PLATFORM: PC, PS5, SWITCH, XBOX SERIES (REVIEWED) | RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW
More than twenty years years since we last saw Kain and his goth mates from the dark fantasy Legacy of Kain games (if you don’t include the recent remasters, that is), the series has been resurrected for a brand new instalment. Ascendance moves away from its predecessors’ 3D formula, instead taking the form of a side-scrolling 2D action platformer with both feet firmly planted on the “retro inspired” side of the room. With its simple gameplay and chunky Game Boy Advance style pixel art visuals, it very much feels like a throwback to days gone by, although admittedly it does seem like a slightly odd decision to make such a departure when the series is so well known for a particular style of gameplay.
The game’s twelve chapters are relatively short, lasting 2-3 hours in total, and largely consist of very straightforward platforming. At various points in the game, you’ll play as series stalwarts Kain and Raziel as well as newcomer Elaleth, each equipped with a single weapon to attack whatever’s in front of them. They all have their own unique ability too – as a vampire, Elaleth can dive down from the air to quickly attack enemies, while Kain can turn into a flock of bats to cross large distances and Raziel is able to throw holy flasks that burn enemies. It’s fairly rudimentary stuff, and the level design follows a similar philosophy – apart from a few levels that ask you to make your way up to higher platforms, there’s very little in the way of platforming challenges or any sort of level variety. The controls can be a bit stiff too, again evoking memories of games from a less refined era, which those who are old enough to remember the Legacy of Kain series from their younger days might perhaps appreciate a little more than modern players would do.
Other than giving those older players a chance to see what some old pals have been up to after all these years, Ascendance doesn’t quite do enough to stand out. Its gameplay is very simplistic and straightforward, lacking any sort of unique mechanic or interesting gimmick to hook you in, and while the visuals are appealing in a retro sort of way and the soundtrack features some nice Doom-esque metal, the overall package feels a little bit undercooked. It’s lovely to hear new lines recorded by the original game’s voice actors (including Breaking Bad‘s Skyler, Anna Gunn) but its brief length, lack of challenge and confusing narrative (based on the fan-funded 2025 comic, The Dead Shall Rise) mean that this one is definitely best suited for hardcore Kain completists.
PLATFORM: PC, PS5, XBOX SERIES (REVIEWED) | RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW
Oh boy, this is going to be a tricky one! Crimson Desert, from Korean developer Pearl Abyss, started life as a follow-up to the beloved MMO Black Desert Online, before plans changed and the game turned into a massive (like, really massive) single-player RPG. It borrows so many systems from such a wide range of games that we’d be here all day if we tried to list them all, but let’s have a brief attempt at giving you a few examples of what to expect:
Fishing, horse racing, gambling, mining, bounties, cooking, crafting, collecting materials, researching new abilities, tons of upgradeable gear with unique perks, interchangeable abilities, skill trees, additional characters to swap between, camp management, the list goes on. We’re really only just scratching the surface here – it seems like if an RPG mechanics is worth having, Crimson Desert has most likely got it, but despite the plethora of well-used mechanics leading to an overwhelming sense of comfort and familiarity, it manages to end up feeling like its own thing.
Stepping into the role of Kliff, a member of the Greymane faction on a quest to find his followers who have been scattered across the land after being attacked by Myurdin and his Black Bears, you’ll work your way through a main questline split across 14 chapters and almost 170 missions. Along the way, you’ll meet countless factions who require your assistance, leading to hundreds of additional side quests. While its story isn’t the greatest – it amounts to “find your mates and beat the evil man” – and the quality of the dialogue is questionable at best, there’s so much to do that the path that you take through the game is likely to be uniquely your own.
The first three or four chapters serve as an extended tutorial, sending you on endless fetch quests while introducing you to the game’s main mechanics and systems. It can honestly be a bit of a slog to get through, and things don’t really get going until you reach chapter 6 or 7 (potentially 50+ hours into the game…), by which time you will have got the hang of what the game expects of you and everything starts to feel like it’s all coming together. Even then though, there are likely to be plenty of things that don’t quite make sense, and there will be a lot of skills and abilities (and indeed entire questlines) that you’ve barely touched. Crimson Desert has a habit of introducing things too quickly, giving you new quests, activities and toys to play with way before you’re anywhere near being ready to handle them. For some, that might be part of the charm – you’re given a ridiculous amount of possibilities, and it’s totally up to you if you want to work your way towards being able to tackle them effectively – but others might be frustrated by the overall lack of direction.
While exploring Crimson Desert‘s five distinct areas, you’ll come across plenty of puzzles, which prove to be one of the game’s strongest points. Many of them are extremely obtuse and are often solved with either a very keen eye (clues can be found through determined exploration) or simply a lucky guess. Others, such as the sprawling puzzle-platforming Abyss – a series of floating islands that are almost big enough to count as a seperate game all of their own – are more skill-based, challenging you to use the abilities that you’ve gained to find the solutions to its many problems. Offering much-needed Abyss Artifacts (upgrade tokens) as a reward for completing each puzzle, having to solve at least a few of these puzzles is almost unavoidable, but those of a more cerebral nature are likely to find them very enjoyable indeed.
Crimson Desert‘s other highlight is its combat, which feels weighty and impactful no matter which type of weapon you choose to wield. There are plenty to choose from, including one-handed swords and maces, two-handed longswords and axes, and bows with a variety of arrows. As you progress, you’ll learn how to find and equip Abyss Cores to your weapons and armour, adding new moves and abilities to your loadout, as well as unlocking additional abilities within Kliff’s skill tree. It takes a while to get there, but when everything finally clicks into place, it’s some of the finest RPG combat of this console generation. It’s a slight shame, then, that boss fights – despite often being memorable in design – aren’t the most engaging, with repeated fights, bosses that flee before you can kill them, and victory depending more often than not on whether you remembered to bring enough healing items with you.
After reaching the end of the story, you’re likely to have a lot of side content to work through, whether that’s hunting legendary beasts, flying your dragon around just for a laugh, creating outlandish weapons and tools in the Kuku kiln, or mopping up faction quests. Spending more time in Crimson Desert‘s world is no bad thing, as the environment is an absolute treat in the visual department. On high-end PCs the scenery is almost jaw-droppingly beautiful, and although consoles fare slightly less well it’s still an incredibly handsome game whichever platform you play on.
With so much going on, Crimson Desert is an extremely ambitious and unique game. For everything that it does right, it seems to take slight mis-steps at the same time. Exploration is fantastic but the controls are peculiar to say the least, combat is excellent but the rewards for completing missions rarely feel satisfying, there’s an admirable variety of characters and enemies but the dialogue and voice acting leave something to be desired… There’s a truly exceptional game in there, but there’s also a lot of things that seem to stand in the way of letting you fully enjoy it. Whether that’s down to the game’s Korean origins and its sensibilities not quite translating well to a western audience, a hangover from its early days as an MMO that’s been repurposed as a single-player title, or if it’s just questionable game design, is something that could be debated for years to come. Several patches have already been deployed in the couple of weeks since release to address the most egregious shortcomings, so there’s hope that over time it might become a slightly more friendly game to play.
So how does one give Crimson Desert a score? There are plenty of undeniably great elements to it, its ambition should absolutely be applauded, and the fact that they even got such an insane piece of work to function (almost) properly in the first place is almost miraculous. At the same time though, the structure of the game and its pacing make it difficult to really get fully invested, for every positive aspect of its gameplay there’s also a negative to counteract it, and the lack of an engaging narrative means that there’s nothing to really push you through those opening few dozen hours other than a heck of a lot of busywork with very little reward. When it hits its stride though, it turns into the sort of game that’s difficult to put down, but frustrations can build up over time and lead to an overwhelming sense of apathy. The need for changes and updates is pretty clear, but the potential is definitely there for Crimson Desert to become something very special in the future. For now, a solid 6 out of 10. Just make sure you’ve got plenty of time to spare…
PLATFORM: PC, PS5, SWITCH 2, XBOX SERIES (REVIEWED) | RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW
The WWE 2K series has been on a pretty good run over the last few years. Since a bit of a mis-step in 2020 (and a year off in 2021), developer Visual Concepts returned with a vastly improved instalment in 2022 and has continued to build on those foundations with each passing year. WWE 2K26 follows tradition by adding a handful of “new” match types, updating the roster of playable wrestlers and tweaking a few bits and pieces to tidy things up, but also – for the first time in quite a while – takes a couple of fairly notable steps backwards.
Four new match types have been introduced, alongside the insane amount of existing list of possible bouts. Inferno matches take place in a ring surrounded by flames, with the first person to send their opponent through the ropes and onto the floor emerging victorious, while Three Stages of Hell allows you to play a best-of-three match across any three match types of your choosing. The other two additions are very similar to existing matches – I Quit matches task you with making your opponent say “I quit” into a microphone, in a variation on the standard Submission match, and Dumpster matches work exactly the same way as Casket and Ambulance matches (throw your opponent in and close the door / lid), but they’re sort of funnier because you get to throw someone into a massive bin. Elsewhere, Backstage Brawls have been expanded with new areas to fight in, allowing either 1v1 or multiman bouts to take place across either an indoor backstage area, an outside parking lot, a scrapyard or the WWE Archives warehouse (a particular highlight for longtime fans, with easter eggs aplenty tucked away in the background). There are a lot more climbable sections this time around, giving you the opportunity to throw opponents off high ledges and into breakable furniture below, as well as countless weapons littering each area. Rules can be tweaked too, so you’re not restricted to the knockout rule of old, allowing you to continue battering your foes until you’re ready to bring things to a close.
After 2K25 capitalised on the success of the WWE’s “Bloodline” storyline by featuring it as its main cast members in the game’s Showcase mode, 2K26 opts for following a single wrestler – CM Punk – through some of his most memorable matches, asking players to meet a variety of objectives along the way. It doesn’t quite live up to its predecessor, but there are some fun touches towards the end as Punk takes the place of legends to take part in historical dream matches. Another returning mode, MyRise, is once again split across a male and female character, with neither story really featuring any real surprises or high points, although worth playing through to acquire the various cosmetics and unlockable roster members that are hidden throughout the storyline. MyGM mode is as fun as always, allowing you to manage your roster and book shows against human or computer-controlled opponents to see who can gain the most fans. While 2K25‘s mode was fairly limited in terms of which matches you were able to book, 2K26 expands the amount of available match types, making it the best version of the mode that Visual Concepts has created so far. MyUniverse has also been expanded, but unfortunately, at the time of writing, contains a lot of bugs that could do with being squashed before it lives up to its potential.
Over on the online side of things, though, 2K26 starts to stumble a bit. This year’s return to The Island – the WWE-themed park where your created character takes part in all manner of unusual storylines – and the card-building MyFaction mode both suffer from unusually difficult matches, with unfeasibly tricky objectives and opponents that seem to counter every other move. Alongside this, a new secondary stamina bar comes into play, which might be the worst thing to happen to the series in its entire history. Taking effect when your regular stamina bar has been depleted, your movement speed slows down and you’re completely unable to run or reverse opponent’s attacks for a limited time. This severely impacts your momentum, offering your opponent a bit too much in the way of an advantage – computer-controlled opponents rarely seem to suffer from it, so it feels like it’s solely there to punish the player. It’s possible to switch this off during most matches, but user settings don’t apply in MyFaction or The Island, so fans of those modes will still have to contend with it. This combination of higher difficulty and seemingly unfair stamina penalties might see some players tapping out of these modes earlier than usual.
Lastly, a mention of 2K26‘s DLC model, which managed to cause a bit of unrest when it was initially announced. A lot of the game’s unlockables are accessed through a “Ringside Pass”, two tiers of which are available – one free, and one “premium”. As you play the game, you automatically earn “RXP” which ranks up your Ringside Pass level (to a maximum of 40), with each new level rewarding you with customisation items, belts, arenas, new characters, and in-game currency to spend in the game’s microtransaction-filled MyFaction and The Island. While it initially seemed that players would have to grind out all 40 levels of the Ringside Pass with every single DLC release, it has been confirmed that downloadable wrestlers will be accessible from the very first level of the Pass. Whether all 40 levels of forthcoming Premium tiers will unlock immediately if your “free” Pass is already maxed out, or if players will need to grind the entire way through with each DLC release, is currently unknown, but hopefully answers will be forthcoming when the first downloadable content pack is released later this month.
WWE 2K26 has absolutely got some of the best gameplay of the series to date (especially if you turn that purple bar off…), but it’s unfortunate that it also takes some big steps backwards with a couple of the game modes that in previous years have proved to be some of its most engaging. Consequently, 2K26 as an overall package doesn’t quite reach the heights of its predecessor, but the new additions and improvements to its gameplay still make it an enticing prospect for those who want to switch off and throw people around for fun.
PLATFORM: PC, PS5, XBOX SERIES (REVIEWED) | RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW
Closely following the familiar action RPG formula, Dragonkin asks players to save the world by stepping into the shoes of one of four classes – a knight (tank), barbarian (brawler), oracle (mage) or tracker (ranged) – and fighting through a roughly 12-hour campaign. An isometric looter along the same lines as Diablo, Torchlight 2 and Path of Exile, Dragonkin differentiates itself from its peers with its levelling system. Your skills, once acquired, must be slotted into a hexagonal Ancestral Grid which expands as you level up, allowing you to add more perks and mods to your five main abilities. Throughout the course of the game you’ll amass a huge variety of buffs and skills to choose from, all potentially linking to each other on the grid to add buffs to their neighbouring tiles. When combined with the huge amounts of equippable loot that you find during quests, you end up with an almost overwhelming amount of options when it comes to building your character, giving even the most demanding player more choice than they could possibly need.
The main campaign is fairly standard stuff as far as ARPGs go, and will feel familiar to anyone who’s played pretty much any other game in the genre. Alongside the Ancestral Grid though, you’re also responsible for multiple skill trees linked to not only your character’s attributes (health, energy, armour, that sort of thing) and those of your wyrmling (your pet / assistant) but also the entire city of Montescail, which acts as the game’s main hub. By upgrading the various different areas of the city, you’ll gain access to even more perks and buffs that affects your character, wyrmling and overall stats.
Post-story, you gain access to the War Room where you can continue to improve your character by going on hunts – quests with modifiers that affect your abilities, enemy behaviours and even the surrounding environment. Other than these modifiers though, there’s not a huge amount of difference between these hunts and the quests that you play during the campaign, but there are a couple of other mini-mission / dungeon crawling diversions and several difficulty settings so you can keep on grinding away to improve your gear if the game really clicks with you.
While not as fully featured as some of its contemporaries, Dragonkin provides a decent amount of fun. The Ancestral Grid adds an enjoyable way to customise your abilities, but the endgame might not quite live up to those found in similar games. If you’re looking for a break from any regular ARPG favourites, it’s well worth considering giving this one a try.
PLATFORM: PC, PS4/5, SWITCH 2, XBOX ONE/SERIES (REVIEWED) | RELEASE DATE OUT NOW
Set amongst the floating islands of the Oneiric Isles, Dread Delusion casts players in the role of Prisoner XVII, released by a higher power to assist in taking down Vela Callose, an outlaw mercenary and the most wanted criminal in all of the Skyrealms. But it isn’t a simple case of just tracking Vela down and taking her into custody – the land has fallen victim to an undead curse, brought about by the apocalyptic “World Rend” which saw any survivors fleeing to the sky to escape the horrors that now roam the surface. Employed by the Apostatic Union, you’ll travel the Isles – and the ground below them – to locate powerful allies to help the fight against Vela, while also dealing with cultists, mutants, clandestine god-worshippers (very much a prohibited activity, for reasons that will become clear) and all manner of unearthly distractions.
Inspired by late 90s / early 2000s RPGs of the PS1 era, Dread Delusion doesn’t hand out quests willy-nilly like modern games do. Instead, it’s up to you to seek things out for yourself. Talking to NPCs or reading the text on a poster might lead to the acquisition of a useful item, or it could just as easily send you off on a multi-part questline that you would otherwise have completely missed out on. Thankfully, the writing is fantastic – almost everything ties into the central story in some way or other, so it never feels like characters are waffling away with nothing interesting to say. Layers of intrigue are added to the main storyline at every turn, immersing you deeper into the world and encouraging you to speak to anyone (and anything) you can find in order to delve further into the game’s mysteries.
Your map is slowly pieced together as you explore the world around you, although you’re never given any quest markers. Your journal contains enough information to be able to keep track of where you need to go, but you’ll still need to keep plenty of mental notes if you want to traverse the Isles without getting lost. The places you’ll discover are visually arresting in a way that’s rarely seen these days – many of the game’s locations you’ll visit are incredibly striking – the late-game Clockwork Kingdom area deserves particular praise – and the blocky 32-bit visuals give the whole game an otherworldly feeling. Combined with the creative character and enemy design and an almost melancholic (yet fantastic) soundtrack, Dread Delusion offers a surreal dreamlike atmosphere that makes you want to keep exploring just to see what you might come across next.
Exploration and talking to NPCs form the bulk of the gameplay, but you’ll do a fair bit of fighting as well. Combat very much takes a back seat though, and contending with the various monsters and bandits is quite a rudimentary affair, slashing with your sword and taking a step back or quickly blocking to avoid getting hit before moving forwards again to get another strike in. Spells and ranged weapons come into play too, depending on the stats you choose to focus on and the character you decide to build. It brings to mind the classic FromSoft series King’s Field, or pre-OblivionElder Scrolls – very evocative of the era that Dread Delusion is replicating, but not necessarily up to scratch when measured against modern combat mechanics. There are other RPG elements thrown in too, with your stats dictating how successful you’re likely to be with various actions like lockpicking, charming NPCs into giving more information away, sneaking and of course fighting, and you’re able to collect items that can be used to create potions and strengthen your weapons and armour. There’s nothing too deep or overwhelming, and you don’t have to spend too long messing around in menus to get anything done, but at the same time there’s more than enough to keep RPG fans happy.
Almost two years after its full 1.0 PC release, Dread Delusion has now made its way to consoles, complete with all previous content including an additional dungeon (set inside a giant mollusc), a hard mode, and other tweaks and touches. Visually stunning, excellently written and supremely engaging in a what-the-hell-is-going-on sort of way, this otherworldly adventure is one not to be missed.
PLATFORM: PC, PS4/5, SWITCH, XBOX ONE/SERIES (REVIEWED) | RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW (SWITCH TBC)
As many retro game fans will be able to attest, being accustomed to modern gaming sensibilities can make revisiting older titles feel like a bit of a bugger, to put it politely. Uncooperative camera angles, unwieldy control schemes and a general lack of what we now know as “quality of life” features can often stand in the way of a good time, making revisiting retro classics feel more like a chore than a pleasure. 2003’s Legacy of Kain: Defiance is one such example – an excellent game marred by such an unfriendly fixed camera that even players at the time realised how much of a hindrance it was. This new remaster from PlayEveryWare seeks to address the original’s shortcomings and finish the journey that modern players might have embarked upon with previous remasters of earlier entries in the series in 2024.
Graphical upgrades offer the choice between classic or modern visuals and the ability to switch between the two at the press of a button, and the new control scheme feels much more in line with those found in today’s titles (so you won’t be fighting the urge to press familiar buttons only to find that you’ve performed a completely different action to the one you expected). The newly-introduced free camera allows players to move their viewpoint around whenever they want, making platforming and gliding sections much easier to navigate and allowing players to take in the surrounding gothic architecture and experience the game in ways that haven’t been possible until now. It’s easy to underestimate how much of a difference camera angles can make – just this enhancement alone elevates the game massively, making it a much stronger recommendation for returning players and newcomers alike.
Elsewhere, Defiance: Remastered includes a comprehensive compendium of series-related ephemera, including the opening movie from the 2003 original, an illustrated history of Nosgoth that traces the paths taken by the game’s dual protagonists, Kain and Raziel, concept art, alternate character skins, a music player, photo mode and countless other odds and ends from across the entire series. There are also nine “lost levels”, along with a playable section of Defiance‘s cancelled sequel, Dark Prophecy. The main game’s combat and level design are rather “of their time”, and the remastered characters maybe don’t quite have the same moody and menacing appearance as their 2003 predecessors but, other than that, this is an excellent remaster that deserves a place in any retro fan’s collection.
PLATFORM: PC, PS5, XBOX SERIES (REVIEWED) | RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW
Originally released in August 2025, this linear third-person action adventure follows lead character Ryn, born with the ability to wield an ancient magic power, on a quest to rescue her brother and defend her homeland from a war that threatens to being the world to the brink of collapse. Coinciding with its arrival on PS Plus, a recent “Enhanced Edition” update has attempted to address many of the issues that players initially encountered, with refined combat, new animations, and more responsive controls, as well as introducing an equipment system that allows players to equip ability-changing relics and experiment with a variety of gameplay styles and builds. There’s also a more balanced difficulty option, New Game Plus mode, a very welcome performance patch, and plenty of other tweaks that refine and enhance the overall experience.
Largely flying under the radar since its release, at first glance Echoes of the End might not look too different from many other games, but its easy to grasp sword and magic-based combat, entertaining powers, intricate puzzles, constantly evolving mechanics and beautiful Icelandic-inspired landscapes prove to be an incredibly satisfying combination. The first hour or so might feel a little slow, as the game takes its time to introduce its movement and combat mechanics, but by the time you reach chapter three or four (of ten in total) you start to amass a decent amount of upgrades to Ryn’s abilities, allowing her to chain heavy strikes, parry enemy attacks, and use magic to hurl enemies around the screen or drain their life to replenish your health bar, as well as combining skills with her companion, Abram, who assists in battle by stunning, tripping and grabbing enemies, allowing Ryn to close in for brutal execution moves.
The further you get into the game, the more vicious its enemies become, and the puzzles and environmental challenges become increasingly unusual and tricky to solve, making each area interesting, engaging and, most importantly, fun to explore. With its most glaring issues seemingly addressed by the Enhanced Edition update, Echoes of the End is one of those games that may well surprise you with how good it really is. Sure, there are still a few rough edges here and there, but it’s still a fantastic effort from a small dev team that fans of fantasy-inspired action-adventure games should have a really good time with.
PLATFORM: PC, PS5, XBOX SERIES (REVIEWED) | RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW
Inspired by 20th century Spanish folklore, Crisol: Theater of Idols casts players in the role of Gabriel Escudero, a divine soldier of the Sun God, sent to the Hispanic island of Tormentosa where a war is brewing between the followers of the Sun and the Sea. Combining the atmosphere of BioShockwith the survival horror elements of Resident Evil and mixing in twisted versions of real-world historical events and religious overtones, Crisol proves to be one of the most surprising games of the year so far.
From the outset, you’re introduced to one of the game’s most unique gimmicks. Each shot that you fire from your weapon uses a small amount of Gabriel’s blood, and refilling an empty gun will take a fair chunk of his health bar away. You’re able to carry a small amount of syringes to replenish your supply, as well as draining blood from any animal or human corpses that you might find lying around, but finding the right balance eventually leads to some incredibly tense situations. The tension is ramped up even further by some incredible sound design and the unsettling atmosphere of the various locations you’ll explore throughout the game, making sure that you never quite know what to expect at any given moment. And that’s before we even get to the creepy puppet-like enemies that require a little more than mere headshots to take down, as well as the Mr. X-like Dolores, a hulking unkillable monstrosity that stalks Gabriel through various sections of the game.
In true survival horror fashion, there are plenty of well thought-out puzzles to solve, unhinged characters to meet, lore to uncover, mysteries that unfold over the course of the game’s four chapters, a variety of weapons, collectibles to find, and an upgrade system that allows you to increase Gabriel’s firepower as well as learning a few handy skills and perks. It’s true that there are dozens – if not hundreds – of indie survival horror games out there, but very few manage to pull all of their influences together into a coherent package as successfully as this one. Crisol: Theater of Idols is a stunning example of what can be achieved by a small team, and should absolutely be on the radar of anyone with even a passing interest in the genre.
PLATFORM: PC, PS5 (REVIEWED), XBOX SERIES | RELEASE DATE: 26TH FEBRUARY
Returning to semi-normality after the strange and otherworldly events of Resident Evil 8: Village, RE9: Requiem kicks off at FBI HQ where a man’s body has been found in an abandoned hotel. It’s the latest discovery in a series of mysterious deaths in which confirmed survivors of the Raccoon City incident have been found lifeless, covered with black bruises. Technical analyst Grace Ashcroft is tasked with investigating the hotel, reluctantly agreeing to head to the crime scene and revisit the same building where her mother – RE: Outbreak‘s Alyssa Ashcroft – was was killed eight years ago. There, she meets former Umbrella researcher Victor Gideon, who seems to have had an eye on Grace for quite some time… Meanwhile, series favourite Leon S. Kennedy arrives at the scene just in time to see Gideon leaving the hotel with Grace draped over his shoulder. Heading to Gideon’s only known property, the Rhodes Hill care centre, Leon and Grace’s paths cross through alternating chapters as they both try to figure out what’s going on…
Requiem‘s dual protagonist approach seems to be an attempt to combine the stealthy scare-based gameplay of RE7: Biohazard with the kind of full-on action found in RE8: Village (and, indeed, series benchmark Resi 4). Played from a first-person perspective (which can be changed to third, if you prefer), Grace spends a fair bit of time running and hiding from enemies, throwing bottles to distract them before sneaking past without engaging them directly. She’s still more than capable of holding her own with firearms when the need arises, but her limited inventory space means that she isn’t able to carry much more than a basic handgun. On the other side of the coin, Leon is much more adept at meeting his foes head-on with a wide range of firepower and also up-close with his hatchet. The way the story is structured means that you’ll play as one character for a while until specific points in the story – usually involving some sort of cliffhanger – dictate that it’s the other character’s time to take over. You do get to spend a fairly lengthy amount of time with each, though, as Grace mostly investigates the Rhodes Hill centre alone before Leon takes the spotlight for the majority of the game’s second half.
Whichever character you’re playing as, gameplay largely follows the standard Resident Evil formula. You’ll explore your surroundings, scavenging for ammo and hunting for items that will help you to solve puzzles to progress further into the game, while dealing with infected enemies that stalk the building’s enclosed corridors. Apart from one or two slightly more obtuse moments, Requiem‘s puzzles aren’t the strongest or most difficult, mostly relying on finding specific items and using them in the right place, but what it might lack in mental challenges is made up for in abundance with some of the best combat and set-pieces the series has seen for a long time.
Fighting Requiem‘s hordes of shambling infected feels magnificent – whether you’re going toe-to-toe in melee combat or popping heads with your preferred gun, your attacks look and feel incredibly satisfying, with snappy gunfire, weighty axe swings and plenty of blood and gore flying around the place, all taken to the next level with some fantastic sound design that makes even the weakest enemies seem truly threatening, really making you feel like you’re fighting for your life. Some really well-directed set-pieces ramp up the tension even more, and there are some particularly exhilarating moments that shouldn’t really be spoken about because they’re absolutely best left for you to discover on your own; it’s enough to say that they easily stand shoulder to shoulder with some of the best moments in the series.
When playing as Leon, you’ll earn credits for each enemy killed, which can then be spent on items, weapons and upgrades, although many of the game’s best weaponry is locked behind “challenges” which are found in the pause menu (and only become available after beating the game once). Here, you’ll earn additional credits for completing challenges (which seem to be tied to the game’s achievements / trophies) which are then spent in a “bonus content” menu to unlock in-game items as well as concept art and the now-expected figurines. Given the game’s relatively short length (around 10 hours for a first attempt) and the absence of New Game Plus or Mercenaries modes, these unlockables do a decent job of giving you something to work towards in repeat playthroughs, especially when some of the locked items are well worth getting your hands on if you want to attempt the game’s highest difficulty setting.
More in line with the Resident Evil 2-4 remakes than its immediate mainline predecessors, Requiem is an excellent action game that pays homage to its past while seemingly confirming its intentions to move forward in a more action-oriented direction. Its story is engaging, the characters and enemies are menacing, reuniting with Leon is like meeting up with an old friend to find that they’re just as cool as they always were, and the sublime combat and thrilling set-pieces all make for a really excellent entry into the series. Those hoping for a return to the slower-paced gameplay of older Resi titles might not quite find what they’re looking for, but fans of Biohazard, Village, and the aforementioned remakes will absolutely be in their element.
PLATFORM: PC, PS5, XBOX SERIES (REVIEWED) | RELEASE DATE: 11TH FEBRUARY
When a new game from Grasshopper Manufacture appears, you pretty much immediately know what to expect. Goichi Suda’s notoriously demented company has been responsible for countless cult favourites over the years, including Shadows of the Damned, No More Heroes and Killer7, games that might not have quite fully broken into the mainstream but nevertheless are highly regarded in certain circles thanks to their wacky characters, memorable visuals, unique mechanics and steadfast refusal to adhere to accepted game design conventions. Romeo Is A Dead Man very much follows suit, although it definitely seems like a conscious decision has been made to rein in some of Grasshopper’s quirkier tendencies.
When young policeman Romeo Stargazer finds an injured woman lying in the road, events take a turn for the worst and he finds himself at the brink of death. Revived by his grandfather, who now exists as a cheerful emblem on the back of his jacket, Romeo has become a half-dead man – or Dead Man for short. If this wasn’t unbelievable enough, Romeo soon joins forces with the FBI Space-Time Police aboard an intergalactic starship known as Last Night, where his job is to hunt and eliminate space pirates who are hiding across time and space. At the same time, there’s also the small matter of Juliet, the mysterious lady who Romeo rescued on that fateful night that turned his life upside down and the person who ultimately becomes the centre of this entire story…
Each chapter of the game’s story is set in a different 20th century time period (well, almost each chapter…), although the gameplay mostly remains the same throughout. As Romeo, you’ll explore each location fighting countless Rotters – shambling zombie-like humans and grotesque mutants – dipping in and out of a neon-soaked wireframe alternate dimension known as subspace to track down keys that will eventually give access to the chapter’s boss. Romeo is equipped with a variety of unlockable and upgradeable melee weapons and firearms, giving you the choice of hacking and slashing away at close-up enemies or shooting out their weak spots from afar. Melee combat feels especially good, with weighty attacks resulting in noisy and colourful showers of blood. You’re also able to collect seeds from some defeated enemies, which can then be planted back on your ship. These seeds grow into Bastards, helpful friendly Rotters who can be equipped and used as special attacks, giving Romeo the ability to wield tornadoes, bowling balls, lasers and more.
Occasional puzzles break up proceedings now and again, but subspace might prove to be the game’s trickiest puzzle of all, with its labyrinthine corridors and focus on finding what appear to be giant marbles that will, after being manipulated into place, create new platforms allowing you to move further into the level. Adding in the need to enter and leave subspace through multiple portals that only open after completing specific objectives, these areas can be quite confusing at times and have an unfortunate habit of slightly outstaying their welcome.
Despite this minor grumble, Romeo Is A Dead Man is one of the more straightforward, accessible and mechanically sound games in SUDA51’s repertoire. The humour isn’t quite as brash and juvenile as something like No More Heroes, but the overall atmosphere retains the edgy punk vibe that the studio has become known for. Grasshopper Manufacture are clearly doing things on their own terms, creating games that stand out from the crowd by never quite doing what you expect them to do, and for that they should absolutely be applauded.
