Despite still being a much debated topic among gamers, I'm fairly certain that many here would agree with the notion that gameplay isn't necessarily the end all be all core of a videogame that validates it in the eyes of its critics, with many well renowned beloved classics owing a fair deal of their reputation and prestige to their presentation and art style, in some cases exclusively so. It's a fine line between the legwork a videogame's interactivity does and the heavy lifting its audiovisual design achieves, some works being so successful in that tug of war that they are able to ride on the coattails of their aesthetic alone. Does El Shaddai pull it off?

Sort of. It's an inspired visual kaleidoscope of arresting fantastical landscapes that reinterpret ancient hebrew religious text depicting the kingdom of the fallen angels who caused the Great Flood through cel shaded watercolored vignettes and bright vivid shades that still stand the test of time. My issues with El Shaddai however rest in its ability to use its biggest strength to communicate the imagery and themes of the source material it tries to interpret.

Putting aside the serviceable combat mechanics that are the bulk of the gameplay experience and reach their apex short of the halfway point, El Shaddai struggles with keeping the player invested in its storyline, hoping that its visual splendor suffices. The disparate tonal shifts, lackluster cast and off the wall liberties the game indulges on, while leading to some successful endeavours like the fantastic rendition of Azazel's domain in Chapter 6, more often than not end up with vacuous and dry shallow confrontations that fail to explore and engage with the text besides superficial tracing of it.

A videogame doesn't necessarily need gameplay, but it's not enough to just be beautiful. In contrast to Okami's reverence for the Shinto religion, El Shaddai is not able to convey the power, majesty and beauty of the imagery it apes from, despite how grandiose and colorful it wants you to see it as. Still, El Shaddai is a curious oddity that baffingly got greenlit during the 7th gen of consoles, and the acid trip is more than worth the price of admission. But you can sort of understand why it never turned into an ICO or a Rez in its proceeding years.

Some good jump scares and atmosphere killed by pacing and story issues.

Bought this on a whim as I love sci-fi horror (Dead Space, Aliens, Event Horizon, Soma etc.) and the start of the game is pretty promising moving around a creepy space station on Mars, as the game progresses however that tantalizing promise slowly falls apart.

The issue seems to be this game doesn't know quite what it wants to be. The story beats seem inconsistent with several arcs of mega corporations, cosmic horror, and sci-fi survival all mixed together but without the narrative thread or gameplay actions to tie them all together. It feels too much like several different game ideas put in one place and the result is that the pacing of the game feels unbalanced. One second a creepy oppressive atmosphere of a cloying nightmare, the next drearily playing mini games to fix solar panels. While I am all for down time to give the player time to compartmentalize and react, this just doesn't work here and I found the ending with it very unsatisfying.

That's not to say it's all bad, there are some genuinely disturbing moments that made me jump. The visuals are quite good for a title on a budget and I loved the more down to earth sci-fi designs of the base and equipment its just a shame it couldn't pull all the threads together it was trying to weave.

+ Nice sci-fi base and equipment designs.
+ Atmospheric at times.
+ Some good jump scares.

- The game is inconsistent it what it wants to be.
- The story can't pull all the pieces together in a satisfying way.
- Pacing is all over the place.