Also available for Switch, Oculus, iOS, Android, OSX, and Windows Republique is a really unique kind of stealth game, and I've never played another game quite like it. Imagine if Five Nights at Freddy's and Metal Gear Solid had a baby. That's a kind of what this game is like. Now those who know me and my gaming habits well will know that I don't much care for pure stealth games; I like games that allow me to be stealthy but also allow me to murder everyone in a five kilometer radius when I inevitably fuck up being stealthy. So my personal opinion of this game is rather lukewarm because it's just not my style of game, but I'll try to review it as objectively as I can here (though, as with any art, every review is going to be somewhat subjective). So you're in an unnamed totalitarian state (or it's called Metamorphosis, one of the two; the game was vague), and the vibe I got from the game was that it was a kind of militarized micronation, but the game was extremely vague about the context and history of the setting, and what little it revealed tended to be done via easily missed collectible pick-ups. Anyway, the whole game has a very 1984 vibe (and that's quite intentional), and while I was a bit confused about what was going on and why from beginning to end, they really nail the authoritarian atmosphere. You play as a weird camera hacker sort of guy; you see the game's world through various security cameras, but you control Hope directly (she's the girl you're trying to guide in her escape from Metamorphosis). You've got to sneak around and avoid being sighted by the Prizrak (the paramilitary guards), and while you don't have the option of "fighting" them, you can pick up pepper spray, tasers, and sleep gas mines to incapacitate a few or escape if they grab you. Really, though, you're avoiding them; pepper spray only distracts them for like 20 seconds, and the other two are tough to find. The game is broken down into five episodes, each one taking between two and three hours depending on how thoroughly you search for collectibles (it took me about 12 hours to finish the game). There's no manual save, but the auto-save seems to be fairly frequent (though I still make sure to finish an episode before quitting just in case). My biggest complaints about the game are that the overarching story never really gets adequately explained in my opinion (there are a lot of questions left unanswered at the end, but not in a "we're-setting-up-for-a-sequel" kind of way) and the last 15 minutes or so of the last episode just gets....weird. And boring. Imagine crossing scanning planets in Mass Effect 2 with Tron. That's kind of what it felt like. I won't say more than that for fear of spoiling something. By no means does it kill the game, but the ending is a bit underwhelming IMO. For fans of the stealth genre, I absolutely and very strongly recommend this. For fans of dystopian, autocratic worlds (like I am), I recommend it. If you fall into neither category, then this is probably a game you're alright skipping, but it's a pretty good game. Not great, but pretty good. My Rating - B |
I'm a teacher.And I like to play video games. I like to collect video games. I like to talk about video games, and I like to write about video games. During the day, I teach high school history; during the night, I spend my spare time gaming. Then I write about it. Archives
April 2024
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