STACK #198 Apr 2021

GAMING REVIEWS

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PERSONA 5 STRIKERS ACTION RPG MULTIPLAYER OUT NOW

The PhantomThieves are back again, as Persona 5 gets put into a blender with DynastyWarriors and remixed into an action combat game – with feeling! Those eager for a sequel get what they were hoping for with Persona 5 Strikers – in a way. Upon start-up it looks and feels effortlessly familiar – all sharply stylised design and flamboyant animation. But

while Strikers does continue the tale of the Phantom Thieves, this isn’t your regular sequel. The story is suitably bonkers,

A NOVEL STORY Despite the combat

a box, Sophia, who joins the team, interacting with them in the real world by inhabiting a mobile phone. If you’re onboard with the story by this stage, you’re in for a wild ride… The combat is exactly what you’d expect from the Dynasty Warriors team, with the concept of Personas woven in via the ability to pause the action and switch between their different abilities, which adds some tactical breathing room to the more difficult fights, as does the ability to switch characters in battle. Persona 5 Strikers is as endearing, funny and bonkers as you’d expect from a game in the series, and it should fill that Persona 5 shaped hole in the hearts of fans just fine. AH

with Joker heading back to Tokyo several months after the conclusion of Persona 5 ’s events, hoping to spend summer with the other Phantom Thieves on a relaxing camping trip. But thanks to a phone app (yes, another one!) those plans quickly get put on hold. The app, EMMA, is being used by loopy multicoloured fashion icon and social media influencer Alice Hiiragi to bring people into an alternate universe known as a Jail – much like the Palaces from Persona 5 . The Thieves come across an AI in

overhaul, the main focus remains the story – those hoping for non-stop action have probably come to the wrong place. But the gameplay in the story- based sections is heavily simplified compared to the original, to the point where it’s much more of a graphic novel.

LITTLE NIGHTMARES II PUZZLE PLATFORMER MULTIPLAYER OUT NOW

Threading the needle between the whimsy that Tim Burton built his career on and the kind of spooks that won’t scar you for life is an exquisite brew, and when you get it right, you can make a lifelong horror fan out of any impressionable young kid. Little Nightmares II – a puzzle- platformer with a preference for the ghoulish – trades in exactly this

balancing act, playing like a series of short stories ripped from the scariest dream journal ever written. As a follow-up to 2017’s Little Nightmares , the world here extends far beyond the original game’s setting. Opening in a misty forest, Little Nightmares II immediately steps up the series’ sense of scale, seeking to answer the question of just how messed up the game’s world can be. No time is wasted setting the pace, with the opening chase sequence taking place across shadowy fields of grass and inky black swamps as you avoid the searchlight of a particularly eager hunter.

EDGE OF MO’ SORROW There’s an overall more sorrowful tone to Little Nightmares II . Where the monsters in the original took on an almost comedic quality as they struggled to capture Six in her dazzlingly yellow raincoat, threats here have a nastier edge to them, sometimes even carrying an air of tragedy.

Soon enough, you’ll find yourself on the shores of Pale City, which is the setting of the majority of the game. At first sight, the city towers over you like so many other monsters before it. Its architecture is foreboding and grim, a new terror in and of itself for your duo of new characters Mono and original game protagonist Six. As a sequel to the 2017 original, Little Nightmares II does a fantastic job of delivering spooks, puzzles, and beautifully grim environments in equal measure. We did wish that it broke outside of its tried-and-true platform-puzzle-chase gameplay loop a little more often and subverted our expectations, but it still stands as a solid entry in the series, and we can’t wait to see where things go from here. NK

76 APRIL 2021

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