Finnish studio Housemarque For too long I went to my big project, for years doing simple arcades and top-down action games. Long awaited Returnal for Playstation 5created with the support Sony Interactive Entertainment, not only plays on the fashionable roguelite field, but also swings at a large sci-fi canvas with an intricate plot and rich action.
In the center of the story is a member of the “ASTRA” division, the cosmonaut Selena, in distress on the unfamiliar planet Atropos. Here, in the depths of the constantly changing configuration of the labyrinth, is the mysterious source of the signal, better known as the “White Shadow”. But besides the wrecked ship and the inability to send a request for help, Selena is faced with another oddity – in the vastness of the hostile world, dead copies of herself are lying everywhere. It turns out that she can not only leave Atropos, but also die. Following the mechanics of death and rebirth familiar to fans of the genre, the developers propose to find out the fate of a lost civilization, go through five biomes and finally get out of this endless cycle. The plot is served through cutscenes and audio diaries – it is very interesting to follow the story, there are some questions and complaints about the second half of the game, but we will not go into details in order to avoid spoilers.
On the one hand, Returnal is on the beaten track of the series Dark souls, while on the other hand, it offers its own findings and solutions. Similar to games from FromSoftware you collect valuable resources from killed enemies, in this case, they are duped, which can be exchanged for important items in the fabricators scattered around the map. Also, at the levels in special places or after the death of strong opponents, you will find improvements and new weapons. True, the game immediately limits the looting excitement, offering in the first hours for use only one active type of weapon, one special single-action item and a laser sword. Moreover, things available for use can vary from a first aid kit to quick teleportation and a protective barrier. At locations, you come across special rooms where you need to pick up a healing sylph or other valuable elements, dodging traps and lasers. Weapons in the game range from pistols to melee shotguns and are classified according to your skill level. If your skill level has become one, then the next chest will have a +1 weapon. If you used an artifact and reached the 5th skill class, then all new weapons will already be of the 5th class, although this effect does not apply to the already collected one.
As the plot progresses and the exploration of new areas, you will unlock additional improvements and abilities, but if the heroine dies and a new cycle begins, they, along with all the collected obolits, will disappear – with the exception of plot items such as a sword or house key, as well as ether units. In Returnal, Housemarque uses mechanics and ideas from its arcade projects. Of course, the found sword, teleportation tool or pistol does not need to be collected after each new revival, but all amplifiers and bonus effects, such as damage multipliers, parasites that strengthen armor, or weapon class, are reset to zero. In this case, the game can be saved only after the cycle is reset, and if you just pause it and a power surge occurs, then all your progress will be lost. In addition, at the time of this writing, Returnal was crashing into the general menu frequently.
Since the configuration of the map changes when you start the cycle again, you will have to start over each next exploration. Of course, you can use the teleporters that are open along the way and return to the recovery chamber if you are lucky enough to get it in this level configuration, but in most cases, you can restore health only with rare first aid kits with sylph, a randomly found regeneration parasite, or by buying a large first aid kit in the fabricator. Returning to the ship and sleeping in bed will change nothing but the passage of time.
Although the levels in Returnal are randomly formed from pre-rendered rooms along with random items and artifacts, some of the rooms do not change. This is an archive with alien information, a zone of transfer to another part of the map, some locations-bridges, as well as numerous rooms with fabricators and caches. While researching, you can open bonus doors with secrets and powerful weapons by collecting the necessary keys. But not all of the things you find are useful. For example, an alien regenerator, instead of restoring health, can eat half a strip of life, and an alien parasite will not only strengthen the spacesuit, but also make it more fragile. And this is not to mention the cursed objects that need to be cleaned – otherwise they are capable of imposing restrictions on you with varying probability. The latter can be as simple as blocking an artifact before opening two chests, and harder, like a ban on the selection of new weapons until you destroy 12 opponents in close combat.
