Everybody's Gone to the Rapture (PS4 Review)

(All screenshots in this review have been captured directly from the PS4)

Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture is a beautiful adventure game by The Chinese Room, the development team behind Dear Esther. It boasts a well written story of convincing characters that are matched in depth by the actors who voice them. The music, composed by the game’s director Jessica Curry, is another strong component in what begins to sound more and more like a ringing endorsement. Unfortunately, the game fails a very basic checklist requirement that left me disappointed and frustrated.

Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture maintains a character movement speed that I would find unacceptable to just about anyone. In fact, the further you play the more it starts to detract from your experience and become a burdening, needless weight. It’s astounding that anyone on the development team could find this as necessary without eventually admitting that it locks itself to a molasses-like trudge merely to prolong the game length. I began the experience with an excited inquisitiveness, walking around every inch of the map to observe the remnants of an empty village. I wanted to inspect all of the little details that caught my eye - but every step of the way I found myself pressing the buttons on the controller compulsively, trying to find if there was some run mechanic that hadn’t unlocked yet or I’d yet to input properly. When I realized I was putting combinations of buttons together that no sane person would ever map a run action to, I knew that I was facing my own personal sort of doomsday.

Even though the acting in this game is phenomenal and the writing is great, I began to steadily lose interest. They do try to make up for the movement speed by offering guidance in the form of these amiable little orbs of light. They lead you through this open concept map by imploring you to follow them like a dog, running toward the place they’re leading you to and then running back over to beckon before running off again. That’s great and all, but it really begins to become the only thing that pushes you forward. I began to rely on it exclusively in order to progress through the story as quickly as possible, and stopping to see many of the more subtle details become too much of a pain. I felt literally exhausted by the experience when I finally got to the end and I have no qualms in saying that I’m not entirely sure what the conclusion amounted to.

The story goes in some interesting directions based around the Biblical end-times. There are a handful of characters that you’ll encounter in a minimalist presentation, obscured forms that appear to be made of agitated light. When you activate these cues, the characters perform minute-long plays that feed you details about the characters and the “situation” that involves the disappearance of more than half the townsfolk. Each of these performances is exceptionally well done, and if it weren’t for these moments, I would’ve probably never finished the game. That creates the secondary problem of feeling numb by the ending. The final divulgence of information feels like a half-baked idea that could’ve been handled better.

Everbody’s Gone to the Rapture is the kind of game that you’ll find good things about but you may feel progressively less fond of them when you let the entire experience digest. There’s things to see here, but without the proper ability to see them, many of the world’s intricacies are willfully left unfound and unappreciated.

Grade: C

The Vanishing of Ethan Carter (PS4 Review)

I downloaded The Vanishing of Ethan Carter on a whim. Things have been slow for games lately and I had heard a few good things about it from friends. Most of those praises were centered around the looks - and to my understanding the game has been remade with the Unreal 4 engine specifically for the PS4. It’s described as a horror adventure game and though my experience with adventure games is limited I was compelled to play through its modest 5 hours in a handful of sittings. I was skeptical at first, feeling as if the highly realistic graphics and simplistic gameplay were going to be just another example of disproportionate priorities within game design - but each consecutive session became more and more engrossing and once arriving at the end I was left with a strong desire to seek out more of these bite-sized experiences. To that point I recommend The Vanishing of Ethan Carter highly.

Ethan Carter begins with a black screen that says, “This game is a narrative experience that does not hold your hand”. There are no fail states. There are no enemies. You explore the world for clues and items. The most involved portions of the game are environmental puzzles where items need to be positioned in order to conjure up ghostlike memories that will help you solve a series of murders. You then enter the proper chronology of events that will piece together how each one of these murders occurred. You’re not required to perform any of these puzzles - in fact, you could walk right to the end of the game without doing any of it. The reward of Ethan Carter is related to how much exploration you put into it. To that end, I find the game’s deceptively linear design effective.

What stood out most about the game were its vignettes of weirdness that punctuate the experience. There’s a fair share of spectacle to be had in the game that incentivizes you to really want to see everything. It's constantly looking to give you good reason to do everything. The hyper realistic presentation paired with these abnormal episodes that seem like hallucinations works quite well. There were definitely more than a few times that the game impressed me, both in the world itself and in its dreamlike happenings.

It’s hard to say a lot about The Vanishing of Ethan Carter because the majority of its enjoyment is found by experiencing it yourself. There’s not much to judge about it from a gameplay perspective and I can’t give away much of the story without doing it a disservice. I think that the shorter length of the experience works very well in tandem with what it offers. It’s a story and experience that I’ll speak fondly of and one that intrigues me to try some of the other recent adventure games that appear to be making a steady comeback.

Grade: A

Arkham Knight (PS4 Review)

Arkham Knight is a game that I wanted to like. I played through about 40% of its content before inevitably dropping it and never wanting to touch it again. The big problem with Arkham Knight is design. On a mechanical level, Arkham Knight controls fine. On a presentational level, Arkham Knight is top notch. It's just that through all of the things that Arkham Knight does right it feels more like fan service than a game I enjoy playing. I can't emphasize enough how visually impressive the world is. It's one of the best looking console games this generation and seldom struggles with framerate dips. While Rocksteady tries new things, they're not that great or even that deep. The design is formulaic, suggesting a gross imbalance between the game's presentational goals and design choices. A lot of the missions are too similar and what's worse is that the game repeats the structure shamelessly. You'll complete a mission or be in between a mission segment spending a portion of that time on a bat call talking to Alfred or Oracle or whomever else. It's nitpicking, I know, but when things are used in excess it's hard not to notice. Arkham Knight didn’t do enough to pull me in and what it offers isn’t enough to make me want more.

The driving and tank combat additions are unreasonably overused and they're bland. It's a real tragedy that they rely on it as much as they do. You use the Batmobile for chases, tank combat, and platforming. Platforming with a car is one part that I simply can’t understand. Even on paper the idea seems bad, so to see it make it to the final product brings up a lot of questions. The on-foot combat looks great and controls fine, but after so many of these games and games that I feel adopted it and did it better (Shadow of Mordor) I expected to see something new. Unfortunately that doesn't seem to be the case.
What this comes down to in the end is that Arkham Knight feels like a gorgeous game with dated gameplay and narrow design choices. It’s possible that Rocksteady is just aching to move on to something new. I can understand that - but for a final hurrah, the closing chapter is stale and contrived. I think it’s worth renting it if you’re a Batman fan, but otherwise I don’t think this game has much to offer.

Grade: C