said, I’ve staved away from writing reviews on them for a number of reasons. First, I tend to only scribe extravagant write-ups for indie/lesser-known releases, and AC being the flagship AAA moneymaker for Ubisoft has ensured that it receives sufficient coverage from mainstream and independent critics alike. And secondly is the fact that part of the reason I write reviews is to create a reference point for me to refresh myself of a title’s individual components should I inevitably forget about them over the years; yet, because of my intimate knowledge of AC, I can near-perfectly recall the gameplay and narrative aspects of every entry regardless of the time gap from when I last played them.
So why write a critique of one now? Well, for one, no matter your familiarity with a subject, it’s always a good habit to collect your thoughts to better articulate yourself. Two, I intend on writing on every entry eventually as my thoughts will carry some unique POV in the conversation, no matter how narrow (it’s why I always encourage every gamer I speak with to write on things- they could bring something to the table that no one would’ve considered before) and this is as good a place to start as any. And three, the Chronicles games flew pretty under-the-radar by AC-spotlight standards, so there’s more to be stated here.
On that front, let’s talk about what exactly the Chronicles games are. They were a standalone trilogy released for consoles, PC, and eventually Vita (strange that it was the last platform to get them given that they seem built for it), focusing on three different eras in the Assassin Brotherhood’s history. Unlike the main series, these weren’t open world games, instead 2.5D platformers with levels that prioritized stealth.
China is the first one, centering around a, you guessed it, Chinese Assassin named Shao Jun. If you’re a long-time fan of this series, chances are you’ll recognize her as the acolyte Ezio trained in the animated movie Embers that simultaneously served as a conclusion to his story and introduction to her’s. While it isn’t necessary to watch Embers before playing ACCC given that all her biographical/background information there is conveyed through dialogue and collectible scrolls here, I’d be lying if I said it doesn’t help you appreciate the character more.
That being said, the story is unfortunately disappointing. It’s clear that developer Climax Studios was more interested in prioritizing gameplay over story, but it’s particularly saddening here given the unique time period. ACCC is set during the height of the Ming Dynasty, and is surprisingly accurate in terms of the figures and actions it chooses to highlight, from the making of the current Jiajing Emperor’s regime to the conflicts with the Mongols. There’s a ton of interesting backstory here, yet it’s all cast to the side in favor of a generic “good vs. evil” trope that’s been seen a dime a dozen (on a side note, it just came to my attention that I have ironically used that expression a dime a dozen times!). There was an opportunity here to do what many AC games before and after have done, which is interweave historical events with the personal tale of the protagonist; however a lot of the more interesting machinations are not only used purely for backstory purposes, but also not expanded upon beyond a black-and-white veil. Prior to the events of the game, for example, the Templars (represented by the Eight Tigers group) successfully took control of the Emperor’s throne and purged the Brotherhood from China, representative of the real-life event wherein the Eight Tigers slowly slipped into an influential position over Zhu Houcong’s Administration.
And yet, all that is a pretense for your atypical “there has been a corrupt takeover of a peaceful government.” By all accounts, the working-class citizenry were not that much better off beforehand, so why is the Templar control objectively bad? What are the goals of the Eight Tigers? How are they treating their subjects? Did them being castrated influence their choices at all? There was one decision at the end that particularly baffled me(+), but the fact is if you go in expecting any nuance, then be prepared for disappointment because the answer to everything is muwahahahaha evil/insertarchetypalvillainy. These guys are depicted as iron-fisted and sadistic, engaging in acts of corruption while committing horrible crimes against their constituents in the name of eliminating opposition and cementing their power (exs. tormenting slaves/concubines; razing the the port city of Macau [despite their being no record supporting this action]).
Look, obviously the Ming Dynasty was a cruel period in human history (the prevalence of foot binding, conduction of family exterminations, mass kidnapping/rape of young girls to be concubines, the popularization of the “death by a thousand cuts”, and more), and I wouldn’t want AC to sanitize any of it by any means. But things are always more complicated than they appear, and those kinds of gradations are what separate a good work from a great one. Every single Templar here is cartoonish in scope, and while that might have been more tolerable if ACCC had been released immediately after Revelations, the fact is it came out post-ACIII, which went back to the greyish morality of ACI. Even if you go into this game not familiar with many of the other entries, I guarantee you that you’ll find ACCC lacking in narrative depth.
But okay look, even if it falters in properly representing the era, surely the personal account makes up for it right? Jun is after the Tigers for what they did to her former comrades, and we all know from playing Origins that a glorified revenge tale can be a powerful experience regardless of lack of macro aspirations. Yeah, except that THAT isn’t well-done either. See, despite the writers committing to portraying the Eight Tigers as this degenerate group, they made the boneheaded decision to craft a “revenge is wrong” arc for Shao Jun.
Ohhhh man. I ranted about this trope enough in my TLOU II review (https://www.backloggd.com/u/RedBackLoggd/review/348721/), but needless to say, I hate it. It simplifies an emotionally-evocative subject under the pretense of a “holier than thou” attitude that comes off as pretentious. Here it makes even less sense given that Jun had to eliminate the Templars anyway as part of her duties as an Assassin, and every action she takes isn’t impulsive- it’s agreed upon beforehand with her Master. And while killing each Tiger does generally result in a negative consequence, the game doesn’t focus on THAT as a problem, but the OVERALL act of going after them. It’s hypocritical, underdeveloped, and generally makes no sense when you put even a little thought into it (AC Syndicate, released later that year, would do a much better job of demonstrating this).
It’s a shame given that ACCC bears a striking resemblance to ACI in terms of its structure- you have real-life targets without much real-world information who are dispensed exactly when they died/disappeared in real life. And yet the “confession” scenes don’t take advantage of this to give you anything more than just “you may have stopped me now, but the war rages on!”. There’s also something to be said about the missed opportunity to incorporate/contrast popular religiophilosophies that were roaming the Ming Dynasty at the time (Neo-Confucianism, Buddhism, Legalism) against the Assassin and Templar beliefs.
If I can say one semi-positive thing about the writing, it’s that the database entries are terrific. Like the ones in the Ezio Trilogy (really all ACs), they manage to condense major trivia/info about the society into bite-size paragraphs that taught me a lot. This level of compact data conveyance extends to Shao Jun herself, whose ENTIRE upbringing is disclosed through collectible scrolls). While I would’ve preferred a more cinematic rendering over hard-read, I can’t deny that it’s well-done, though keep in mind that I did notice some minor typos in them.
Graphically, ACCC is stunning. Despite being made for the bigger consoles, it’s clear Climax Studios was given a budget to work with, and yet they did wonders. For all my complaints about how Ming society was depicted narratively, artistically it is a masterclass to behold. From popular locations like the Forbidden City and Great Wall to general-environs like the industrialized Nan'an, 16th Century China looks exactly like I imagine it looked at the time (granted, it seems to be eternally Fall, but that’s a small quibble). There’s a water-coloury feel to the landscapes that stylizes them whilst simultaneously managing to keep the aesthetic soft on the eyes. It’s not that you don’t get any bright or primary hues, but more that they’re utilized in a way that is more reminiscent of a pictorial vista- a natural part of the terrain (minus the splashes of red meant to indicate the presence of a parkourable avenue). Plus water surfaces depict reflections of Jun!
The most impressive part has to be the subtle blend of shades and colors on objects like columns and textiles and surfaces: it reminded me a lot of Half Past Fate (https://www.backloggd.com/u/RedBackLoggd/review/279145/) in the sense that this aesthetic blend accurately reflects the way color works in real-life. None of this is even taking into account the actual backdrops, which tend to include a gorgeously-rendered panorama of an environmental feature like mountains or trees, with clouds and billows of mist slowly swirling about.
One of my personal favorites is the way cutscenes are exhibited- taking inspiration from Ancient Chinese tapestries and paintings (as well as contemporary motion comics), you have schemas that look like smeary ink drawings, their subjects darkened figures of mystery against a lightened, subtly-cross-stitched papyrus. Combined with the kinetic flair, this gives them a dynamic feel that provides yet another great example of how a limited budget can be utilized to match the videographic feel of full motion techniques seen in higher-end productions.
Not everything is rainbows though. Shao Jun moves, attacks, and responds well, but animations can’t help but come off as a bit janky. Character models in general have that stick-figurey quality reminiscent of AA titles ported to handheld consoles- stiff limbs and singular animations for every action. It’s not distracting, but it bears recognition for the sake of crafting a whole picture. I also experienced a couple instances of the framerate dropping. If I can end on a positive note, though, it’s that there is a great amount of heterogeneity in the stealth kill animations- while Shao Jun putting her Hidden Blade in her shoe prevents it from being used much in them, the others more than make-up for it, being semi-dependent on your movement/approach, with blood streams reminiscent of 300’s in terms of them resembling paint streaks/splashes that disperse as quickly as they materialize.
Soundwise, I can’t be as positive as I was with the graphics. First off, the audio mixing was poorly done as everything is too quiet- I had to turn the volume up all the way just to make things hearable. Secondly, none of the three subfacets are particularly distinct, starting with the voice acting. It should be noted that the major characters are given British accents, which is actually consistent with the Abstergo Animus filtering out non-western intonations for protagonists, but may be off-putting to those not familiar with the series’ tradition, especially since Chinese actors were utilized for the NPCs (who speak in diatribes repeated ad nauseam, indicating laziness on the part of the writers).
But regardless of their choice of timbre, the actors are too limited by the writing to do a good job. As I said, the Tigers are caricatures, and not only are they caricatures, but their villainy is rendered in Shakespearean-esque conversations that feel more out-of-place in the Eastern settings than the accents. I also was just not a fan of Annabelle Galea’s performance as Jun- I get that the script didn’t do her any favors, but she still opted to give Jun this “I’m superior to you and I know it” flair that didn’t fit someone who had a tragic past and spent years training elsewhere under Ezio.
Oh, and on that note, wtf were the casting directors’ thinking? In ACCC, Ezio is not voiced by Roger Craig Smith, instead given to an unnamed artist who sounds like he’s doing an Italian impression of Mr. Miyagi. Yeah, despite Ezio’s limited appearances, it’s as disconcerting as it sounds. And no, this was not a case of Smith being unavailable, as he claimed he was never asked- luckily, though, he collaborated with the YouTuber Loomer to re-record all the dialogue (free-of-charge!), and I’m hoping someone somewhere will eventually patch it into the game. Until then, you can listen to it here if you wish: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAoEWB547KU
The sound effects are generally too muted for me to make a proper assessment. Tools and environmental dins like firecrackers, barking dogs, sword clangs, and wind chimes are loud enough to give off a bang, but footsteps and grips are subdued. Things are satisfactory when you can hear it, but it’s inconsistent what was programmed with an aural tick.
The score isn’t as great as it could have been. When the big action moments occur, it stands out, but for the more atmospheric times where you’re just walking or stealthing around (which, being honest, is 90% of the game), it fails to make itself known. Granted, stealth music has never been a strong suit of the series, but again, Chronicles has it worse given that it’s entirely focused on the concept.
And that’s a great transition point to the gameplay. As I mentioned before, ACCC drops the open world format in favor of a 2.5D platformer. Your goal is to make your way through specially-crafted levels that have one of two endgoals in mind: assassinate a target or run from a propulsive threat, these latter ones appearing after a main assassination.
The 2.5D scheme is honestly utilized very well. In most places, Shao Jun will have multiple methods of approach, with the ability to climb above, descend below, hang off rafters, or shimmy along sides all giving the illusion of 3D platforming perfectly. Not everything has this level of open-mindedness: there were a number of times where the game blatantly set forward a specific path for you to take (such as using the shadow rush ability to move between hiding places, as marked by an appropriately-placed helix crystal), and choosing to diverge from it would mean wasting a large number of tools or outright heavily-risking detection. But for the most part, it’s the exception, not the norm.
I was admittedly surprised by how well the parkour translated to the 2D interface. Shao Jun moves very fluidly, grabbing onto objects both automatically and manually as necessitated (though sometimes the manual would falter if going from a side to back environ, but then again, it wouldn’t be AC if you didn’t have sporadic moments of the parkour failing you). That being said, ACCC was too reminiscent of Unity (its direct predecessor) in the sense that jumps come off as too floaty- it made me surprised to learn that this game was made in Unreal 3.0 as opposed to the AnvilNext 2.0 as, like Arno, Shao Jun leaps/ascends at ridiculous distances.
This is, by and large, the most stealth-focused AC game ever made. Not only do you have a small health bar that can be knocked apart in a few hits, but you have all the conventions of an old-school stealth title: limited gear for distracting over dispatching; a crouch button; noise as a factor; and assassinations/subterfuge being tangibly rewarded more than combat. That is to say, completing a section with a higher degree of covertness will net you more points (Bronze, Silver, Gold rating) than going in guns-ablazing, which in turn unlock greater rewards like new combat maneuvers and increased ammo capacity.
That’s not to say that combat isn’t feasible, it’s just discouraged. What I mean by this is you have decent variety in terms of being able to weak hit, strong hit, block, kick, and flip-over enemies, as well as even deflect projectiles; and there’s also a SURPRISINGLY constant supply of new enemy types that have their own strengths/weaknesses to your combat prowesses. However, because of your small hit-box, it really isn’t worth engaging them mano-y-mano. Memorizing movement patterns, avoiding vision cones, moving from hiding place-to-hiding place, and strategically utilizing your gadgets will make things far easier for you. This has its cons though: one, obviously it is distinct from past-AC games where, if we’re being truthful, stealth was more of an intrinsically-motivated avenue that encouraged allowed players to be quicker/more impulsive in their approach given the lack of consequences for failing; trying to do that here will almost certainly get you detected/killed (score one for local respawn points though!). Two, sometimes there were inconsistencies in terms of enemy awareness, particularly when you do this one overpowered move that allows you to run-slide-kill an enemy or try to assassinate multiple guards after stunning them with firecrackers. And three, there is NO diversity for stealth goons the way there was with combat. Outside of one guy down the line who has a stronger field of perception, every single opponent class is the exact same.
And I hate to say it, but this latter point is the main reason that I ended up not enjoying ACCC. It may seem minor, but you guys have to understand that, without a strong story, the gameplay had to make-up for the lack of impetus. And when you’re cruising through level-after-level having to do the EXACT SAME TASK each and every time, it makes things grindy, no matter how beautifully-constructed the settings are. It’s kind of appropriate that I drew a comparison to ACI earlier as this was the first Assassin’s Creed since that one that I felt like I had to force myself to see through to the end, primarily because of this facet.
The Temple Run-esque levels try to add some spice, and I’d be lying if I said they weren’t fun (side note- was anyone else reminded of the Hot Air Balloon Mission from Unity?), but at the end of the day, they are purely linear, and the near-rails gameplay occasionally leads to frustrations when you don’t hit the mandatory jump prompt in time, forcing you to reset from your last checkpoint and killing the immersion these locomotive-type levels are meant to induce. They also all over-rely on the same “escape the blaze” trope.
Again, I want to stress that a lot of thought was put into the craftsmanship behind the areas you navigate through, and I loved how useful and resourceful you had to be with tools (particularly firecrackers and noise darts). It’s just that the objectives, even with the presence of full-sync optional ones and collectibles, are too repetitious for a 6 hour+ game. Combined with the story flaws and I can’t say I enjoyed it as an AC fan.
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SPOILERS
+The Head Eunuch decides to let the Mongols invade China. What? Why would you do that knowing that they would dismantle your entire empire? He claims that they will be crueler to the Chinese people if they show resistance, which isn’t wrong, but regardless their success culminates in the same result of you losing power and being subjugated. And no, in case anyone is wondering, the Mongols were not Templars in Assassin’s Creed lore, so there is no authentic collaboration between members of the same faction.
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You couldn’t tell from the lack of recorded activity on my Backloggd account, but Assassin’s Creed is arguably my favorite video game franchise of all time. It took that title from the Donkey Kong Country series, which was no small feat given the latter’s presence in my childhood, but took it, it did. Every kid with too much time on their hands has that one piece of media that they’ve become heavily immersed in the mythology of, from Lord of the Rings to Mass Effect to Star Wars to Game of Thrones, etc.... And AC is that for me. I know the lore and history of this series like the back of my hand, and that has made me look forward to digesting every entry, mainline or side.
That being said, I’ve staved away from writing reviews on them for a number of reasons. First, I tend to only scribe extravagant write-ups for indie/lesser-known releases, and AC being the flagship AAA moneymaker for Ubisoft has ensured that it receives sufficient coverage from mainstream and independent critics alike. And secondly is the fact that part of the reason I write reviews is to create a reference point for me to refresh myself of a title’s individual components should I inevitably forget about them over the years; yet, because of my intimate knowledge of AC, I can near-perfectly recall the gameplay and narrative aspects of every entry regardless of the time gap from when I last played them.
So why write a critique of one now? Well, for one, no matter your familiarity with a subject, it’s always a good habit to collect your thoughts to better articulate yourself. Two, I intend on writing on every entry eventually as my thoughts will carry some unique POV in the conversation, no matter how narrow (it’s why I always encourage every gamer I speak with to write on things- they could bring something to the table that no one would’ve considered before) and this is as good a place to start as any. And three, the Chronicles games flew pretty under-the-radar by AC-spotlight standards, so there’s more to be stated here.
On that front, let’s talk about what exactly the Chronicles games are. They were a standalone trilogy released for consoles, PC, and eventually Vita (strange that it was the last platform to get them given that they seem built for it), focusing on three different eras in the Assassin Brotherhood’s history. Unlike the main series, these weren’t open world games, instead 2.5D platformers with levels that prioritized stealth.
China is the first one, centering around a, you guessed it, Chinese Assassin named Shao Jun. If you’re a long-time fan of this series, chances are you’ll recognize her as the acolyte Ezio trained in the animated movie Embers that simultaneously served as a conclusion to his story and introduction to her’s. While it isn’t necessary to watch Embers before playing ACCC given that all her biographical/background information there is conveyed through dialogue and collectible scrolls here, I’d be lying if I said it doesn’t help you appreciate the character more.
That being said, the story is unfortunately disappointing. It’s clear that developer Climax Studios was more interested in prioritizing gameplay over story, but it’s particularly saddening here given the unique time period. ACCC is set during the height of the Ming Dynasty, and is surprisingly accurate in terms of the figures and actions it chooses to highlight, from the making of the current Jiajing Emperor’s regime to the conflicts with the Mongols. There’s a ton of interesting backstory here, yet it’s all cast to the side in favor of a generic “good vs. evil” trope that’s been seen a dime a dozen (on a side note, it just came to my attention that I have ironically used that expression a dime a dozen times!). There was an opportunity here to do what many AC games before and after have done, which is interweave historical events with the personal tale of the protagonist; however a lot of the more interesting machinations are not only used purely for backstory purposes, but also not expanded upon beyond a black-and-white veil. Prior to the events of the game, for example, the Templars (represented by the Eight Tigers group) successfully took control of the Emperor’s throne and purged the Brotherhood from China, representative of the real-life event wherein the Eight Tigers slowly slipped into an influential position over Zhu Houcong’s Administration.
And yet, all that is a pretense for your atypical “there has been a corrupt takeover of a peaceful government.” By all accounts, the working-class citizenry were not that much better off beforehand, so why is the Templar control objectively bad? What are the goals of the Eight Tigers? How are they treating their subjects? Did them being castrated influence their choices at all? There was one decision at the end that particularly baffled me(+), but the fact is if you go in expecting any nuance, then be prepared for disappointment because the answer to everything is muwahahahaha evil/insertarchetypalvillainy. These guys are depicted as iron-fisted and sadistic, engaging in acts of corruption while committing horrible crimes against their constituents in the name of eliminating opposition and cementing their power (exs. tormenting slaves/concubines; razing the the port city of Macau [despite their being no record supporting this action]).
Look, obviously the Ming Dynasty was a cruel period in human history (the prevalence of foot binding, conduction of family exterminations, mass kidnapping/rape of young girls to be concubines, the popularization of the “death by a thousand cuts”, and more), and I wouldn’t want AC to sanitize any of it by any means. But things are always more complicated than they appear, and those kinds of gradations are what separate a good work from a great one. Every single Templar here is cartoonish in scope, and while that might have been more tolerable if ACCC had been released immediately after Revelations, the fact is it came out post-ACIII, which went back to the greyish morality of ACI. Even if you go into this game not familiar with many of the other entries, I guarantee you that you’ll find ACCC lacking in narrative depth.
But okay look, even if it falters in properly representing the era, surely the personal account makes up for it right? Jun is after the Tigers for what they did to her former comrades, and we all know from playing Origins that a glorified revenge tale can be a powerful experience regardless of lack of macro aspirations. Yeah, except that THAT isn’t well-done either. See, despite the writers committing to portraying the Eight Tigers as this degenerate group, they made the boneheaded decision to craft a “revenge is wrong” arc for Shao Jun.
Ohhhh man. I ranted about this trope enough in my TLOU II review (https://www.backloggd.com/u/RedBackLoggd/review/348721/), but needless to say, I hate it. It simplifies an emotionally-evocative subject under the pretense of a “holier than thou” attitude that comes off as pretentious. Here it makes even less sense given that Jun had to eliminate the Templars anyway as part of her duties as an Assassin, and every action she takes isn’t impulsive- it’s agreed upon beforehand with her Master. And while killing each Tiger does generally result in a negative consequence, the game doesn’t focus on THAT as a problem, but the OVERALL act of going after them. It’s hypocritical, underdeveloped, and generally makes no sense when you put even a little thought into it (AC Syndicate, released later that year, would do a much better job of demonstrating this).
It’s a shame given that ACCC bears a striking resemblance to ACI in terms of its structure- you have real-life targets without much real-world information who are dispensed exactly when they died/disappeared in real life. And yet the “confession” scenes don’t take advantage of this to give you anything more than just “you may have stopped me now, but the war rages on!”. There’s also something to be said about the missed opportunity to incorporate/contrast popular religiophilosophies that were roaming the Ming Dynasty at the time (Neo-Confucianism, Buddhism, Legalism) against the Assassin and Templar beliefs.
If I can say one semi-positive thing about the writing, it’s that the database entries are terrific. Like the ones in the Ezio Trilogy (really all ACs), they manage to condense major trivia/info about the society into bite-size paragraphs that taught me a lot. This level of compact data conveyance extends to Shao Jun herself, whose ENTIRE upbringing is disclosed through collectible scrolls). While I would’ve preferred a more cinematic rendering over hard-read, I can’t deny that it’s well-done, though keep in mind that I did notice some minor typos in them.
Graphically, ACCC is stunning. Despite being made for the bigger consoles, it’s clear Climax Studios was given a budget to work with, and yet they did wonders. For all my complaints about how Ming society was depicted narratively, artistically it is a masterclass to behold. From popular locations like the Forbidden City and Great Wall to general-environs like the industrialized Nan'an, 16th Century China looks exactly like I imagine it looked at the time (granted, it seems to be eternally Fall, but that’s a small quibble). There’s a water-coloury feel to the landscapes that stylizes them whilst simultaneously managing to keep the aesthetic soft on the eyes. It’s not that you don’t get any bright or primary hues, but more that they’re utilized in a way that is more reminiscent of a pictorial vista- a natural part of the terrain (minus the splashes of red meant to indicate the presence of a parkourable avenue). Plus water surfaces depict reflections of Jun!
The most impressive part has to be the subtle blend of shades and colors on objects like columns and textiles and surfaces: it reminded me a lot of Half Past Fate (https://www.backloggd.com/u/RedBackLoggd/review/279145/) in the sense that this aesthetic blend accurately reflects the way color works in real-life. None of this is even taking into account the actual backdrops, which tend to include a gorgeously-rendered panorama of an environmental feature like mountains or trees, with clouds and billows of mist slowly swirling about.
One of my personal favorites is the way cutscenes are exhibited- taking inspiration from Ancient Chinese tapestries and paintings (as well as contemporary motion comics), you have schemas that look like smeary ink drawings, their subjects darkened figures of mystery against a lightened, subtly-cross-stitched papyrus. Combined with the kinetic flair, this gives them a dynamic feel that provides yet another great example of how a limited budget can be utilized to match the videographic feel of full motion techniques seen in higher-end productions.
Not everything is rainbows though. Shao Jun moves, attacks, and responds well, but animations can’t help but come off as a bit janky. Character models in general have that stick-figurey quality reminiscent of AA titles ported to handheld consoles- stiff limbs and singular animations for every action. It’s not distracting, but it bears recognition for the sake of crafting a whole picture. I also experienced a couple instances of the framerate dropping. If I can end on a positive note, though, it’s that there is a great amount of heterogeneity in the stealth kill animations- while Shao Jun putting her Hidden Blade in her shoe prevents it from being used much in them, the others more than make-up for it, being semi-dependent on your movement/approach, with blood streams reminiscent of 300’s in terms of them resembling paint streaks/splashes that disperse as quickly as they materialize.
Soundwise, I can’t be as positive as I was with the graphics. First off, the audio mixing was poorly done as everything is too quiet- I had to turn the volume up all the way just to make things hearable. Secondly, none of the three subfacets are particularly distinct, starting with the voice acting. It should be noted that the major characters are given British accents, which is actually consistent with the Abstergo Animus filtering out non-western intonations for protagonists, but may be off-putting to those not familiar with the series’ tradition, especially since Chinese actors were utilized for the NPCs (who speak in diatribes repeated ad nauseam, indicating laziness on the part of the writers).
But regardless of their choice of timbre, the actors are too limited by the writing to do a good job. As I said, the Tigers are caricatures, and not only are they caricatures, but their villainy is rendered in Shakespearean-esque conversations that feel more out-of-place in the Eastern settings than the accents. I also was just not a fan of Annabelle Galea’s performance as Jun- I get that the script didn’t do her any favors, but she still opted to give Jun this “I’m superior to you and I know it” flair that didn’t fit someone who had a tragic past and spent years training elsewhere under Ezio.
Oh, and on that note, wtf were the casting directors’ thinking? In ACCC, Ezio is not voiced by Roger Craig Smith, instead given to an unnamed artist who sounds like he’s doing an Italian impression of Mr. Miyagi. Yeah, despite Ezio’s limited appearances, it’s as disconcerting as it sounds. And no, this was not a case of Smith being unavailable, as he claimed he was never asked- luckily, though, he collaborated with the YouTuber Loomer to re-record all the dialogue (free-of-charge!), and I’m hoping someone somewhere will eventually patch it into the game. Until then, you can listen to it here if you wish: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAoEWB547KU
The sound effects are generally too muted for me to make a proper assessment. Tools and environmental dins like firecrackers, barking dogs, sword clangs, and wind chimes are loud enough to give off a bang, but footsteps and grips are subdued. Things are satisfactory when you can hear it, but it’s inconsistent what was programmed with an aural tick.
The score isn’t as great as it could have been. When the big action moments occur, it stands out, but for the more atmospheric times where you’re just walking or stealthing around (which, being honest, is 90% of the game), it fails to make itself known. Granted, stealth music has never been a strong suit of the series, but again, Chronicles has it worse given that it’s entirely focused on the concept.
And that’s a great transition point to the gameplay. As I mentioned before, ACCC drops the open world format in favor of a 2.5D platformer. Your goal is to make your way through specially-crafted levels that have one of two endgoals in mind: assassinate a target or run from a propulsive threat, these latter ones appearing after a main assassination.
The 2.5D scheme is honestly utilized very well. In most places, Shao Jun will have multiple methods of approach, with the ability to climb above, descend below, hang off rafters, or shimmy along sides all giving the illusion of 3D platforming perfectly. Not everything has this level of open-mindedness: there were a number of times where the game blatantly set forward a specific path for you to take (such as using the shadow rush ability to move between hiding places, as marked by an appropriately-placed helix crystal), and choosing to diverge from it would mean wasting a large number of tools or outright heavily-risking detection. But for the most part, it’s the exception, not the norm.
I was admittedly surprised by how well the parkour translated to the 2D interface. Shao Jun moves very fluidly, grabbing onto objects both automatically and manually as necessitated (though sometimes the manual would falter if going from a side to back environ, but then again, it wouldn’t be AC if you didn’t have sporadic moments of the parkour failing you). That being said, ACCC was too reminiscent of Unity (its direct predecessor) in the sense that jumps come off as too floaty- it made me surprised to learn that this game was made in Unreal 3.0 as opposed to the AnvilNext 2.0 as, like Arno, Shao Jun leaps/ascends at ridiculous distances.
This is, by and large, the most stealth-focused AC game ever made. Not only do you have a small health bar that can be knocked apart in a few hits, but you have all the conventions of an old-school stealth title: limited gear for distracting over dispatching; a crouch button; noise as a factor; and assassinations/subterfuge being tangibly rewarded more than combat. That is to say, completing a section with a higher degree of covertness will net you more points (Bronze, Silver, Gold rating) than going in guns-ablazing, which in turn unlock greater rewards like new combat maneuvers and increased ammo capacity.
That’s not to say that combat isn’t feasible, it’s just discouraged. What I mean by this is you have decent variety in terms of being able to weak hit, strong hit, block, kick, and flip-over enemies, as well as even deflect projectiles; and there’s also a SURPRISINGLY constant supply of new enemy types that have their own strengths/weaknesses to your combat prowesses. However, because of your small hit-box, it really isn’t worth engaging them mano-y-mano. Memorizing movement patterns, avoiding vision cones, moving from hiding place-to-hiding place, and strategically utilizing your gadgets will make things far easier for you. This has its cons though: one, obviously it is distinct from past-AC games where, if we’re being truthful, stealth was more of an intrinsically-motivated avenue that encouraged allowed players to be quicker/more impulsive in their approach given the lack of consequences for failing; trying to do that here will almost certainly get you detected/killed (score one for local respawn points though!). Two, sometimes there were inconsistencies in terms of enemy awareness, particularly when you do this one overpowered move that allows you to run-slide-kill an enemy or try to assassinate multiple guards after stunning them with firecrackers. And three, there is NO diversity for stealth goons the way there was with combat. Outside of one guy down the line who has a stronger field of perception, every single opponent class is the exact same.
And I hate to say it, but this latter point is the main reason that I ended up not enjoying ACCC. It may seem minor, but you guys have to understand that, without a strong story, the gameplay had to make-up for the lack of impetus. And when you’re cruising through level-after-level having to do the EXACT SAME TASK each and every time, it makes things grindy, no matter how beautifully-constructed the settings are. It’s kind of appropriate that I drew a comparison to ACI earlier as this was the first Assassin’s Creed since that one that I felt like I had to force myself to see through to the end, primarily because of this facet.
The Temple Run-esque levels try to add some spice, and I’d be lying if I said they weren’t fun (side note- was anyone else reminded of the Hot Air Balloon Mission from Unity?), but at the end of the day, they are purely linear, and the near-rails gameplay occasionally leads to frustrations when you don’t hit the mandatory jump prompt in time, forcing you to reset from your last checkpoint and killing the immersion these locomotive-type levels are meant to induce. They also all over-rely on the same “escape the blaze” trope.
Again, I want to stress that a lot of thought was put into the craftsmanship behind the areas you navigate through, and I loved how useful and resourceful you had to be with tools (particularly firecrackers and noise darts). It’s just that the objectives, even with the presence of full-sync optional ones and collectibles, are too repetitious for a 6 hour+ game. Combined with the story flaws and I can’t say I enjoyed it as an AC fan.
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SPOILERS
+The Head Eunuch decides to let the Mongols invade China. What? Why would you do that knowing that they would dismantle your entire empire? He claims that they will be crueler to the Chinese people if they show resistance, which isn’t wrong, but regardless their success culminates in the same result of you losing power and being subjugated. And no, in case anyone is wondering, the Mongols were not Templars in Assassin’s Creed lore, so there is no authentic collaboration between members of the same faction.
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2016
Is it possible to create a terrifying piece of horror media without the threat of death? When you think about it, there hasn’t been a single successful feature film, television show, or video game that has not predicated its tense atmosphere on the fear of something deadly befalling its protagonist(s), at least none that I can think of (and yes, I consider corporeal possession a form of death since you’re being forcibly deprived of what makes you human). Sure, you may have a disturbing scene involving someone losing (or at threat of losing) their limbs, but that’s not enough to sustain agitation on the part of viewers for the long haul (it’s why the first Saw had to frequently alter to B plots involving the police and prior victims).
But look, given the longevity of the movie industry, I’m sure I’m wrong to apply this assertion to such a long body of work. Video games though? Can you actually place gamers in a world that leaves them on edge despite the lack of fatal danger to their avatar? I personally don’t think so, and unfortunately, Layers of Fear failed to move my position on this despite that being developer Bloober Team’s intent. Focusing on a mad artist trying to paint his magnum opus, it features all the tropes necessary for a scary time: a forsaken dwelling, hallucinations, and malignant milieu, but fails to turn any of them into something consistently or mostly nerve-wracking.
All that said, it should be made clear that I didn’t need to be left screaming- the vast majority of horror stories are simultaneously mysteries since they involve uncovering some unknown secret or identity, and a thrilling yarn can yield its own rewards (I felt this way about Gothika and Secret Window). But no, Layers doesn’t achieve that either. As your unnamed protagonist makes his way through the house, choppy blasts from the past are thrown at you piecemeal, divulging dark secrets that tormented his life as an artisan, lover, and parent. And what you come to realize relatively quickly through each of these is just how of an a$$hole this guy was. I don’t think I’m exaggerating when I say that Layers of Fear has the most unlikable main character I have ever played as (excluding choice-based RPGs), and I genuinely don’t know what the writers were thinking. On all three bearings, let me repeat, on ALL THREE BEARINGS outlined above, there isn’t a single redeeming factor about this man (whom we shall call JD for the sake of me not having to type anymore dumb placeholder monikers).
First, is the painter front- Layers takes on the “tortured artist” archetype that has been popularized to no end since the fall of Van Gogh, and chooses to double down on its stupidity without any kind of alteration or subversion. I’ve never been a fan of this motif due to mental illness not being something anyone should idealize or associate with expressiveness- we’ve all seen works where an unstable individual is shown crafting extravagantly demented oeuvres (Sander Cohen in BioShock) or exhausting themselves to the point of producing a grand psychedelic masterpiece (Black Swan), and the subtle implication has evidently been that a mental toll yields brilliance and ambition.
Layers, to its credit, doesn’t romanticize the concept since there are nothing but negative consequences to the insanity, but it still opts to utilize it purely as an excuse to indulge in psychoactive deliria. I’ve always advocated for creators having complete freedom with regards to taking any topic and exploring it to fruition, but this here is so lazy that I can’t even call it exploitative- there is no commentary on mental illness, on the stresses that capitalistic output necessitates from laborers, nothing; just exercises in phantasmagoria that have been done much better in other works (including The Simpsons of all media). The worst part is how the writers don’t even bother explaining what caused JD to succumb to hysteria beyond allusions to atypical karoshiism. That’s right- all you have is a man going crazy (or having already gone crazy depending on how you choose to interpret the story) because he got too caught up in perfecting his art. Just lame.
Second and third are the lover and parent, which I’ll talk about together since they go hand-in-hand. I should be upfront that Layers of Fear requires multiple runs in order to glean all the secrets that the developers put into the game- like literally, new info and (I believe) new dialogues are available to find during the “new game pluses.” So it’s very much possible that more supplementary material for these phases of JD’s life were provided in-game and I just didn’t experience it.
My counters here would be two-fold: one, designing a non-roguelike title to be completed more than once is beyond pretentious, thinking your product will be so great that gamers will feel compelled to go through it again and again for the sake of finding secrets that you could have just as easily released the first time; and on that note, two, I don’t think you should have to beat something more than once to acquire pertinent narrative information. Yes, I know back in the day (and even occasionally today) there were a lot of smaller indie titles that called for at least a second playthrough to uncover the “true” ending, but this was usually blatantly done to artificially elongate the game’s time, and the extra finale rarely made much of a difference. Layers of Fear, however, is a 2016 title, published in an era where such design schemes are outdated, and any extra details here could have gone a long way towards fleshing out JD’s character, thereby significantly impacting how you came away from the story.
Regardless, the plot just wasn't fun enough the first time to compel me to do it, and so I have to go by purely what I derived from that initial experience, which, to reiterate, showcased JD as a surly character who only gets worse with each data clump you mine. He’s horrible to his wife as she undergoes her own tragedies, he’s neglectful to his child; he cares only for his art, which has gotten increasingly demented as his mind cracks (alienating him from his friends who try to help him out with commissions). Even his lawyer is implied to be done with him courtesy of his temperament and illogical behavior. I wish I was exaggerating each of these, but I’m not- to dive into specifics would give away spoilers; however, just know that, again, none of it is given a cogent justification. I thought I had witnessed peak human unlikability when the protagonist of Oklahoma! sang a song urging the “antagonist” to commit suicide just so he could be with the heroine- JD makes that sociopath look nice by comparison.
Graphically, Layers utilizes the Unity engine, which, in my opinion, has always been an underappreciated rival to Unreal. Unfortunately, my praise for its usage this time around has to be restrained due to two constraints: one, it seems like Bloober took the default assets of the software without bothering to put enough of their own lacquer, and while that strategy generally works for Unreal given the deep photorealism of its core architecture, Unity’s ability to alter between lifelike verisimilitude and abstract schemas necessitates that developers commit more than normal. Layers’s problem is that, for all the macabre imagery thrown at you, it’s firmly grounded in a real-life setting: a destitute home from the early-20th century. And so, without that extra polish that grounded vistas and belongings inherently warrant, I personally couldn’t help but find a lot of the furniture and paraphernalia to have a tenuousness, almost cheapness, to their exteriors. Wood and plasterboard, in particular, were the worst, which you’ll be seeing a lot of given that they are the fundamental building materials of the manor (and, well, any house these days).
I want to stress that this is a purely subjective critique as there are a lot of reviewers, including one of my favorites GmanLives (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H3KyPmyTC-4), who loved the look of the residence, and outside of fruit and plastic simulacra, I can’t deny the strong texturizing all-around. But I don’t know, having seen these exact same surfaces in past walking sims Gone Home and Dear Esther (both of which pulled them off better courtesy of occupying soft 90s vibrancy and pictorial mysticism respectively), and not seeing any perceptible variations from Bloober Team, I ultimately found it to be uncanny- it wasn’t photogrammatic or stylized enough, just a strange in-between if that makes sense.
Another big issue is the inconsistency of the lighting- when the developers want an area to be baked or manipulated in up/down refulgence, it looks solid, with the first person camera even emitting a lens flare if you stare directly at a heat source. But sadly, most of the game has you traversing darkened corridors and quarters, which are too dim even by horror standards, and required me to adjust the brightness.
Lastly, I have to note that, for a title that is centered around an occupant of the art of…art, there is a severe lack of variety in terms of the potential visuals that Layers could’ve opted to use when tossing madness your way. You tend to get either short or long digressions, both with their own issues. The former is too brief to be remembered given that you quickly revert back to your regular state of mind, which is a shame as Layers of Fear truly had the potential to be more thrilling given its dilapidated ghosthouse setting. And yet, what you’ll find is a series of ordinary rooms that only mildly alternate when hit with the Painter’s visual aberrations: sleeping arenas, foyers, kitchens, it’s all relatively stock by any decent person’s standard of living. Sure, you get some nice paintings (couldn’t tell if they were famous in real life or handmade in-game by the arthouse folks) or mounted taxidermy adorning the wall that may or may not have their eyes bleeding out the second you do a double-take, but that’s too minor to be distressing.
The longer digressions, on the other hand, bank on converting your surroundings into paint-like substances, melting or conforming at the will of JD’s degenerating consciousness. The problem is the dissolving animations tend to look out of place when applied to most of the items they’re affecting, as though they were being done on an invisible canvas ON TOP OF the environment instead of directly on the environment itself. You also get instances, particularly back in your studio hub, where multiple blobs form up, which I guess were supposed to represent paint globs but reminded me more of that black globule trap from the first Incredibles over the splodges from say Epic Mickey- that is, they were aesthetically malapropos to their purpose.
The sound design falters significantly. First and foremost, the balancing is poorly done, with the SFX being significantly quieter than the music; I had to go into the options menu and turn down the latter just to hear the former, which was not a positive sign of things to come given that a good acoustic layout is key to any successful horror enterprise. And as it turns out, this was most likely a deliberate design choice given that such aurality is minimal even with the negative volume boost- footsteps are so inconsistent, blatantly giving away the fact that you’re playing as a camera and not a pseudo-solid figure. Thunder and lightning crash outside as you move by windows, but at a far enough distance it doesn’t even register as volatile beyond generic inclement weather. Anything else, from stereotypical creaks to the minute tense noises heard when being in a house by yourself, are either omitted or so hushed as to be silent.
There are a couple of favorable traits here that deserve to be highlighted. For one, while the physics engine makes object interaction harder than it should (more on that below), there was effort put into giving a motion-based range to interactable features in the foreground like swinging cabinet doors and winding keys. Also, the din associated with jump scares (like a crashing piano or screaming baby) serves its function (though I wonder if you can even fail at programming something as easy as a screamer).
The music is fine. Arkadiusz Reikowski is clearly going for a gothic tone with his use of pianos and strings, which means altering between scenes of idyllicism and deranged nightmare fuel at the drop of a hat. I didn’t think he quite succeeded with the secondary timbre as I rarely ever felt unnerved by a shift in composition, but your mileage will vary.
Voice acting is awful courtesy of lone star Erik Braa. He reminds me of someone I once acted alongside with for a video production- the guy was so nice, that he was literally incapable of pulling off any other emotion in his delivery, from anger to disappointment. Likewise, Braa seems like an individual who is so kind he just cannot do well as an pr!ck, which is kind of a problem given my aforementioned rant about JD’s personage. He’s not even provided an option to emit the archetypal breathing and gasping a horror character naturally does whenever something panic-inducing occurs to them.
Finally, we get to the gameplay, which is minimal since Layers of Fear is a walking simulator. You have the ability to run, zoom-in, examine certain items, and engage with predesignated belongings, all things you’ll have to complete as you make your way through the game’s six “levels”. I use quotation marks because, like Dear Esther, Layers of Fear fails to give you any kind of meaningful exploration, making these escapades more akin to one of those Mario Maker stages that were purely about initiating a chain reaction and watching the results unfold than actually participating. And though you are mostly given time beforehand to amble around the spaces, my aforestated point in the graphics section about the lack of artistic virtuosity renders them not worth looking at- you wouldn’t believe the amount of cupboards and drawers I opened only for there to be literally nothing in them: no Easter Eggs, no new secrets, nada. When it comes to storage spaces, Layers of Fear violates Chekhov's gun to the extreme.
In terms of the quality of the reactions, well, let’s just say that I was not surprised to learn that Bloober Team was the same company behind Observer (in fact, during a break in my playthrough, I took the time to go back and relook at my review of it- I wonder if that decision was borne out of a subconscious push!- https://www.backloggd.com/u/RedBackLoggd/review/279057/). I was not a fan of that game either, but one thing it somewhat succeeded in doing was placing the player in a menacing plane whenever Lazarski would jack into a dead person’s brain. I get the sense that the ghastly beats assailing JD in Layers were a bit of a prototype for what Bloober Team eventually did there, and the roughness of being a draft shows. As you can probably imagine, a lot of Layers’ horror takes place in them, and it'll immediately dawn on you just how repetitive the beats get as the triggers are tied to the same cues of either selecting a particular object or turning around to see a radical change in the space you were occupying ala Antichamber.
On top of this, because Layers lacks a tense atmosphere from conception, it tries to make-up for it by over-relying on shock tactics. This was already going to end badly as an exercise in cheapness, but it gets worse when you realize that even THIS component amounts to one of four instances: an object flying at you, something crashing nearby, paraphernalia suddenly melting, and the always hackneyed demonic entity screaming in your face via a sudden close-up. The second you fathom this is all you’re going to get, the terror becomes immensely predictable, and combined with my introductory assertion about a video game not being scary without the threat of death, you get a removal of the one piece of entertainment Layers had going for it.
Some reviewers have claimed that puzzles are present that change up the gameplay, but I personally don’t consider finding a combination lock and inputting it, or searching for and touching a glowing piece, intriguing enough to be considered puzzles, though they probably are by the barest of video game definitions.
Lastly, to elaborate on my issues with object interaction, Layers puts up resistance based on the direction you move your mouse in a seeming attempt to replicate how real-world push/pull physics work. I’ve admittedly never liked these kinds of systems (what exactly is wrong with a single button prompt?), but this "innovation" makes such actions even more annoying because you can’t alter your elevation (no crouch/jump), so theoretically everything should be treated as though you are at the perfect angle to move it, yet the game acts like any slight alteration from a straight horizontal swipe of the mouse is moving your hands vertically at odds with the directional swing of the door you’re pulling. And no, adjusting the sensitivity didn’t appear to affect this. Granted it’s not a huge issue overall, but it bears noting for a fair critique.
One small thing I do like was how you're able to use the WASD keys to turn an object you’re examining instead of just the mouse. But yeah, that’s about the only real notable “feat” I can claim for the gameplay.
In conclusion, it goes without saying that I did not have fun with Layers of Fear and therefore can’t recommend it. Despite having sections that don’t overstay their welcome, the central overarching narrative is mediocre with one of the worst protagonists in modern gaming history, and it isn’t even close to being scary, technically or artistically. To top all of this off, you get multiple endings based on choices so obscure, you wouldn’t know what they were unless you looked them up- not that it matters, since none of the finales makes for a satisfying conclusion. I do not recommend this game.
But look, given the longevity of the movie industry, I’m sure I’m wrong to apply this assertion to such a long body of work. Video games though? Can you actually place gamers in a world that leaves them on edge despite the lack of fatal danger to their avatar? I personally don’t think so, and unfortunately, Layers of Fear failed to move my position on this despite that being developer Bloober Team’s intent. Focusing on a mad artist trying to paint his magnum opus, it features all the tropes necessary for a scary time: a forsaken dwelling, hallucinations, and malignant milieu, but fails to turn any of them into something consistently or mostly nerve-wracking.
All that said, it should be made clear that I didn’t need to be left screaming- the vast majority of horror stories are simultaneously mysteries since they involve uncovering some unknown secret or identity, and a thrilling yarn can yield its own rewards (I felt this way about Gothika and Secret Window). But no, Layers doesn’t achieve that either. As your unnamed protagonist makes his way through the house, choppy blasts from the past are thrown at you piecemeal, divulging dark secrets that tormented his life as an artisan, lover, and parent. And what you come to realize relatively quickly through each of these is just how of an a$$hole this guy was. I don’t think I’m exaggerating when I say that Layers of Fear has the most unlikable main character I have ever played as (excluding choice-based RPGs), and I genuinely don’t know what the writers were thinking. On all three bearings, let me repeat, on ALL THREE BEARINGS outlined above, there isn’t a single redeeming factor about this man (whom we shall call JD for the sake of me not having to type anymore dumb placeholder monikers).
First, is the painter front- Layers takes on the “tortured artist” archetype that has been popularized to no end since the fall of Van Gogh, and chooses to double down on its stupidity without any kind of alteration or subversion. I’ve never been a fan of this motif due to mental illness not being something anyone should idealize or associate with expressiveness- we’ve all seen works where an unstable individual is shown crafting extravagantly demented oeuvres (Sander Cohen in BioShock) or exhausting themselves to the point of producing a grand psychedelic masterpiece (Black Swan), and the subtle implication has evidently been that a mental toll yields brilliance and ambition.
Layers, to its credit, doesn’t romanticize the concept since there are nothing but negative consequences to the insanity, but it still opts to utilize it purely as an excuse to indulge in psychoactive deliria. I’ve always advocated for creators having complete freedom with regards to taking any topic and exploring it to fruition, but this here is so lazy that I can’t even call it exploitative- there is no commentary on mental illness, on the stresses that capitalistic output necessitates from laborers, nothing; just exercises in phantasmagoria that have been done much better in other works (including The Simpsons of all media). The worst part is how the writers don’t even bother explaining what caused JD to succumb to hysteria beyond allusions to atypical karoshiism. That’s right- all you have is a man going crazy (or having already gone crazy depending on how you choose to interpret the story) because he got too caught up in perfecting his art. Just lame.
Second and third are the lover and parent, which I’ll talk about together since they go hand-in-hand. I should be upfront that Layers of Fear requires multiple runs in order to glean all the secrets that the developers put into the game- like literally, new info and (I believe) new dialogues are available to find during the “new game pluses.” So it’s very much possible that more supplementary material for these phases of JD’s life were provided in-game and I just didn’t experience it.
My counters here would be two-fold: one, designing a non-roguelike title to be completed more than once is beyond pretentious, thinking your product will be so great that gamers will feel compelled to go through it again and again for the sake of finding secrets that you could have just as easily released the first time; and on that note, two, I don’t think you should have to beat something more than once to acquire pertinent narrative information. Yes, I know back in the day (and even occasionally today) there were a lot of smaller indie titles that called for at least a second playthrough to uncover the “true” ending, but this was usually blatantly done to artificially elongate the game’s time, and the extra finale rarely made much of a difference. Layers of Fear, however, is a 2016 title, published in an era where such design schemes are outdated, and any extra details here could have gone a long way towards fleshing out JD’s character, thereby significantly impacting how you came away from the story.
Regardless, the plot just wasn't fun enough the first time to compel me to do it, and so I have to go by purely what I derived from that initial experience, which, to reiterate, showcased JD as a surly character who only gets worse with each data clump you mine. He’s horrible to his wife as she undergoes her own tragedies, he’s neglectful to his child; he cares only for his art, which has gotten increasingly demented as his mind cracks (alienating him from his friends who try to help him out with commissions). Even his lawyer is implied to be done with him courtesy of his temperament and illogical behavior. I wish I was exaggerating each of these, but I’m not- to dive into specifics would give away spoilers; however, just know that, again, none of it is given a cogent justification. I thought I had witnessed peak human unlikability when the protagonist of Oklahoma! sang a song urging the “antagonist” to commit suicide just so he could be with the heroine- JD makes that sociopath look nice by comparison.
Graphically, Layers utilizes the Unity engine, which, in my opinion, has always been an underappreciated rival to Unreal. Unfortunately, my praise for its usage this time around has to be restrained due to two constraints: one, it seems like Bloober took the default assets of the software without bothering to put enough of their own lacquer, and while that strategy generally works for Unreal given the deep photorealism of its core architecture, Unity’s ability to alter between lifelike verisimilitude and abstract schemas necessitates that developers commit more than normal. Layers’s problem is that, for all the macabre imagery thrown at you, it’s firmly grounded in a real-life setting: a destitute home from the early-20th century. And so, without that extra polish that grounded vistas and belongings inherently warrant, I personally couldn’t help but find a lot of the furniture and paraphernalia to have a tenuousness, almost cheapness, to their exteriors. Wood and plasterboard, in particular, were the worst, which you’ll be seeing a lot of given that they are the fundamental building materials of the manor (and, well, any house these days).
I want to stress that this is a purely subjective critique as there are a lot of reviewers, including one of my favorites GmanLives (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H3KyPmyTC-4), who loved the look of the residence, and outside of fruit and plastic simulacra, I can’t deny the strong texturizing all-around. But I don’t know, having seen these exact same surfaces in past walking sims Gone Home and Dear Esther (both of which pulled them off better courtesy of occupying soft 90s vibrancy and pictorial mysticism respectively), and not seeing any perceptible variations from Bloober Team, I ultimately found it to be uncanny- it wasn’t photogrammatic or stylized enough, just a strange in-between if that makes sense.
Another big issue is the inconsistency of the lighting- when the developers want an area to be baked or manipulated in up/down refulgence, it looks solid, with the first person camera even emitting a lens flare if you stare directly at a heat source. But sadly, most of the game has you traversing darkened corridors and quarters, which are too dim even by horror standards, and required me to adjust the brightness.
Lastly, I have to note that, for a title that is centered around an occupant of the art of…art, there is a severe lack of variety in terms of the potential visuals that Layers could’ve opted to use when tossing madness your way. You tend to get either short or long digressions, both with their own issues. The former is too brief to be remembered given that you quickly revert back to your regular state of mind, which is a shame as Layers of Fear truly had the potential to be more thrilling given its dilapidated ghosthouse setting. And yet, what you’ll find is a series of ordinary rooms that only mildly alternate when hit with the Painter’s visual aberrations: sleeping arenas, foyers, kitchens, it’s all relatively stock by any decent person’s standard of living. Sure, you get some nice paintings (couldn’t tell if they were famous in real life or handmade in-game by the arthouse folks) or mounted taxidermy adorning the wall that may or may not have their eyes bleeding out the second you do a double-take, but that’s too minor to be distressing.
The longer digressions, on the other hand, bank on converting your surroundings into paint-like substances, melting or conforming at the will of JD’s degenerating consciousness. The problem is the dissolving animations tend to look out of place when applied to most of the items they’re affecting, as though they were being done on an invisible canvas ON TOP OF the environment instead of directly on the environment itself. You also get instances, particularly back in your studio hub, where multiple blobs form up, which I guess were supposed to represent paint globs but reminded me more of that black globule trap from the first Incredibles over the splodges from say Epic Mickey- that is, they were aesthetically malapropos to their purpose.
The sound design falters significantly. First and foremost, the balancing is poorly done, with the SFX being significantly quieter than the music; I had to go into the options menu and turn down the latter just to hear the former, which was not a positive sign of things to come given that a good acoustic layout is key to any successful horror enterprise. And as it turns out, this was most likely a deliberate design choice given that such aurality is minimal even with the negative volume boost- footsteps are so inconsistent, blatantly giving away the fact that you’re playing as a camera and not a pseudo-solid figure. Thunder and lightning crash outside as you move by windows, but at a far enough distance it doesn’t even register as volatile beyond generic inclement weather. Anything else, from stereotypical creaks to the minute tense noises heard when being in a house by yourself, are either omitted or so hushed as to be silent.
There are a couple of favorable traits here that deserve to be highlighted. For one, while the physics engine makes object interaction harder than it should (more on that below), there was effort put into giving a motion-based range to interactable features in the foreground like swinging cabinet doors and winding keys. Also, the din associated with jump scares (like a crashing piano or screaming baby) serves its function (though I wonder if you can even fail at programming something as easy as a screamer).
The music is fine. Arkadiusz Reikowski is clearly going for a gothic tone with his use of pianos and strings, which means altering between scenes of idyllicism and deranged nightmare fuel at the drop of a hat. I didn’t think he quite succeeded with the secondary timbre as I rarely ever felt unnerved by a shift in composition, but your mileage will vary.
Voice acting is awful courtesy of lone star Erik Braa. He reminds me of someone I once acted alongside with for a video production- the guy was so nice, that he was literally incapable of pulling off any other emotion in his delivery, from anger to disappointment. Likewise, Braa seems like an individual who is so kind he just cannot do well as an pr!ck, which is kind of a problem given my aforementioned rant about JD’s personage. He’s not even provided an option to emit the archetypal breathing and gasping a horror character naturally does whenever something panic-inducing occurs to them.
Finally, we get to the gameplay, which is minimal since Layers of Fear is a walking simulator. You have the ability to run, zoom-in, examine certain items, and engage with predesignated belongings, all things you’ll have to complete as you make your way through the game’s six “levels”. I use quotation marks because, like Dear Esther, Layers of Fear fails to give you any kind of meaningful exploration, making these escapades more akin to one of those Mario Maker stages that were purely about initiating a chain reaction and watching the results unfold than actually participating. And though you are mostly given time beforehand to amble around the spaces, my aforestated point in the graphics section about the lack of artistic virtuosity renders them not worth looking at- you wouldn’t believe the amount of cupboards and drawers I opened only for there to be literally nothing in them: no Easter Eggs, no new secrets, nada. When it comes to storage spaces, Layers of Fear violates Chekhov's gun to the extreme.
In terms of the quality of the reactions, well, let’s just say that I was not surprised to learn that Bloober Team was the same company behind Observer (in fact, during a break in my playthrough, I took the time to go back and relook at my review of it- I wonder if that decision was borne out of a subconscious push!- https://www.backloggd.com/u/RedBackLoggd/review/279057/). I was not a fan of that game either, but one thing it somewhat succeeded in doing was placing the player in a menacing plane whenever Lazarski would jack into a dead person’s brain. I get the sense that the ghastly beats assailing JD in Layers were a bit of a prototype for what Bloober Team eventually did there, and the roughness of being a draft shows. As you can probably imagine, a lot of Layers’ horror takes place in them, and it'll immediately dawn on you just how repetitive the beats get as the triggers are tied to the same cues of either selecting a particular object or turning around to see a radical change in the space you were occupying ala Antichamber.
On top of this, because Layers lacks a tense atmosphere from conception, it tries to make-up for it by over-relying on shock tactics. This was already going to end badly as an exercise in cheapness, but it gets worse when you realize that even THIS component amounts to one of four instances: an object flying at you, something crashing nearby, paraphernalia suddenly melting, and the always hackneyed demonic entity screaming in your face via a sudden close-up. The second you fathom this is all you’re going to get, the terror becomes immensely predictable, and combined with my introductory assertion about a video game not being scary without the threat of death, you get a removal of the one piece of entertainment Layers had going for it.
Some reviewers have claimed that puzzles are present that change up the gameplay, but I personally don’t consider finding a combination lock and inputting it, or searching for and touching a glowing piece, intriguing enough to be considered puzzles, though they probably are by the barest of video game definitions.
Lastly, to elaborate on my issues with object interaction, Layers puts up resistance based on the direction you move your mouse in a seeming attempt to replicate how real-world push/pull physics work. I’ve admittedly never liked these kinds of systems (what exactly is wrong with a single button prompt?), but this "innovation" makes such actions even more annoying because you can’t alter your elevation (no crouch/jump), so theoretically everything should be treated as though you are at the perfect angle to move it, yet the game acts like any slight alteration from a straight horizontal swipe of the mouse is moving your hands vertically at odds with the directional swing of the door you’re pulling. And no, adjusting the sensitivity didn’t appear to affect this. Granted it’s not a huge issue overall, but it bears noting for a fair critique.
One small thing I do like was how you're able to use the WASD keys to turn an object you’re examining instead of just the mouse. But yeah, that’s about the only real notable “feat” I can claim for the gameplay.
In conclusion, it goes without saying that I did not have fun with Layers of Fear and therefore can’t recommend it. Despite having sections that don’t overstay their welcome, the central overarching narrative is mediocre with one of the worst protagonists in modern gaming history, and it isn’t even close to being scary, technically or artistically. To top all of this off, you get multiple endings based on choices so obscure, you wouldn’t know what they were unless you looked them up- not that it matters, since none of the finales makes for a satisfying conclusion. I do not recommend this game.
Link to review of base game: https://www.backloggd.com/u/RedBackLoggd/review/392524/
In a lot of ways, Inheritance feels like it was written as a response to some of the critiques that hit its vanilla predecessor- you get a seemingly more sympathetic protagonist in the form of the Painter’s Daughter, a story that is less about jump scares and more about demented childhood visions, art that holds greater consistency, and narrative choices that are a lot more clear-cut this time around.
Unfortunately, these responses are only half-successful, and they don’t offset the other problems that prevail. Nonetheless, let’s begin with those partial wins, starting with the protagonist since she segues nicely into the story. As I said, the plot is about the child of JD, now all grown-up, visiting her family home to gain closure over the abuse she experienced. Interestingly, there’s a bit of a retcon here towards her father; JD, as you guys know from reading my review of the base game, was not given a reason as to why he went ballistic and acted maliciously towards everyone. This time around, you get a couple of postulations: one is from the woman (who shall be given the initials DJ for future references), who believes her dad’s schizophrenia was genetic, and the second is hinted as stress from dealing with his physically/emotionally scarred wife (who suffered an accident) and having to essentially raise his girl by himself. At the same time, though, there were many occasions wherein the narrative doubled down on the perfectionist mentality being the cause of JD’s destruction, so you can see what I mean by a half-measure.
All this information is divulged via flashbacks, which are triggered upon visiting various rooms in the old estate. Dialogue is unfortunately very limited in terms of DJ’s reactions to what she sees around her, but regardless I did appreciate the writers at least incorporating SOME lines compared to the silent protagonist drivel of her dad- hearing her gasp, for example, as a lamp fell out of nowhere, was a great, naturalistic jumper that simultaneously made her more human.
Referring to the secondary half-measure, the horror gimmicks of the prequel have been mostly replaced with beats resembling a Gothic tragedy. I’ve always been particularly sensitive to tales involving childhood trauma, especially as it pertains to being yelled at, and Inheritance hits the right melancholic notes. Hearing DJ get screamed at for using the wrong color in a drawing, or witnessing her dog yelp from pain affected me more than anything in the first game due to this natural empathy.
Like her father, her mind bends spacetime around her, warping memories into supernatural perturbations. However, it works a little better this time around because, outside of a crayon-schemed swamp, Bloober Team was more interested in crafting simple alterations for her: you aren’t getting collapsing libraries, screeching banshees, or phantom merry-go-rounds, but conflagrations, toys en masse, and imposing doorways. Stuff still deliquesces like wax on a burning candle, but those kind of stunts are very much minimized. And though it’s not scary (that partly being the intention here), if you accept the whole enterprise as a 3D storybook rendering of a child’s suffering, it works a lot better.
Unfortunately, the trajectory of DJ’s arc is inherently goaded towards her accepting who her father was by way of two of the endings, which would have been fine if the game had successfully portrayed him in a better light (as I noted above, it does not succeed at). As such, the daughter is slightly unlikable. The third ending is better, but harder to achieve, and ends on a depressing note that implies the developers did not support players taking this path. When considered in conjunction with the very short nature of the DLC, I can’t say that the narrative is good, though at least it is an improvement from its originator.
Graphically, I’m not going to go into extravagant detail since these are essentially the same assets as Layers of Fear. The house’s power has been cut entirely, basking it in a darkness that has sapped away all the hues- a flashlight is provided that reveals decayed furniture, collapsing structures, paint stains, and all kinds of gunk. I complained about the caliginosity in the main title, however, the lightsource in Inheritance really makes a difference in spite of its limited range.
The glimpses into the past, on the other hand, mostly abandon the murky luminosity, giving way to colored lighting that concurrently evokes wistful reminiscence and schitzy memories, going a long way towards overcoming that uncanniness I had issues with in the main Layers. There was an attempt here at recreating a kid’s perspective, and, frankly, it worked for me: the aforementioned tall doors, having to climb to reach simple heighted furniture like tables, toys being utilized as puzzle answers, a little bit of everything is here. That swamp section I briefly skimmed over earlier is also a sight to behold, reminding me a lot of the Paper Mario series in terms of all the vistas being papyraceous and drawn upon like a kid was set amok with crayola sticks.
Unfortunately, while the lighting is fine, the developers decided to throw in groundmist on 50 percent of the areas you enter, as though someone left a fog machine running somewhere nonstop. It makes things pointlessly obscure and doesn’t add anything to the atmosphere besides feeling like a dumb, funhouse attraction at a carnival. There was also this one section that had a dog speeding around, and the model, in all sincerity, looked painfully cheap, like someone pulled it out of a sixth-gen proprietary engine.
Sound effects and music are essentially the same as the prequel, so I won’t spend time there. The voice acting is slightly improved upon since DJ’s actress, Kristen Lennox, is a more-rounded performer, taking on the mother in addition to the daughter, though she’s still honestly not that great. JD, on the other hand, has been replaced with a new vocalist named Chris Nichter- he is better than Braa, but still suffers from the same base issues of not being able to properly convey the harsher emotions necessitated from an abusive father and husband.
No changes have occurred to the gameplay outside of narrative choices being more noticeable for players to engage with should they wish to exercise some agency.
But overall, that’s it. If you liked Layers of Fear, Inheritance is a fine DLC that both adds a lot of context to it whilst also crafting a decent sequel to events past. However, if you were like me and didn’t enjoy the previous one, then Inheritance’s few improvements won’t do enough to convince you to give it a try.
In a lot of ways, Inheritance feels like it was written as a response to some of the critiques that hit its vanilla predecessor- you get a seemingly more sympathetic protagonist in the form of the Painter’s Daughter, a story that is less about jump scares and more about demented childhood visions, art that holds greater consistency, and narrative choices that are a lot more clear-cut this time around.
Unfortunately, these responses are only half-successful, and they don’t offset the other problems that prevail. Nonetheless, let’s begin with those partial wins, starting with the protagonist since she segues nicely into the story. As I said, the plot is about the child of JD, now all grown-up, visiting her family home to gain closure over the abuse she experienced. Interestingly, there’s a bit of a retcon here towards her father; JD, as you guys know from reading my review of the base game, was not given a reason as to why he went ballistic and acted maliciously towards everyone. This time around, you get a couple of postulations: one is from the woman (who shall be given the initials DJ for future references), who believes her dad’s schizophrenia was genetic, and the second is hinted as stress from dealing with his physically/emotionally scarred wife (who suffered an accident) and having to essentially raise his girl by himself. At the same time, though, there were many occasions wherein the narrative doubled down on the perfectionist mentality being the cause of JD’s destruction, so you can see what I mean by a half-measure.
All this information is divulged via flashbacks, which are triggered upon visiting various rooms in the old estate. Dialogue is unfortunately very limited in terms of DJ’s reactions to what she sees around her, but regardless I did appreciate the writers at least incorporating SOME lines compared to the silent protagonist drivel of her dad- hearing her gasp, for example, as a lamp fell out of nowhere, was a great, naturalistic jumper that simultaneously made her more human.
Referring to the secondary half-measure, the horror gimmicks of the prequel have been mostly replaced with beats resembling a Gothic tragedy. I’ve always been particularly sensitive to tales involving childhood trauma, especially as it pertains to being yelled at, and Inheritance hits the right melancholic notes. Hearing DJ get screamed at for using the wrong color in a drawing, or witnessing her dog yelp from pain affected me more than anything in the first game due to this natural empathy.
Like her father, her mind bends spacetime around her, warping memories into supernatural perturbations. However, it works a little better this time around because, outside of a crayon-schemed swamp, Bloober Team was more interested in crafting simple alterations for her: you aren’t getting collapsing libraries, screeching banshees, or phantom merry-go-rounds, but conflagrations, toys en masse, and imposing doorways. Stuff still deliquesces like wax on a burning candle, but those kind of stunts are very much minimized. And though it’s not scary (that partly being the intention here), if you accept the whole enterprise as a 3D storybook rendering of a child’s suffering, it works a lot better.
Unfortunately, the trajectory of DJ’s arc is inherently goaded towards her accepting who her father was by way of two of the endings, which would have been fine if the game had successfully portrayed him in a better light (as I noted above, it does not succeed at). As such, the daughter is slightly unlikable. The third ending is better, but harder to achieve, and ends on a depressing note that implies the developers did not support players taking this path. When considered in conjunction with the very short nature of the DLC, I can’t say that the narrative is good, though at least it is an improvement from its originator.
Graphically, I’m not going to go into extravagant detail since these are essentially the same assets as Layers of Fear. The house’s power has been cut entirely, basking it in a darkness that has sapped away all the hues- a flashlight is provided that reveals decayed furniture, collapsing structures, paint stains, and all kinds of gunk. I complained about the caliginosity in the main title, however, the lightsource in Inheritance really makes a difference in spite of its limited range.
The glimpses into the past, on the other hand, mostly abandon the murky luminosity, giving way to colored lighting that concurrently evokes wistful reminiscence and schitzy memories, going a long way towards overcoming that uncanniness I had issues with in the main Layers. There was an attempt here at recreating a kid’s perspective, and, frankly, it worked for me: the aforementioned tall doors, having to climb to reach simple heighted furniture like tables, toys being utilized as puzzle answers, a little bit of everything is here. That swamp section I briefly skimmed over earlier is also a sight to behold, reminding me a lot of the Paper Mario series in terms of all the vistas being papyraceous and drawn upon like a kid was set amok with crayola sticks.
Unfortunately, while the lighting is fine, the developers decided to throw in groundmist on 50 percent of the areas you enter, as though someone left a fog machine running somewhere nonstop. It makes things pointlessly obscure and doesn’t add anything to the atmosphere besides feeling like a dumb, funhouse attraction at a carnival. There was also this one section that had a dog speeding around, and the model, in all sincerity, looked painfully cheap, like someone pulled it out of a sixth-gen proprietary engine.
Sound effects and music are essentially the same as the prequel, so I won’t spend time there. The voice acting is slightly improved upon since DJ’s actress, Kristen Lennox, is a more-rounded performer, taking on the mother in addition to the daughter, though she’s still honestly not that great. JD, on the other hand, has been replaced with a new vocalist named Chris Nichter- he is better than Braa, but still suffers from the same base issues of not being able to properly convey the harsher emotions necessitated from an abusive father and husband.
No changes have occurred to the gameplay outside of narrative choices being more noticeable for players to engage with should they wish to exercise some agency.
But overall, that’s it. If you liked Layers of Fear, Inheritance is a fine DLC that both adds a lot of context to it whilst also crafting a decent sequel to events past. However, if you were like me and didn’t enjoy the previous one, then Inheritance’s few improvements won’t do enough to convince you to give it a try.
This review contains spoilers
Spoilers only discussed at the very bottom
Ah, what a disappointment this was. The original Darksiders was one of my biggest surprises as a gamer. I went in thinking it would be a God of War-clone, only to discover a Zelda/hack-and-slash hybrid with a unique mythos and grand scope. And while I would’ve loved to have seen a direct follow-up to the cliffhanger it ended on, the decision to go the sidequel direction with II at least presented the writing team with an opportunity to expand on their existing lore.
Unfortunately, while there is some worldbuilding, Darksiders II is ultimately a significant step-down from its predecessor. As a story guy, I’ll jump right into the narrative flaws- Death, one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, has learned of his brother, War’s, crimes from the first game, and goes on a quest to undo the damage. It sounds great, the start of another realm-spanning odyssey, but from the get-go we’re introduced to a recurring problem that will plague this title, and that is its overabundance and overreliance on made-up characters. Unlike most fictional media, which generally take inspiration from religions that aren’t as widely-practiced anymore (i.e., polytheistic paganistic systems like Greek Hellenism or Old Norse), Darksiders was daring in that it drew inspiration from the Abrahamic Faiths. This was exemplified by the decision to incorporate actual figures from the Holy Texts, such as: Abaddon, Azrael, Uriel, Samael, the aforementioned Horsemen, as well as direct aspects like the Garden of Eden and Seven Seals. In an era where creators are afraid of angering certain demographics who actively believe in these originating doctrines (see the controversy over Far Cry 5), it was a treat to see developer Vigil Games move forward with such an idea. That’s not to say there weren’t fictitious beings conceived explicitly, but those tended to be primarily reserved as boss fights rather than individuals who moved story beats forward (Ulthane being the largest exception).
Here, though, 90% of the NPCs that guide Death around don’t have any Judeo-Islamic heritage, and the worst part is how generic and lame they are on their own merits. Amongst such a cast you have the Crowfather, a half-demented/half-wise older man who simultaneously rambles and weaves advice, donning shackles so large it’s a miracle they don’t fall off his wrists; Eideard, a magic sage who boasts about being powerful but falters consistently; a cruel skeletal ruler named the Lord of Bones (oooh); the Archon, a big angel, and Osteogoth, a freakin goat-headed tradesman (to quote the great Stan Lee, ‘nuff said) amongst others. It’s not that they’re not memorable, it’s that they come off as lackluster in comparison to the inherent magnetism that their Semitic counterparts held. The only new additions are Lilith (hinted at in the first game), who certainly makes her mark, and Absalom, who is nothing like his Biblical counterpart. Overall, these beings end up causing Darksiders 2 to feel more like another dime-a-dozen fantasy yarn over the theological epic that the first one evoked.
Not helping things on this front is the decision by the ADA team to use voices in the upper register for the vast majority of the characters. You have some returning actors like Troy Baker and Keith Szarabajka, but new or old performers alike, they generally talk in a lighter tone that further robs from the grand feeling. I know I said that the deep accents of the first game could be problematic in terms of differentiating between individuals, but credit where credit is due- it made you feel like you were experiencing an Apocalyptic trip!
But even if there were compelling personalities, the biggest issue plaguing DS2’s narrative is that it is, for all intents and purposes, just fetch quest after annoying fetch quest. Seriously, the story beats generally follow the same structure: Death will go to an area, find the guy or gal in charge, and be tasked to get something for them in exchange for progression; this thing, 9 times out of 10, being a MacGuffin in a dungeon. Rinse and repeat. It gets boring, kills the pacing, and, to add salt to the wounds, often indulges in the video game cliche of “collect three keys”. The lack of a compelling impetus, either narratively or even specifically around the item you have to retrieve, removes any bastion of motivation.
With regards to the protagonist, Death just isn’t as invigorating to follow as War, namely because he’s far too serious. War was hardboiled, but his sardonic humor came out infrequently enough to make him as funny as he was badass. Death has moments of dry wit, however he tends to approach interactions with a “get me to the end” perspective that robs them of the flavor that could have come from sharp banter (the exception to this being his talks with the Chancellor). Now to be clear, I wouldn’t have had a problem with a more-brooding character (I am a fan of Zack Snyder’s Superman after all), but that would’ve required giving Death more agency in the story over the constant order-following that instead preoccupies his time.
That’s not to say that the writers didn’t have greater aspirations than pure solemness- there was this clear idea around giving Death regret over certain actions he committed in the past, a character arc that would culminate in his endgame decision. Unfortunately, you don’t get many notions around it; there aren’t any philosophical or ethical discussions regarding why Death did what he did. Every time it’s brought up, he simply looks away and grasps the scar on his chest, putting a stop to any potential monologue/dialogue. Whether the writers didn’t intend to say more or didn’t know/didn’t want to say anything I can’t be sure, but the result is Death being bland and his actions not having much emotional weight.
The final issue I had was with the antagonist, but it involves spoilers, so I’ll leave it at the end of my review.+
Graphically, this remaster is superb. As a late-seventh generation release, the vanilla version of Darksiders II already looked solid, but the upgrades for the Deathinitive Edition are welcome regardless. While rock-based surfaces are inconsistent in terms of the firmness of their textures, nothing ever stands out poorly and every other exterior is superb, which is saying something given the agglomerate of vistas you’ll be rummaging through: from the war-torn urbicide of Earth to a Limbo-like everlost, elements endemic to these places are consistent in their craftsmanship (ex. a broken down automobile appears as solidly built as a golem in a dwarven plane; lava simmers as well as snow permeates an icy landscape).
Two aspects, in particular, that impressed me the most were 1) the lack of 2Dification of minor objects and 2) the lucency of hues. With the former, we’ve all played AAA games that cut corners on some minor part, whether it was hair on an NPC or grass out in the field, and this is often rendered by way of making things flat since it takes a lot of effort to give something a third dimension (or rather, the illusion of a third dimension since we’re all viewing games through screens). In DS2, I didn’t catch any of that. Even with lesser traits like wisps of smoke or collectible tokens, you can glean that extra planar height.
Of the two, though, hues are arguably the most impressive design feat. While the primary lighting is static, DS2 throws a lot of objects at you that glower with their own luminance, and I LOVED seeing the colors bounce off of adjacent areas like walls or Death’s model. It’s not just a generic luster either- there’s mini, yet discernible, kinetic movement reflective of the type of incandescence in proximity. From the purple flames of an avatar clone to the beady little lights of tens of skull eyes on a castle portal, you’ll see what I’m talking about when you play.
Unlike DS1, cutscenes are rendered in-game, allowing character models to maintain your customization choices (more on that below), and they still look impressive to this day. That being said, the limitations of the Phoenix Engine do mean that the cinematic scope is downgraded noticeably compared to if they had been pre-rendered: moments that were evidently shot to be “epic” lack the smoothness that pure animation would have conveyed. But, nonetheless, it’s still admirable. And the draw distance is an absolute delight, rivaling an Elder Scrolls game.
Overall, my only major criticism in the graphical department is the prevalence of bugs. You got a famous game breaking one that naturally comes up during your progression and requires you to do mandatory side content since it was never patched out. I also experienced multiple crashes, which is always irate and inexcusable.
In the sound field, I alluded to my qualms with the vocal direction beforehand, but make no mistake- the performances themselves are excellent. While a deeper elocution might’ve helped the actors overcome the impotency brought about by the non-grandiose atmosphere of the narrative, I can’t accuse the actors of phoning it in. Also, there was this strange “juttiness” that came with lip movements- the dialogue is sync, but it’s like there’s a framerate drop whenever NPCs speak.
The SFX is immaculate in certain areas. Some of you may have inferred this from reading my reviews, but one of my personal delights are different reverberations from footsteps colliding with different layers, and it is done SO WELL here. The crunch of sleet, the clank of metal, the thump of stone, the splash of water, the softness of dirt- not only will you be able to distinguish what Death is walking on based solely off of the aurality, but you’ll also perceive variations contingent on his speed.
Unfortunately, I did use the term “immaculate” for a reason- shortcuts were taken with the weaponry and enemies. You can hack-and-slice all you want: Death’s armaments will resound with the same din (though interestingly, gunshots have a programmed distinction for steel, probably because who doesn’t love the classic din of a bullet ricocheting off a ferrous casting?). Creatures of the under and above worlds have limited multiplicities to their growls and scratching, and even minibosses tend to give off a sense of auditory deja-vu. Not unexpected since the first Darksiders had the same shortcomings.
Music, I got to be honest with you guys, was disappointing, mainly because of who the composer was. Fans of the Assassin’s Creed series will no doubt recognize him to be none other than Jesper Kyd, who wrote up the magnificent scores for the Ezio Trilogy and Valhalla, with his extensive synth work heavily influencing the direction of the franchises music style in general (the sole exception being AC Syndicate, as intentionally done by Austin Wintory).
The thing was, outside of some tunes in the Heaven Outpost section, nothing ever roused me in the way the tracks of ACII and AC Brotherhood did. I do think the weak narrative direction impaired what Jesper was tasked with doing, but even that aside, there’s no questioning that, for a game focused on the Divine, I didn’t get any celestial elicitations. There was also this one recurring dungeon leitmotif that I could not stand, and indicated the existence of reused music over unique themes.
On that note, we can transition to the gameplay. Darksiders II leans a lot more into RPG mechanics than its predecessor did: while your choice of weapons is pretty limited, you can customize armor pieces as well as attribute boosters called talismans; there’s a leveling system tied to a skill tree; enemies have health bars, and there’s a bit of inventory management involved with all the looting you’ll be doing.
None of this is fleshed out enough to be considered a good foundation, though at the same it isn’t mediocre enough to detract from the game. While hammers, boots, and talismans provide stats that technically differentiate them from the other (like elemental powers, magic regeneration, increased money spawn), the only sets that genuinely impact the gameplay are strength and defense. And because you’re always getting stronger weapons as you move further in the game (whether it’s from fort chests or merchants of death), you’re not really incentivized to hold onto anything. DS2 tries to offset this by providing a special class of melee tools called “possessed weapons” that you can consistently modify with individualized upgrades, but they are few and far between, and you honestly don’t need them unless you want to blitz through the game's battle arena, dubbed "The Crucible".
Your skill tree gives some cool abilities, but it’s only divided into two halves: one focused on attacking, the other on necromancy/defense. And while I’d be lying if I said the abilities weren’t cool/useful, the limited points you get (and Darksiders II being a child of the hack-and-slash genre) encourages you to prioritize the attack hemisphere.
Fighting remains fun, though even with new combos it can admittedly get repetitive. By throwing in hotkeys, DS2 fixes the prompt issue I had with the first where you had to awkwardly press different buttons on the controller to trigger some of your newly-acquired powers during combat. Unfortunately, it comes with its own prompt problem, this one being the dodge synced to the RB bumper (on the 360)- I have no idea who thought this would be a good idea, but it feels awkward to use despite you adapting to it over the course of hours. Why they couldn’t just give it to the B button like most games is beyond me, especially since B isn’t even used for ANYTHING else minus opening things (which is proximity-based anyway).
On that note, let’s talk about the world. DS2 boasts a semi-open world divided into five major areas. I say “semi” because, while you are able to free roam, the vast majority of the game is actually Death entering fortresses and completing them- it’s more or less a dungeon crawler with lots of empty space between the oubliettes. You’d think this would at least make for some creative junctures, but sadly, the gameplay is pretty rote- Death will solve a puzzle to gain access to a new chamber, which will then trigger a mandatory locked-off battle, rinse-and-repeat until you get to the boss. This would be fine if everything was entertaining, but, with the exception of Lostlight, I found almost all of the puzzles painfully simplistic. Look, I’m not going to act like the first Darksiders was a masterpiece in this department, but there was creativity involved in resolving quandaries thrown your way- here, you’ll literally be moving a ball into an oval hole or stepping on a platform 80% of the time to advance. And brawling only goes so far, even in an action game.
The dungeons themselves aren’t copy/pasted; however, their interiors definitely aren’t as unique as they could have been. You’ll see the same stacks of bricks, iron railings, twisting stairwells and other facets more times than you’d like. This criticism kind of extends to the four planes of existence as well: while Earth, Heaven, Forge Lands, Demon’s Realm and the Underworld are all gorgeous to look at, I do feel more could’ve been done gameplay-wise instead of simply altering the color palette: (it’s one of the reasons I liked Lostlight the most since new pathways via surging water were conceived). All that said, the one consistently salient art piece you’ll see in citadel after citadel are the statues- appearing as though they were chiseled by a master craftsman, I gotta say I always enjoyed looking at each new one I came across in my travels, they symbolizing the general atmosphere present in the abode.
One thing DS2 does objectively better than the first is not make tools useless after their area of debut. You’ll frequently find yourself having to reuse past equipment and competencies to maneuver through areas, making the intricate coding seem like a worthwhile pursuit. There’s also no large backtracking mission the way there was during the endgame of DS1.
DSII boasts its fair share of side missions, but these are either just more fetch quests or beating some optional miniboss/boss. The dialogue is generally well-scribed as far as giving you a decent yarn behind your mission, but Death still feels like a lackey rather than this mythical Horseman. Darksiders II also indulges in collectathon nonsense with MULTIPLE curios that rival the flags from Assassin’s Creed I not only in their abundance but in the lack of a unlockable map to find them outside of an unofficial mod. DS2 also gives you WAY too much money- I ended up with over 100k by the end of my playthrough, and this is before NG+. The loot you gain from treasure troves and unlockables is so excessive and useless that you’re better off selling it to retailers who have unlimited gold on hand- even Vulgrim works better as a fence due to his shop being dialed back in the bartering of specialities.
A lot of my other pet peeves had to do with the movement systems. For starters, Darksiders 2 gives Death his stead, Despair, from the get-go, but the game is very limited in when you are allowed to summon him. Obviously indoors is fair game, however there are a number of long stretches that you have to just bolt through on foot because “this is no place for a horse,” (on a side note, could the writers seriously have not given Death more than two lines to say to indicate this to players? His mask made lip syncing a non-issue) and Death isn’t the fastest protagonist in gaming. You can’t even do constant flips/jumps to cheese acceleration the way you can with Zelda titles due to Death stopping after the third jump Super Mario 64-style.
The parkour is the biggest letdown here- you’re restricted in where you can climb (specific ballasts and poles), and even there you don’t have any agency as a player: you’re setting off a pre-programmed animation that locks you out from doing anything until the animation has completed. This is obviously fine if you’re successful in your inputs- unfortunately, because you need to angle the joystick strongly in the direction you’re going, any slight dip will result in Death just darting straight-up, at best forcing you to wait until he returns to his original starting point or, worse, cause you to fall off the place you were hanging and have to re-route back there.
Wall-running is a little better since you can actually jump side-to-side in motion (which you’ll have to do for certain tunnels), but I didn’t like the weird angle you had to push the joystick towards, and it’s certainly nowhere near as polished as Sands of Times’s (which came out almost 10 years prior).
In the end, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that I didn’t have much fun with Darksiders II. It obviously does some things better than its predecessor, but in most departments it’s a step-down: story, puzzles, atmosphere, voice direction, etc…Death’s arc to simultaneously redeem himself and his brother could have been decent, but the execution was too misguided to make it work.
Please note that the DLCs are story-in-name only, providing some treasure-seeking incentive to finish a newly-arisen dungeon.
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+After being slain by Death during the purge of the Nephilim, Absalom transformed into a being called Corruption. His transformation is the magical cliche of hate breeding into a detrimental threat to life, but that’s not the issue- my question is, how in the world has he become so powerful? I’d understand successfully conquering one realm by way of a surprise attack, but to takeover multiple areas with deity figures was just ridiculous.
I also didn't understand where his power came from, and the game doesn’t bother to fill in the blanks. Sure, Absalom was chock-full of malevolence, but how does that manifest into a substance literally capable of corroding and brainwashing anyone it touches at such a fast speed? He had venom, but surely they didn’t mean that literally! It just felt like they couldn’t come up with a smarter obstacle and so went this lame route- a huge step down from the Destroyer, that’s for sure.
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Ah, what a disappointment this was. The original Darksiders was one of my biggest surprises as a gamer. I went in thinking it would be a God of War-clone, only to discover a Zelda/hack-and-slash hybrid with a unique mythos and grand scope. And while I would’ve loved to have seen a direct follow-up to the cliffhanger it ended on, the decision to go the sidequel direction with II at least presented the writing team with an opportunity to expand on their existing lore.
Unfortunately, while there is some worldbuilding, Darksiders II is ultimately a significant step-down from its predecessor. As a story guy, I’ll jump right into the narrative flaws- Death, one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, has learned of his brother, War’s, crimes from the first game, and goes on a quest to undo the damage. It sounds great, the start of another realm-spanning odyssey, but from the get-go we’re introduced to a recurring problem that will plague this title, and that is its overabundance and overreliance on made-up characters. Unlike most fictional media, which generally take inspiration from religions that aren’t as widely-practiced anymore (i.e., polytheistic paganistic systems like Greek Hellenism or Old Norse), Darksiders was daring in that it drew inspiration from the Abrahamic Faiths. This was exemplified by the decision to incorporate actual figures from the Holy Texts, such as: Abaddon, Azrael, Uriel, Samael, the aforementioned Horsemen, as well as direct aspects like the Garden of Eden and Seven Seals. In an era where creators are afraid of angering certain demographics who actively believe in these originating doctrines (see the controversy over Far Cry 5), it was a treat to see developer Vigil Games move forward with such an idea. That’s not to say there weren’t fictitious beings conceived explicitly, but those tended to be primarily reserved as boss fights rather than individuals who moved story beats forward (Ulthane being the largest exception).
Here, though, 90% of the NPCs that guide Death around don’t have any Judeo-Islamic heritage, and the worst part is how generic and lame they are on their own merits. Amongst such a cast you have the Crowfather, a half-demented/half-wise older man who simultaneously rambles and weaves advice, donning shackles so large it’s a miracle they don’t fall off his wrists; Eideard, a magic sage who boasts about being powerful but falters consistently; a cruel skeletal ruler named the Lord of Bones (oooh); the Archon, a big angel, and Osteogoth, a freakin goat-headed tradesman (to quote the great Stan Lee, ‘nuff said) amongst others. It’s not that they’re not memorable, it’s that they come off as lackluster in comparison to the inherent magnetism that their Semitic counterparts held. The only new additions are Lilith (hinted at in the first game), who certainly makes her mark, and Absalom, who is nothing like his Biblical counterpart. Overall, these beings end up causing Darksiders 2 to feel more like another dime-a-dozen fantasy yarn over the theological epic that the first one evoked.
Not helping things on this front is the decision by the ADA team to use voices in the upper register for the vast majority of the characters. You have some returning actors like Troy Baker and Keith Szarabajka, but new or old performers alike, they generally talk in a lighter tone that further robs from the grand feeling. I know I said that the deep accents of the first game could be problematic in terms of differentiating between individuals, but credit where credit is due- it made you feel like you were experiencing an Apocalyptic trip!
But even if there were compelling personalities, the biggest issue plaguing DS2’s narrative is that it is, for all intents and purposes, just fetch quest after annoying fetch quest. Seriously, the story beats generally follow the same structure: Death will go to an area, find the guy or gal in charge, and be tasked to get something for them in exchange for progression; this thing, 9 times out of 10, being a MacGuffin in a dungeon. Rinse and repeat. It gets boring, kills the pacing, and, to add salt to the wounds, often indulges in the video game cliche of “collect three keys”. The lack of a compelling impetus, either narratively or even specifically around the item you have to retrieve, removes any bastion of motivation.
With regards to the protagonist, Death just isn’t as invigorating to follow as War, namely because he’s far too serious. War was hardboiled, but his sardonic humor came out infrequently enough to make him as funny as he was badass. Death has moments of dry wit, however he tends to approach interactions with a “get me to the end” perspective that robs them of the flavor that could have come from sharp banter (the exception to this being his talks with the Chancellor). Now to be clear, I wouldn’t have had a problem with a more-brooding character (I am a fan of Zack Snyder’s Superman after all), but that would’ve required giving Death more agency in the story over the constant order-following that instead preoccupies his time.
That’s not to say that the writers didn’t have greater aspirations than pure solemness- there was this clear idea around giving Death regret over certain actions he committed in the past, a character arc that would culminate in his endgame decision. Unfortunately, you don’t get many notions around it; there aren’t any philosophical or ethical discussions regarding why Death did what he did. Every time it’s brought up, he simply looks away and grasps the scar on his chest, putting a stop to any potential monologue/dialogue. Whether the writers didn’t intend to say more or didn’t know/didn’t want to say anything I can’t be sure, but the result is Death being bland and his actions not having much emotional weight.
The final issue I had was with the antagonist, but it involves spoilers, so I’ll leave it at the end of my review.+
Graphically, this remaster is superb. As a late-seventh generation release, the vanilla version of Darksiders II already looked solid, but the upgrades for the Deathinitive Edition are welcome regardless. While rock-based surfaces are inconsistent in terms of the firmness of their textures, nothing ever stands out poorly and every other exterior is superb, which is saying something given the agglomerate of vistas you’ll be rummaging through: from the war-torn urbicide of Earth to a Limbo-like everlost, elements endemic to these places are consistent in their craftsmanship (ex. a broken down automobile appears as solidly built as a golem in a dwarven plane; lava simmers as well as snow permeates an icy landscape).
Two aspects, in particular, that impressed me the most were 1) the lack of 2Dification of minor objects and 2) the lucency of hues. With the former, we’ve all played AAA games that cut corners on some minor part, whether it was hair on an NPC or grass out in the field, and this is often rendered by way of making things flat since it takes a lot of effort to give something a third dimension (or rather, the illusion of a third dimension since we’re all viewing games through screens). In DS2, I didn’t catch any of that. Even with lesser traits like wisps of smoke or collectible tokens, you can glean that extra planar height.
Of the two, though, hues are arguably the most impressive design feat. While the primary lighting is static, DS2 throws a lot of objects at you that glower with their own luminance, and I LOVED seeing the colors bounce off of adjacent areas like walls or Death’s model. It’s not just a generic luster either- there’s mini, yet discernible, kinetic movement reflective of the type of incandescence in proximity. From the purple flames of an avatar clone to the beady little lights of tens of skull eyes on a castle portal, you’ll see what I’m talking about when you play.
Unlike DS1, cutscenes are rendered in-game, allowing character models to maintain your customization choices (more on that below), and they still look impressive to this day. That being said, the limitations of the Phoenix Engine do mean that the cinematic scope is downgraded noticeably compared to if they had been pre-rendered: moments that were evidently shot to be “epic” lack the smoothness that pure animation would have conveyed. But, nonetheless, it’s still admirable. And the draw distance is an absolute delight, rivaling an Elder Scrolls game.
Overall, my only major criticism in the graphical department is the prevalence of bugs. You got a famous game breaking one that naturally comes up during your progression and requires you to do mandatory side content since it was never patched out. I also experienced multiple crashes, which is always irate and inexcusable.
In the sound field, I alluded to my qualms with the vocal direction beforehand, but make no mistake- the performances themselves are excellent. While a deeper elocution might’ve helped the actors overcome the impotency brought about by the non-grandiose atmosphere of the narrative, I can’t accuse the actors of phoning it in. Also, there was this strange “juttiness” that came with lip movements- the dialogue is sync, but it’s like there’s a framerate drop whenever NPCs speak.
The SFX is immaculate in certain areas. Some of you may have inferred this from reading my reviews, but one of my personal delights are different reverberations from footsteps colliding with different layers, and it is done SO WELL here. The crunch of sleet, the clank of metal, the thump of stone, the splash of water, the softness of dirt- not only will you be able to distinguish what Death is walking on based solely off of the aurality, but you’ll also perceive variations contingent on his speed.
Unfortunately, I did use the term “immaculate” for a reason- shortcuts were taken with the weaponry and enemies. You can hack-and-slice all you want: Death’s armaments will resound with the same din (though interestingly, gunshots have a programmed distinction for steel, probably because who doesn’t love the classic din of a bullet ricocheting off a ferrous casting?). Creatures of the under and above worlds have limited multiplicities to their growls and scratching, and even minibosses tend to give off a sense of auditory deja-vu. Not unexpected since the first Darksiders had the same shortcomings.
Music, I got to be honest with you guys, was disappointing, mainly because of who the composer was. Fans of the Assassin’s Creed series will no doubt recognize him to be none other than Jesper Kyd, who wrote up the magnificent scores for the Ezio Trilogy and Valhalla, with his extensive synth work heavily influencing the direction of the franchises music style in general (the sole exception being AC Syndicate, as intentionally done by Austin Wintory).
The thing was, outside of some tunes in the Heaven Outpost section, nothing ever roused me in the way the tracks of ACII and AC Brotherhood did. I do think the weak narrative direction impaired what Jesper was tasked with doing, but even that aside, there’s no questioning that, for a game focused on the Divine, I didn’t get any celestial elicitations. There was also this one recurring dungeon leitmotif that I could not stand, and indicated the existence of reused music over unique themes.
On that note, we can transition to the gameplay. Darksiders II leans a lot more into RPG mechanics than its predecessor did: while your choice of weapons is pretty limited, you can customize armor pieces as well as attribute boosters called talismans; there’s a leveling system tied to a skill tree; enemies have health bars, and there’s a bit of inventory management involved with all the looting you’ll be doing.
None of this is fleshed out enough to be considered a good foundation, though at the same it isn’t mediocre enough to detract from the game. While hammers, boots, and talismans provide stats that technically differentiate them from the other (like elemental powers, magic regeneration, increased money spawn), the only sets that genuinely impact the gameplay are strength and defense. And because you’re always getting stronger weapons as you move further in the game (whether it’s from fort chests or merchants of death), you’re not really incentivized to hold onto anything. DS2 tries to offset this by providing a special class of melee tools called “possessed weapons” that you can consistently modify with individualized upgrades, but they are few and far between, and you honestly don’t need them unless you want to blitz through the game's battle arena, dubbed "The Crucible".
Your skill tree gives some cool abilities, but it’s only divided into two halves: one focused on attacking, the other on necromancy/defense. And while I’d be lying if I said the abilities weren’t cool/useful, the limited points you get (and Darksiders II being a child of the hack-and-slash genre) encourages you to prioritize the attack hemisphere.
Fighting remains fun, though even with new combos it can admittedly get repetitive. By throwing in hotkeys, DS2 fixes the prompt issue I had with the first where you had to awkwardly press different buttons on the controller to trigger some of your newly-acquired powers during combat. Unfortunately, it comes with its own prompt problem, this one being the dodge synced to the RB bumper (on the 360)- I have no idea who thought this would be a good idea, but it feels awkward to use despite you adapting to it over the course of hours. Why they couldn’t just give it to the B button like most games is beyond me, especially since B isn’t even used for ANYTHING else minus opening things (which is proximity-based anyway).
On that note, let’s talk about the world. DS2 boasts a semi-open world divided into five major areas. I say “semi” because, while you are able to free roam, the vast majority of the game is actually Death entering fortresses and completing them- it’s more or less a dungeon crawler with lots of empty space between the oubliettes. You’d think this would at least make for some creative junctures, but sadly, the gameplay is pretty rote- Death will solve a puzzle to gain access to a new chamber, which will then trigger a mandatory locked-off battle, rinse-and-repeat until you get to the boss. This would be fine if everything was entertaining, but, with the exception of Lostlight, I found almost all of the puzzles painfully simplistic. Look, I’m not going to act like the first Darksiders was a masterpiece in this department, but there was creativity involved in resolving quandaries thrown your way- here, you’ll literally be moving a ball into an oval hole or stepping on a platform 80% of the time to advance. And brawling only goes so far, even in an action game.
The dungeons themselves aren’t copy/pasted; however, their interiors definitely aren’t as unique as they could have been. You’ll see the same stacks of bricks, iron railings, twisting stairwells and other facets more times than you’d like. This criticism kind of extends to the four planes of existence as well: while Earth, Heaven, Forge Lands, Demon’s Realm and the Underworld are all gorgeous to look at, I do feel more could’ve been done gameplay-wise instead of simply altering the color palette: (it’s one of the reasons I liked Lostlight the most since new pathways via surging water were conceived). All that said, the one consistently salient art piece you’ll see in citadel after citadel are the statues- appearing as though they were chiseled by a master craftsman, I gotta say I always enjoyed looking at each new one I came across in my travels, they symbolizing the general atmosphere present in the abode.
One thing DS2 does objectively better than the first is not make tools useless after their area of debut. You’ll frequently find yourself having to reuse past equipment and competencies to maneuver through areas, making the intricate coding seem like a worthwhile pursuit. There’s also no large backtracking mission the way there was during the endgame of DS1.
DSII boasts its fair share of side missions, but these are either just more fetch quests or beating some optional miniboss/boss. The dialogue is generally well-scribed as far as giving you a decent yarn behind your mission, but Death still feels like a lackey rather than this mythical Horseman. Darksiders II also indulges in collectathon nonsense with MULTIPLE curios that rival the flags from Assassin’s Creed I not only in their abundance but in the lack of a unlockable map to find them outside of an unofficial mod. DS2 also gives you WAY too much money- I ended up with over 100k by the end of my playthrough, and this is before NG+. The loot you gain from treasure troves and unlockables is so excessive and useless that you’re better off selling it to retailers who have unlimited gold on hand- even Vulgrim works better as a fence due to his shop being dialed back in the bartering of specialities.
A lot of my other pet peeves had to do with the movement systems. For starters, Darksiders 2 gives Death his stead, Despair, from the get-go, but the game is very limited in when you are allowed to summon him. Obviously indoors is fair game, however there are a number of long stretches that you have to just bolt through on foot because “this is no place for a horse,” (on a side note, could the writers seriously have not given Death more than two lines to say to indicate this to players? His mask made lip syncing a non-issue) and Death isn’t the fastest protagonist in gaming. You can’t even do constant flips/jumps to cheese acceleration the way you can with Zelda titles due to Death stopping after the third jump Super Mario 64-style.
The parkour is the biggest letdown here- you’re restricted in where you can climb (specific ballasts and poles), and even there you don’t have any agency as a player: you’re setting off a pre-programmed animation that locks you out from doing anything until the animation has completed. This is obviously fine if you’re successful in your inputs- unfortunately, because you need to angle the joystick strongly in the direction you’re going, any slight dip will result in Death just darting straight-up, at best forcing you to wait until he returns to his original starting point or, worse, cause you to fall off the place you were hanging and have to re-route back there.
Wall-running is a little better since you can actually jump side-to-side in motion (which you’ll have to do for certain tunnels), but I didn’t like the weird angle you had to push the joystick towards, and it’s certainly nowhere near as polished as Sands of Times’s (which came out almost 10 years prior).
In the end, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that I didn’t have much fun with Darksiders II. It obviously does some things better than its predecessor, but in most departments it’s a step-down: story, puzzles, atmosphere, voice direction, etc…Death’s arc to simultaneously redeem himself and his brother could have been decent, but the execution was too misguided to make it work.
Please note that the DLCs are story-in-name only, providing some treasure-seeking incentive to finish a newly-arisen dungeon.
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+After being slain by Death during the purge of the Nephilim, Absalom transformed into a being called Corruption. His transformation is the magical cliche of hate breeding into a detrimental threat to life, but that’s not the issue- my question is, how in the world has he become so powerful? I’d understand successfully conquering one realm by way of a surprise attack, but to takeover multiple areas with deity figures was just ridiculous.
I also didn't understand where his power came from, and the game doesn’t bother to fill in the blanks. Sure, Absalom was chock-full of malevolence, but how does that manifest into a substance literally capable of corroding and brainwashing anyone it touches at such a fast speed? He had venom, but surely they didn’t mean that literally! It just felt like they couldn’t come up with a smarter obstacle and so went this lame route- a huge step down from the Destroyer, that’s for sure.
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Short development times and rehashed assets aren’t always a guarantee of mediocrity- titles like Majora’s Mask and Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood showed that a myriad of small changes combined with a good story could go a long way towards making a rushed sequel feel fresh and exciting.
Alas, LostWinds 2: Winter of the Melodias fails to join those ranks. Created in the span of six months and released less than 1.5 years from its predecessor, it throws a few new gimmicks in, but several setbacks, new problems, and a failure to address prior issues ultimately bring it down.
In my review of LostWinds 1, the haphazard cliffhanger ending made me wonder whether it was deliberately done to forcibly create a sequel. Having played 2, I can safely say that this wasn’t the case, though that wasn’t for the better as, in many ways, 2 feels completely divorced from its predecessor. Yes, it immediately takes place after the fight with Magmok, but none of the threads from before are continued- Balasar is completely abandoned, instead replaced with a new antagonist named Riveren; the Melodias and Toku’s mom, who were barely namedropped in the first (don’t remember if the latter was even mentioned) are now major plot points, and the whole thing about needing to restore Enril’s power is forgotten about.
You might be thinking this was done to make it easier for newcomers to get into the story, but that train of thought falters when you see just how much the game takes it for granted that you know everything. There’s no recap of what happened before, no explanation of who Toku and Enril are, no delving into the (potentially-interesting but wasted) mythology, nothing- it’s presented point blank as though you understand the basics of the world. In other words, that counter-argument falters, and what you’re left with is a standalone sequel in the same vein as Taken 3 that has no business being standalone when there were beats left unresolved.
This is made worse by the fact that the replacement narrative isn’t that good. In quick retrospect, it’s ironic I brought about Majora’s Mask earlier as the events that transpire in Winter of the Melodias are reminiscent of it, involving an innocent kid getting corrupted by dark magic, tormenting his village, and a young boy and his fairy companion trying to stop him. The snag here is that nothing is developed- we don’t get a sense of who the Melodia Boy was prior to his adulteration, who the Melodias even are beyond a species of magic singers, why Toku’s Mom Magdi wanted to find the Melodias instead of staying back and raising him (he has no dad), nothing. I’ve frequently used this expression in the past, and it applies just as much here: it’s as though the developers were more interested in moving from A to B than fleshing out anything, and that makes the game forgettable.
Of course, Majora’s Mask had similar issues (not bothering to explain where the Masks came from or who the Skull Kid was at all), and I criticize those aspects of it accordingly, but Zelda games have generally coasted on good gameplay over a powerful narrative, something Lostwinds 2 doesn’t have either. Like in the first game, the main mechanic is manipulating wind: you use it for movement, combat, and puzzle solving. One of the strangest decisions the developers make is to do a Metroid Prime-style removal of Toku/Enril’s powers without an explanation as to what happened. You start off the game and you’ve lost everything except basic airbending- storywise, it makes no sense; gameplay-wise, it was evidently done because the developers were either too lazy to incorporate a brief tutorial or craft brand new abilities.
Not like it matters because everything you do is very substandard- using slipstreams to move rocks onto switches, creating vortexes to propel a projectile into a breakable wall, utilizing strategic gusts to make it over long gaps between platforms. One of the more interesting abilities Toku gets allows him to summon tornadoes that can move water sources or drill into the earth, but the solutions to predicaments involving these are painfully obvious- the pool you need to refill is right next to the one you sapped from.
As the subtitle suggests, Lostwinds 2 throws in a new system involving abruptly changing the seasons from summer to winter. These lead to aesthetic reshufflings that I’ll talk about in the graphics section, but from a gameplay perspective there isn’t much imagination put into their differentiations (not surprising since you don’t even get the switching till halfway through the title). Frozen water is the only major thing, with icebound lakes and waterfalls presenting some facet for you to either overcome or employ for the sake of traversing a place or obtaining the game’s primary collectibles of mini gold statues.
Honestly though, the truth of the matter is Frontier Developments didn’t successfully make both sides equivalent in terms of pros/cons. Because most of LostWinds 2 takes place during the cold spell, winter in general presents more advantages than summer: verglas barriers can be demolished, snowballs conjured to hit switches, and monsters are far-less abundant. When you initially arrive in the frost-ridden mountains, you are made to deal with survival aspects of keeping Toku warm and strategically lighting fire sources, but this is quickly made useless by the obtaining of an Eskimo outfit that makes you immune to the frigid temperatures (making me wonder why they bothered putting it in, in the first place- such permanent solutions are usually saved closer to the endgame, like water filtration in Subnautica or the light suit in Metroid Prime 2). Overall, it’s clear more could have been done with this Oracle of Seasons mechanic.
I also felt it would’ve been better to have a smaller number of larger-sized areas over the abundance of medium-sized ones you see throughout your odyssey. Not only could this have led to the crafting of more intricate puzzles, but it would’ve also reduced the amount of backtracking you’re required to do, which is aplenty and strongly suggests a poor man’s attempt at implementing a Metroidvania design. The incorporation of a fast travel system would have also done wonders to alleviate this, though I’m 90% sure the reason such a scheme wasn’t implemented was because it would’ve cut down on the length of the game.
I ranted about combat in the first Lostwinds, and my criticisms remain just as potent here. New enemy types are thrown your way that you can’t just toss into walls (no pun intended) the way you could the first time around. Unfortunately, there is still no incentive to even engage in fights minus mandatory sections or minibosses- you don’t get any rewards for beating blobs, they’re easy to avoid, and, above all, it’s not just fun. You’d think a game with aerokinetic forces would be the breeding ground for something entertaining here, but you’d be wrong to do so.
If I can end on a positive note, it’s that the one-to-one motion of the mouse is a lot more fluid this time around compared to the first game, where I felt the initial Wiiware intentions had limited the capabilities of the port.
Graphically, Lostwinds 2 bears the hallmarks of its predecessor, which were already quite good and consequently hold up well here. I won’t go into too much detail since I explained it enough in my review of the first (https://www.backloggd.com/games/lostwinds/), but you got blocky, colorfully-adorned 3D characters that match up well against more 2D backdrops.
One of the things I really appreciated was the amount of small animations the developers programmed with regards to wind impact- you swipe the cursor in four different directions, and each cardinal yields a unique reaction on the NPC or object it’s hitting; you hit Toku while he’s hanging off a cliff edge and he’ll roll over as though beckoned by a squall; smack some trees and snow falls off it (but only once!); stand on a glacial sheet and Toku slides as though he’s wearing ice skates.
Ice, as a whole, yielded its own visual delights- giant crystal stalagmites act like funhouse mirrors that project Toku’s persona, while manipulating flames through rimy enclaves generate orangey, blurry glares. It’s not surprising to see the extravagances put up in later Frontier Development’s games considering what they were able to accomplish with a limited budget for LostWinds.
The sound is honestly another downside to the title. I didn’t like the music at all- most of it doesn’t stand out, and the tracks that do are more irate than pleasant. The title screen (which simultaneously operates for emotional leitmotifs) is like a modernized version of the old Lavender Town theme, while battle music is the same Asiany stringed instrument piece repeated ad nauseam.
Sound effects range from adequate to outright bad. The soothing sound of a blaze is always nice (despite the streams only being damaging at the tip, not the body) and splashing water syncs well with the fall of the droplets on the ground. However, this is contrasted with most of your wind moves surprisingly not having any associated din, the ones that do coming off as pretty stocky sounding. Getting rid of ice blocks or icicles via collision literally sounds like a baseball shattering a glass window, and the less said about the squawking of the glob toons the better. Taking everything into consideration, it’s not surprising that the mixers deliberately dampened the SFX. And as there is no voice acting, there is nothing to say on that front.
So in the end, Lostwinds 2, like the first one, isn’t recommendable by my book. The motion is more synchronous, but story and gameplay that don’t live up to their potential knock it down several pegs. Combined with backtracking galore and you got a platformer that just barely made the cut over shovelware.
Alas, LostWinds 2: Winter of the Melodias fails to join those ranks. Created in the span of six months and released less than 1.5 years from its predecessor, it throws a few new gimmicks in, but several setbacks, new problems, and a failure to address prior issues ultimately bring it down.
In my review of LostWinds 1, the haphazard cliffhanger ending made me wonder whether it was deliberately done to forcibly create a sequel. Having played 2, I can safely say that this wasn’t the case, though that wasn’t for the better as, in many ways, 2 feels completely divorced from its predecessor. Yes, it immediately takes place after the fight with Magmok, but none of the threads from before are continued- Balasar is completely abandoned, instead replaced with a new antagonist named Riveren; the Melodias and Toku’s mom, who were barely namedropped in the first (don’t remember if the latter was even mentioned) are now major plot points, and the whole thing about needing to restore Enril’s power is forgotten about.
You might be thinking this was done to make it easier for newcomers to get into the story, but that train of thought falters when you see just how much the game takes it for granted that you know everything. There’s no recap of what happened before, no explanation of who Toku and Enril are, no delving into the (potentially-interesting but wasted) mythology, nothing- it’s presented point blank as though you understand the basics of the world. In other words, that counter-argument falters, and what you’re left with is a standalone sequel in the same vein as Taken 3 that has no business being standalone when there were beats left unresolved.
This is made worse by the fact that the replacement narrative isn’t that good. In quick retrospect, it’s ironic I brought about Majora’s Mask earlier as the events that transpire in Winter of the Melodias are reminiscent of it, involving an innocent kid getting corrupted by dark magic, tormenting his village, and a young boy and his fairy companion trying to stop him. The snag here is that nothing is developed- we don’t get a sense of who the Melodia Boy was prior to his adulteration, who the Melodias even are beyond a species of magic singers, why Toku’s Mom Magdi wanted to find the Melodias instead of staying back and raising him (he has no dad), nothing. I’ve frequently used this expression in the past, and it applies just as much here: it’s as though the developers were more interested in moving from A to B than fleshing out anything, and that makes the game forgettable.
Of course, Majora’s Mask had similar issues (not bothering to explain where the Masks came from or who the Skull Kid was at all), and I criticize those aspects of it accordingly, but Zelda games have generally coasted on good gameplay over a powerful narrative, something Lostwinds 2 doesn’t have either. Like in the first game, the main mechanic is manipulating wind: you use it for movement, combat, and puzzle solving. One of the strangest decisions the developers make is to do a Metroid Prime-style removal of Toku/Enril’s powers without an explanation as to what happened. You start off the game and you’ve lost everything except basic airbending- storywise, it makes no sense; gameplay-wise, it was evidently done because the developers were either too lazy to incorporate a brief tutorial or craft brand new abilities.
Not like it matters because everything you do is very substandard- using slipstreams to move rocks onto switches, creating vortexes to propel a projectile into a breakable wall, utilizing strategic gusts to make it over long gaps between platforms. One of the more interesting abilities Toku gets allows him to summon tornadoes that can move water sources or drill into the earth, but the solutions to predicaments involving these are painfully obvious- the pool you need to refill is right next to the one you sapped from.
As the subtitle suggests, Lostwinds 2 throws in a new system involving abruptly changing the seasons from summer to winter. These lead to aesthetic reshufflings that I’ll talk about in the graphics section, but from a gameplay perspective there isn’t much imagination put into their differentiations (not surprising since you don’t even get the switching till halfway through the title). Frozen water is the only major thing, with icebound lakes and waterfalls presenting some facet for you to either overcome or employ for the sake of traversing a place or obtaining the game’s primary collectibles of mini gold statues.
Honestly though, the truth of the matter is Frontier Developments didn’t successfully make both sides equivalent in terms of pros/cons. Because most of LostWinds 2 takes place during the cold spell, winter in general presents more advantages than summer: verglas barriers can be demolished, snowballs conjured to hit switches, and monsters are far-less abundant. When you initially arrive in the frost-ridden mountains, you are made to deal with survival aspects of keeping Toku warm and strategically lighting fire sources, but this is quickly made useless by the obtaining of an Eskimo outfit that makes you immune to the frigid temperatures (making me wonder why they bothered putting it in, in the first place- such permanent solutions are usually saved closer to the endgame, like water filtration in Subnautica or the light suit in Metroid Prime 2). Overall, it’s clear more could have been done with this Oracle of Seasons mechanic.
I also felt it would’ve been better to have a smaller number of larger-sized areas over the abundance of medium-sized ones you see throughout your odyssey. Not only could this have led to the crafting of more intricate puzzles, but it would’ve also reduced the amount of backtracking you’re required to do, which is aplenty and strongly suggests a poor man’s attempt at implementing a Metroidvania design. The incorporation of a fast travel system would have also done wonders to alleviate this, though I’m 90% sure the reason such a scheme wasn’t implemented was because it would’ve cut down on the length of the game.
I ranted about combat in the first Lostwinds, and my criticisms remain just as potent here. New enemy types are thrown your way that you can’t just toss into walls (no pun intended) the way you could the first time around. Unfortunately, there is still no incentive to even engage in fights minus mandatory sections or minibosses- you don’t get any rewards for beating blobs, they’re easy to avoid, and, above all, it’s not just fun. You’d think a game with aerokinetic forces would be the breeding ground for something entertaining here, but you’d be wrong to do so.
If I can end on a positive note, it’s that the one-to-one motion of the mouse is a lot more fluid this time around compared to the first game, where I felt the initial Wiiware intentions had limited the capabilities of the port.
Graphically, Lostwinds 2 bears the hallmarks of its predecessor, which were already quite good and consequently hold up well here. I won’t go into too much detail since I explained it enough in my review of the first (https://www.backloggd.com/games/lostwinds/), but you got blocky, colorfully-adorned 3D characters that match up well against more 2D backdrops.
One of the things I really appreciated was the amount of small animations the developers programmed with regards to wind impact- you swipe the cursor in four different directions, and each cardinal yields a unique reaction on the NPC or object it’s hitting; you hit Toku while he’s hanging off a cliff edge and he’ll roll over as though beckoned by a squall; smack some trees and snow falls off it (but only once!); stand on a glacial sheet and Toku slides as though he’s wearing ice skates.
Ice, as a whole, yielded its own visual delights- giant crystal stalagmites act like funhouse mirrors that project Toku’s persona, while manipulating flames through rimy enclaves generate orangey, blurry glares. It’s not surprising to see the extravagances put up in later Frontier Development’s games considering what they were able to accomplish with a limited budget for LostWinds.
The sound is honestly another downside to the title. I didn’t like the music at all- most of it doesn’t stand out, and the tracks that do are more irate than pleasant. The title screen (which simultaneously operates for emotional leitmotifs) is like a modernized version of the old Lavender Town theme, while battle music is the same Asiany stringed instrument piece repeated ad nauseam.
Sound effects range from adequate to outright bad. The soothing sound of a blaze is always nice (despite the streams only being damaging at the tip, not the body) and splashing water syncs well with the fall of the droplets on the ground. However, this is contrasted with most of your wind moves surprisingly not having any associated din, the ones that do coming off as pretty stocky sounding. Getting rid of ice blocks or icicles via collision literally sounds like a baseball shattering a glass window, and the less said about the squawking of the glob toons the better. Taking everything into consideration, it’s not surprising that the mixers deliberately dampened the SFX. And as there is no voice acting, there is nothing to say on that front.
So in the end, Lostwinds 2, like the first one, isn’t recommendable by my book. The motion is more synchronous, but story and gameplay that don’t live up to their potential knock it down several pegs. Combined with backtracking galore and you got a platformer that just barely made the cut over shovelware.