STACK #200 Jun 2021

GAMING REVIEWS

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NEW POKÉMON SNAP

SIMULATION MULTIPLAYER

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Ever craved a break from all that battling? A chance to sit back and chill, where the only capturing comes via the lens of a camera? Nintendo have a knack for recycling that rarely disappoints and, in this instance, we receive a top update to a game from the Nintendo 64 days.

The story goes a little like this: You’re an ace photographer, and you’re tasked

with assisting Professor Mirror in his studies of wildlife – and the mysterious ‘Illumina’ phenomenon. You’re sent on missions in various locations ranging from jungle to desert to beach to seafloor, aiming to capture photos of various Pokémon and their habitat. That core play is as simple as it sounds. You trundle about safari-style in an “on-rails” scenario, but can turn 360 degrees, keeping a keen eye out for various Pokémon (plus the odd bit of flora) and happy snapping. They’re not all ones to just boldly sit up and say “Cheese!” for

SNAP, ZHUZH, SHARE!

you though, so you must capture them at their best, often requiring quick reactions before they scuttle off into bushes or beyond your field of vision. After each sortie into the wild you return to base, where you can sort through your snaps, pick the best of each Pokémon, and submit them for a Photo Evaluation. You can repeat opened areas at will until you capture the perfect shot – and you will need to grind a bit at times both to get those spot-on snaps and to reach research point unlock targets. But it’s relaxed grinding. Pokémon fans who relish uncovering new creatures and cataloguing them will find New Pokémon Snap to be a wonderfully chilled experience that can quickly become alarmingly addictive. Hey, gotta snap them all! AF

The game packs niceties such as stickers, photo filters, borders and more, which can be used to zhuzh up the contents of your ever-growing photo album. Your best snaps can also be shared with the world, ready for rating by your Snap peers.

BIOMUTANT

ACTION RPG MULTIPLAYER

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Years in the making, Biomutant – a mashup of action RPG with open-world exploration – pushes all the right button combos. There’s no shortage of big, sprawling games to sink dozens of hours into, but none let you play as a mutated miniature fuzzball creature with giant swords, a fear of water and a

knack for an alternate-universe form of kung fu – until now. Biomutant approaches the ARPG from several directions at once, mashes them all together and somehow gets away with it. You’re in a world that’s gone

A TELLING PRESENCE The narrator in Biomutant is terrific. A constant presence as you progress through the world, his crisp British voice gives you information about you and your place in the world, as well as translating all of the little bit Asian/little bit alien character dialogue throughout.

the game about which way you’ll play out the story, starting with which of the tribes you decide to align yourself with. Biomutant is jaw-droppingly gorgeous at times, with

awry somewhere in the past, resulting in genetic mutations occurring in both the native population and other creatures that roam the world. Feeding the land’s existence is the Tree-of-life, but it’s been poisoned by the ancient bio-disaster, and it’s dying. Your fuzzball sets out to save it – or to ally with the darker side and use it to shape the world in a more menacing way. Decisions are made from early in

its vivid, colourful world looking especially lovely in HDR, with elaborate use of depth-of-field effects giving everything a kind of surreal lushness – much like a down-the-rabbit-hole version of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild , which this game shares much in common with. But the combat here is far more interesting – it’s fast, fluid and immensely customisable via skill points as you progress throughout the game. Made by a tiny team, with gorgeous open-world exploration and smart action combat, Biomutant is brilliantly crafted, humorous and heartfelt. It’s quite the achievement. AH

42 JUNE 2021

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