Playlist (May 2021) (Patreon)

Hello Patreon people. It's time for the playlist, where I talk about some of the games I've been playing lately. You can watch it as a video or read it as an article. 

Resident Evil VIII: Village

Okay, let's start with May's biggest new game: Resident Evil 8. This is a first-person horror game, that follows the storyline and characters of Resident Evil 7.

This time we're in a ramshackle European village, and instead of fighting the traditional zombies that the franchise is known for - we're blasting away at werewolves and vampires. Including one character who has become a fan favourite: an unusually tall and rather busty vampire lady. Who is, actually, not in the game for very long. Kind of reminds me of Vaas from Far Cry 3: an excellent baddy who disappears in favour of some generic, forgettable villain.

Anyway: gameplay wise, this is a pretty fine horror game. I really liked the semi-open world hub at the centre of the game's world. You can really explore to your heart's content, come back with new items to unlock more areas, and find hidden treasure after following clues and puzzles.

But there are two drawbacks. One is something Resident Evil has done for a while now: its got a map where rooms are coloured red if there are still items left to be found, and blue if you've discovered everything. And so the optimum way to play is to keep pulling up the map and not leaving a room until you've found every last item. It's slow and tedious, but hard to avoid when supplies are so important.

However: if you really stick around and get everything, it's quite easy to become slightly overpowered. In the last area of the game I had so much ammo for my upgraded weapons that even the biggest monsters felt like cannon fodder Imps in a Doom game. The balance was just way off. I guess it's my reward for being a scavenger - but it didn't lead to a great gameplay experience.

The game is neatly split up into chunks, and one area stands out more than others. In this part, your weapons are taken away and you have to solve puzzles rather than shoot monsters. But then - the monsters do show up and you're still unarmed so you've now got to run, hide, and try to escape. It's a good, memorable part of the game.

Overall, I did enjoy Village. The setting and campy tone reminded me of Resident Evil 4, the gunplay was pretty satisfying, and there are some good bits. But I'd say the game's biggest problem is inconsistency: you never know if you're going to get some great level design with memorable characters or some boring areas with annoying villains and unbalanced gameplay. It's a roll of the dice.

Returnal

Returnal comes from Housemarque: a Finnish firm known for indie arcade games like Resogun and Nex Machina. But, fed up with low sales, they decided to go all-in on a big blockbuster PS5 exclusive: Returnal.

Never fear, though: the game's still got arcade and indie roots. It's a third person shooter but with a generous dash for zipping through colourful projectiles. And it's got arcade-y combo systems like a kill streak and an active reload. And, heck, the whole thing is a roguelike with randomly generated levels and permadeath.

For the most part, I really enjoyed Returnal. The basic combat loop never stops being enjoyable, the mysterious world and story encouraged me to explore further, and I really dig the progression system. The game gives you serious rewards with permanent consequences - like new abilities and shortcuts. But you only get them by making serious progress or beating bosses: so it's not about grinding to success. It's more about marking your accomplishments with something that will make future runs more interesting and fun.

My only real bug bears are, one: a lack of variety from run-to-run. Major rooms are identical every time, the random rooms reappear over and over again, and there just aren't many ways to dramatically change your character's abilities. It sometimes doesn't feel like a roguelike at all: just a normal game with very unforgiving checkpoints.

And two: the optimum way to play - there's that phrase again - is to explore every room, find every item, and properly scour the map before moving on to the boss or next biome. With nothing to make you speed up, the best way to play is "slowly", and that can turn quickfire roguelike runs into huge, hours-long sessions. Not always what you want.

Still: I really loved the game and feel proud to say I finished it! I look forward to seeing what the studio makes next.

A Short Hike

Finally, a short piece on A Short Hike. If you've been getting open world fatigue lately, then this game might be the one for you. It's about a bird who goes on a hike up a mountain and it's ostensibly an open world game: but just in a very small, very constrained location.

But that doesn't mean it's not packed with things to do. There are items to find, quests to complete, characters to help out. You can get upgrades and find shortcuts: all of which will help you on your quest to scale up the mountain.

This is a perfect example of a cozy game. The art and characters remind me of Animal Crossing, the stakes are about as low as you can get, there's no danger or death, and it's just kind of lovely. It will only take about an hour to finish but it's a nice picture postcard of a game that I enjoyed. I really don't have much to say on this one: the game kind of speaks for itself. But it's adorable and relaxing and after dying 40 times in a row in Returnal, sometimes that's exactly what you need.

See you next month!