Marvel's Midnight Suns Delayed (Again), Switch Version To.Ī New Limited-Time Pokémon Sword And Shield Distribution. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe Booster Course Pass DLC - Release Dat.
Sadly, though, it's not a standout – it wasn't on its original release and it still isn't here on the Switch. It looks superb and there's plenty of variety in the locales even in its brief running time. Here, though, they have the tone of someone like Nelson Muntz generic schoolyard tykes.ĭespite a somewhat lacking narrative and a fairly short length – we saw the (beautiful) credits in less than four hours – Sea of Solitude is fun to play while it lasts. The sequence with the bullies, for example, was quite haunting in the original as the tormentors sounded almost impassive in their behaviour, like real psychopaths. It's a shame, too, that the voice acting has been completely re-recorded for this Director's Cut – the new voices, while perfectly well-performed, give the game an almost "Saturday morning cartoon" flavour and lack sincerity in places. We did notice some irritating glitches though, where water levels would seem to interfere with our ability to clamber onto a ladder or a piece of safe ground, resulting in the occasional unfair death. It's a very, very impressive-looking title and something of a visual showcase for what the Switch can do (rather like the recent Crash Bandicoot 4 port). One thing that Sea of Solitude always delivers on is visuals and performance – as we've mentioned, the game looks awesome, and we never noted any meaningful compromise in its framerate or fidelity no matter how busy the screen got with pouring rain, rising and falling water, and clutches of demonic kids giving chase. You'll also find messages in bottles and hidden seagulls that act as Sea of Solitude's collectables, and while it's enjoyable to seek out whatever esoteric path is required to grab them, the reward is just another snippet of vague and sometimes irritatingly banal lore.
The locations feel organic despite the aforementioned linearity, so when you manage to figure out how to reach higher ground, or open up a new path that allows you to move forward, it's always satisfying. Journeying through the game's environments on foot is always enjoyable thanks to responsive controls and interesting level layouts. Exploration is relatively limited but the world feels expansive a neat trick considering it's quite linear. At least in terms of how it tells its story.Īs for the gameplay itself, there's definitely something there. There's some heavy stuff here, but it's not enough just to be heavy, it also has to be interesting – and we found Sea of Solitude disappointing in that regard. It’s just so very familiar in its tale of clumsy and obvious symbolism, with drip-fed details that really don’t conjure up any kind of resonance. It pushes its story but doesn’t marry it brilliantly with the mechanics, so we often felt as though we were playing an enjoyable platformer that constantly talked as us to very little effect.
Indeed, we hate to say it, but we didn’t get a lot out of Sea of Solitude as a narrative experience. And it really is stunningly attractive, even in handheld mode – the gorgeous architecture married with the constantly rising and falling ebb and flow of the water lends it an aesthetic quite unlike anything else, raising the proceedings above the level of its unfortunately rather generic and meandering story. It’s concerning, then, that also just like real life (in a few years’ time), the ocean seems to cover 90% of Sea of Solitude’s beautifully-realised world. Just like in real life, the ocean here contains a gigantic supernatural monster that wants nothing more than to scoop you up into its enormous mouth and consume you, crunching your bones between its teeth. Great news for us enthusiasts – Sea of Solitude has a pretty significant amount of boating action. Cars, planes and humans are cool and all, but boats? They really float our… what was it again? It was the best part of Assassin’s Creed: Black Flag, formed the pulse-pounding backbone of Hydro Thunder, and it’s everyone’s favourite bit in The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker. There are simply not enough games where you get to ride around in a boat. Captured on Nintendo Switch (Handheld/Undocked)