Image a difficult third-person shooter set on a blueish-greyish alien planet, starring a feminine scientist with few solutions as to why she is there and what the state of the world is.
She encounters artefacts that inform her of her previous, whereas traversing hostile environments filled with enemies that come again to life every time you come(al).
If you happen to see gameplay footage of Scars Above and get the sensation that you just’re watching some early footage of Housemarque’s unimaginable roguelike shooter Returnal then you definitely wouldn’t be alone – not solely does Scars Above remind us of the sport, it appears like an intentional homage that fails to completely grasp what made the unique so nice.
Scars Above begins strongly with Kate, the protagonist, crashing to a mysterious planet because of an enormous alien construction known as The Metahedron. When she miraculously survives she’s now tasked with trying to place the items again collectively.
The preliminary thriller is well-sprung, the voice appearing is sweet and there’s sufficient intrigue, no less than initially, to encourage you to discover. However from the second you get to the planet, and start to discover, it’s frankly completely distracting simply how a lot Scars Above appears to be trying to emulate Returnal.
The opening of the sport is about exploring an intimidating, harmful planet, retaken by hostile vegetation, the place unusual obelisks that don’t seem to suit trace at a wider, extra refined civilization that after inhabited the land.
There are actually digicam pictures that may as nicely be shot-for-shot lifted from Returnal, it’s frankly absurd at instances. We half anticipated a Nineteenth-century farmhouse to look in the course of a degree in some unspecified time in the future.
Whereas Kate’s voice-acting efficiency is pleasurable, simply strive to not get a have a look at her face while you’re within the midst of gameplay. Kate could be chased by probably the most nightmarish, Lovecraftian horror possible, and he or she’ll emote with the identical depth as when you’d informed her that her prepare can be a couple of minutes late.
The horror itself and the creature design is certainly one of Scar Above’s few sturdy factors, with some good, disgusting monsters to blast to bits, and a few strong physique horror, though there’s not a large quantity of enemy selection.
Animation on the whole is an issue all through the sport. Enemies cycle the identical extraordinarily predictable actions, to the purpose the place if there’s greater than one of many identical sort, they change into a weird conga line. There’s no unpredictability. This feels virtually like a concession, nonetheless, for a way unbelievably stiff the primary character is. Motion is extraordinarily restricted, an issue that permeates the entire sport.
The way in which Kate improves her talents is by buying information through scanning numerous lifeforms and different components of the world, which is a superb contact.
The sport and narrative are at their strongest when extra centered on this scientific pursuit. It appears like these components, with considerably fewer enemies and a deal with fight, might be reappropriated into an attention-grabbing survival horror.
This thought could have occurred to us, nonetheless, as a result of Kate turns like she’s in a Resident Evil sport on the unique PlayStation.
The sport itself units up the concept that Kate isn’t a soldier, however throws all of that out the window while you’re dodge-rolling towards behemoth enemies inside an hour of beginning the sport. It’s a complete disconnect.
Technically, Scars Above was extremely unstable throughout our time taking part in it on PS5. This included a litany of crashes, with three occurring throughout the opening quarter-hour of the sport at the very same spot, and a bunch of frame-rate points and bugs.
“Technically, Scars Above was extremely unstable throughout our time taking part in it on PS5.”
From boss enemies failing to animate correctly, or simply fully ignoring Kate, to taking injury regardless of being nicely outdoors the enemies space of impact, it feels extraordinarily unstable, particularly within the early sport.
Scars Above faces the identical downside {that a} billion Soulslikes that adopted in FromSoftware’s wake have for the final decade. If you happen to’re going to evoke one other sport so closely, you need to be sure that the overriding feeling throughout each second of gameplay isn’t a need to play the sport that it’s evoking.
As an alternative, we’d finish classes with Scars Above desirous to play Returnal. Each single time.