Scarlet Nexus Demo: An Interesting, Chaotic Action RPG
Scarlet Nexus Demo: An Interesting, Chaotic Action RPG
Video games are great because they offer endless opportunities to explore different worlds people have created, but in a way that is exclusive to you. Sometimes these worlds can be simplistic and require little interaction, while others lean toward being experiences players need to expert to succeed and move on to the next level. And sometimes you end up playing a game that manages to balance high-strung chaos with an intriguing, mysterious story to the point where—despite some admitted flaws—the game still grabs your attention and challenges you to improve your skill as you move through the level. The demo version for Bandai Namco’s upcoming action role-playing game, Scarlet Nexus, is that last one. And despite some flaws, the free, hour-long demo version that I played on the PlayStation 4 was a worthwhile experience that has me at least interested in the full product.
Scarlet Nexus takes place in a dystopian future, centering around a cluttered seemingly Japanese city called New Himuka. The game follows two playable characters, Yuito Sumeragi and Kasane Randall, members of the Other Suppression Force, or OSF, tasked with defending the city from strange, otherworldly creatures known as “Others.” Outside of this premise, the overall story has remained wrapped in a veil of mystery since the game was announced back in 2020, and the demo doesn’t do much to further explain what the full game will be about. However, it does do a good job at establishing the gameplay style of both characters, as well as the overarching gimmick to the game as a whole.
Yuito and Kasane both utilize psychokinesis in their playstyles, allowing players to toss objects at oncoming enemies. Outside of this, the individual characters have their own unique playstyles. Yuito wields a blade and relies on close-up attacks so he can deal damage, while Kasane relies on her “knives,” a set of small, floating blades that are more distanced from enemies. Kasane’s playstyle seemed much easier than Yuito’s, as she doesn’t stand close enough to Others for taking damage to be a major problem (I suppose it also helps that I saved her part of the demo for last, so I was already familiar with how the game worked, given the general similarities between the two). The demo does a good job at establishing how both characters work with a tutorial mission for each of them. After this, both characters and sent through the wringer facing enemy after enemy in a semi-open world level that ends with the same boss fight for each of them. I doubt this will end up being in the actual game, but it made for a good starting mission for each character despite the parallel similarities.
But what Scarlet Nexus does to differentiate itself from similar action games is its element system. It appears that, for each mission in the game, the player will be accompanied by two team members who can also fight and be fought by Others they encounter. They will also have two “backup members” who aren’t on the field with them, but whose elements the player can still utilize. This is done through a system by which players can choose to use one of their teammate’s elements to better battle enemies they come across. For example, in Yuito’s mission the team encountered enemies that were weak to fire. One of the characters in the team, Hanabi Ichijo, has pyrokinesis as her associated element. By pressing a specific button combination, I was also able to wield pyrokinesis as Yuito for a limited amount of time. Both Yuito and Kasane had four unique elements they could wield throughout their missions alongside regular psychokinesis. It made for interesting gameplay, especially once the game started throwing me into situations where I had to decide for myself what the best element would be to use against tougher enemies and the final boss. It was a very well-structured system that was fun to play around with.
I also enjoyed some of the smaller details about the game too. I liked how players were rewarded for exploring the level, often with healing items that helped a lot during each characters’ final fight. It gave me a reason to go back at certain points in the level to collect items I knew would help me later. The skill tree portion of the game also seemed intriguing, though it appeared to be underutilized in the demo. It seems that, once players start to level up in the game, they’re able to use skill points to make different aspects of their gameplay more powerful, useful when taking on tougher enemy as a game like this progresses. The demo relegated players to only 10 points, and I can’t say there was a considerable difference in damage I was doing or taking when I started using my points. I’m sure later parts of the full product will make more use of the skill tree, which is an exciting prospect, especially when some elements of it involve teaching your character new moves you can use for bigger damage down the line. There was also the gear that was unique to each character’s team, little wings or a visor that you could equip onto any character for pure aesthetic purposes. I liked how the gear would also show up on characters in cutscenes; it was a nice touch and I’m excited to see what other options for character customization we’ll have in the full game.
Then there is the overall gameplay, which I have to admit I have mixed feelings about. I think it’s great to fight enemies in a fast-paced, chaotic setting, and having so many elements to choose from when doing so also makes the game feel unique and fun. But it also felt a little cluttered at times, to the point where it was difficult to know just what I was supposed to be doing. As an example, there was a point in Yuito’s mission where the team was ambushed by six Others. The mission, however, was taking place in the city, meaning there was clutter all over the place that Yuito could use to throw at enemies to damage them alongside elemental attacks. The only issue was trying to dodge the enemies being thrown at me while also trying to maintain a close enough distance to objects so I could hold down the right button for long enough for Yuito to throw it at my designated target. This didn’t happen often, and it didn’t deter me from playing the game. But it does make for some chaotic moments that are less high-octane action and are instead more wondering what the hell is going on.
As a technical gripe, I also had some trouble with the camera angle, especially when fighting the final bosses for each character. In Kasane’s final fight especially the camera angle would suddenly tilt upward when the boss was doing a jumping attack, even if it wasn’t aiming for me. It made it more difficult to try and land blows with psychokinesis during that time and threw me off of whatever plan I had going up until that point. The camera angle is supposed to be customizable as you go, but because it switched so often between wherever I wanted to point it and wherever the developers wanted it to be, the game had a bit of a wonky vibe to it throughout.
That doesn’t mean I didn’t have fun, though. Because despite its flaws, Scarlet Nexus is a fun game, and if the final product manages to be as good as the demo, then I might end up playing it. I’m not sure if the full $60 price tag is something I could fork over for it, but given the amount of content in this demo alone, I think it’s reasonable to assume the full game will have enough in there to justify paying that much for it. The Scarlet Nexus demo was very fun despite a few hiccups and I look forward to playing it in the future. If you’re interested, the demo is out for free on Xbox and PlayStation platforms and the full game releases for Xbox, PlayStation, and PC on June 25th.
***
If you like the blog and want to support me, consider buying one of my books! More content coming soon!
Comments
Post a Comment