Rime Review - Island of Bad Luck

For all its visual brilliance, Rime manages to land on its face when it comes to gameplay.

send

From the first frames, the player begins to be tormented by a powerful sense of deja vu. We have seen all this before, more than once. , yes, finally - it’s immediately clear where the Spaniards come from Tequila Works drew inspiration.

Who is this kid in the tattered red cape? How did he get to this picturesque island? What is that tall tower on the horizon? Where did the interface go? As expected, the game will give answers to these and many other questions gradually, only gently pushing the gamer in the right direction, but leaving him the right to follow the advice or try to figure it out on his own.

The pseudo-open world can easily awaken the curiosity of even the laziest mattress, burning the retina with bright colors, dense vegetation and ancient ruins alluring with their mystery. A deeper immersion in the game world is also facilitated by unobtrusive but melodic music, which literally puts the gamer in a drug trance, depriving him of a sense of time and fatigue. The game will never give you clear orders what to do next, you have to figure it out yourself. And even after the credits run across the screen, you still want to replay in order to better understand the message hidden somewhere under a thick layer of sand. And he is. Or should be, anyway.

The game handles exposure very well. Sun-drenched lawns, dense forests, sandy beaches and dilapidated ruins - you just want to climb everywhere, stare at everything and generally touch everything. But no! Will not work!

In terms of accessibility, it is somewhat reminiscent of an insanely beautiful and terribly expensive exhibition that no stupid people are allowed to enter. All the visual splendor of the game is hidden behind unreasonably complex puzzles, too complicated navigation around the island, and a simply incomprehensible storyline. You spend more time to understand where you need to go now than to think about the next scenario twist.

We managed to test all versions of the game - for PC, PS4 (taken as the basis for writing a review), PS4 Pro and Xbox One. They look identical on standard monitors and LCD TVs within 40 inches. Even the much-lauded super textures and super shadows in the PS4 Pro and PC versions can only be seen on 4K displays and monitors. In addition to almost the same picture, all versions are united by not the best optimization. The game sometimes starts to mercilessly slow down for no apparent reason, and the PS4 Pro version suffers more from subsidence in frame rate.

As mentioned above, from an artistic point of view, you can safely put it on a par with games such as or. But the artisans at Tequila Works have forgotten that despite the visual splendor, they don't shy away from giving the player subtle hints about where they should go and what to do next. But these hints are not there, or they are too well hidden. So, in one place, scribbles on the walls can be instructions for an ancient and complex mechanism, while in another the same daub can mean absolutely nothing.

The puzzles themselves are very organically integrated into the world. They don't feel out of place or redundant. True, they are often more annoying with their complexity than somehow contribute to a better understanding of the local world and its rules. For example, even a monkey can carry stones or bawl into some totems, but not everyone will be able to understand the purpose of a ball that changes the time of day. And there are plenty of such puzzles - they are all either ridiculously simple, or just annoying and break for the most part the measured pace of the game. And it’s not even the complexity that infuriates, but the complete absence of the slightest hint of the right solution. If in the same and with the solution of even the most difficult and complex puzzles the environment helped, whether it be marks and drawings on the walls or the location of the scenery, then it leaves the player alone with his ingenuity.

Navigation problems don't stop there. Because of them, it is sometimes completely unclear where to go next. You can aimlessly cut circles on the line and climb the rocks for half an hour without understanding what the game wants from you. In the same Rime, it does not open up gradually, but instead dumps everything on you and immediately towards the very end. And, as mentioned above, after the credits you want to start the game again. And not because it is so cool and mysterious, but only in order to understand one thing: are you really that stupid that you could not understand everything from the very beginning?

Rime is beautiful, no doubt about it, but behind the attractive facade lies a boring and very pretentious walking simulator in places.