Scarlet Nexus just released on all current machines – except the Switch – and we got to try it out on PS5. Do we have a good representative of its genre or a great Japanese action RPG that barely attracts attention? Spoiler: After blowing hot and cold on our various previews, the end result may be very good.
Scarlet Nexus, it is a big project in the eyes of Bandai Namco, who wears the double hat of developer and editor here. So big that the release will be accompanied by a cartoon that will take up the story of one of the game’s two heroes, so Tokyote’s ambitions are huge with its next-gen versions. Well places?
The red wire
So much to say at once, given the atmosphere here Scarlet Nexus wants to be futuristic, shouldn’t think of the publisher’s other productions such as Code Vein or God Eater at first contact. A manga / anime universe provided, and quite delightful if you are genre sensitive. This time the scenario takes place in a dystopian future in which humanity, living in cities of disproportionate proportions, is exposed to the threat of others, creatures that are half flowerpot, half skeleton, half tentacle, half sexy. You have the choice between two protagonists, Kasane and Yuito, who then experience an adventure with slightly different stakes, which ensures a certain replay value after the first game. The two bastards are part of the teams fighting the monsters and are soon faced with government conspiracies that could solve the origins of these very threatening, quickly very intimate enemies.
If the beginnings are going to be very classic and summary, there will be an opportunity to discover a gallery of characters that are certainly quite strotyped, with twists and turns and traitors. , but also with a delicate punk neon neon pink design for the most beautiful effect. Clearly a success. If the whole thing can be accompanied by French texts and English or Japanese voices, the narration will be done almost entirely through visual novel type panels, namely still images and the scrolling text underneath. Big show question, we clearly knew better, especially for a license proud to have an anime version. The music is very unequal, with very good, jazzy persona or electronic skrillex and other much more tasteless stuff. When the universe is very successful Scarlett Nexus it is not without errors in video playback.
May the force be with you
On the other hand, if there’s one really interesting aspect it’s playability. Our fighters have the peculiarity of fighting body to body with a knife, but also at a distance with magic and telkinsia, which make it possible to move objects. So the goal will be to enchant your opponents with your sword and then everything that’s lying around in the facility, from the simple box to the van that didn’t ask for anything! The mix is quite daunting and consists almost of a rhythm game with the management of its magical scale. Placing large combos is pretty exciting, especially when using large objects on the map, with animations sometimes worthy of what the apprentice does in The Power of the Force. However, be careful not to miss any bumps or bumps, otherwise you will have to rebuild your power meters.
Rely more on the powers of your teammates for either your strengths or substantial bonuses. If the basic adversaries with their weaknesses are varied enough, they will grow in size quickly and be impressive on the bumpy side. And with three difficulty modes, there is something for everyone when it comes to the challenge. It’s a little less enjoyable on the exploration side, with environments that are overall beautiful but similar, and in which we sometimes get lost. Fortunately, there is a card. The controls are a bit stiff and the camera often shows itself to be of a different age in the corridors and in combat, when many boxes come between the lens and the player.
Weave your web
On the RPG side, it’s pretty easy. The menus are very complex, but you have few accessories – sometimes cosmetic – and skills to unlock in a not-so-big tree. But if you want management, you get it anyway. We talked to you about the power of your comrades in the gameplay part. Well, in order to improve them, you have to connect with them! During the rest periods between missions, you have to talk to them, complete missions in their company, give them gifts and answer their texts to foster relationships and unlock new levels of destruction. This management ends up making it all pretty complete in terms of the time spent on the menus. And if the game is short enough for its genre, as it will take around 20 hours to finish, we can double the stake with a second run by taking the other hero’s point of view.
Technically, it’s very clean on PS5. Almost no visual flaws, almost no popping, nice resolution, as well as the frame rate, and if the game also appears on PS4 and the 3D modeling is not very thorough, it all looks great. The very fast loading times only contribute to the gaming comfort, there will even be a cross-save function for those who should start the game on the PS4 … At the level of the DualSense, on the other hand, it is a small disappointment: haptic vibrations and noises are absent from the participants. And force feedback triggers are rarely used.
