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The first thing that stands about Blade Chimera is its artwork, which is drop-dead gorgeous at times. Making use of pixel art, Blade Chimera quite easily stands head and shoulders above other similarly designed titles thanks to just how vividly detailed its sprites, animations and environments tend to be. While just about any scene of the game looks great on its own, seeing characters move around, attack, or otherwise be in motion is where the game’s visuals truly start standing out.

The smooth animations and Chimera Blade’s great implementation of its art style is further compounded thanks to excellent use of an excellent color palette. The game is able to seamlessly provide a fantastic atmosphere in just about any of its various locations by making use of striking color combinations. This can range from the muted ones to dull colors of an underground train system, from scorching orange hues in the sky in its more industrial zones to the lush greenery when you enter the science lab. Even the streets of the game’s main setting, a cyberpunk rendition of Osaka, absolutely oozes with atmosphere thanks to well-lit neon signs, flickering vending machines, and even animatronic displays of a roadside stand.

"The first thing that stands about Blade Chimera is its artwork"

Backing up the great visuals is its engaging soundtrack. While Blade Chimera has its fair share of intriguing ambience, especially when there is a lot of exposition happening, the game’s soundtrack manages to easily put you in the mood to hunt down some demons thanks to its thumping electronic soundtrack. The fast-paced techno music might not top any gaming list charts, but it’s definitely well-suited for on screen actions like jumping around, avoiding energy beams, and taking out Japanese yokai inspired demons.

However, what separates a good platformer from a great one are the gameplay mechanics, and while Blade Chimera largely feels addictive to play, there are some minor nagging issues with it. The biggest issue is that the game doesn’t tend to explain its mechanics very well. Sure, you’ll be jumping, shooting, and doing all sorts of cool things in no time, more advanced ideas, however, like how certain abilities might interact with each other, or even just a more convenient way to compare equipment, is never really explained. In fact, the game feels decidedly old school in that respect; you’re going to have to grab a pen and paper to write down the stats of your currently-equipped plasma gun so that you can easily compare it to a new one in the shop to figure out if it’s an upgrade.

Information about side quests is similarly obscured from the player. While you can quickly figure out what you’re supposed to be doing once you’ve accepted the side quest, there is no real way for you to see these details before the quests begins. This problem is somewhat mitigated by the game having no penalties for abandoning side quests and picking up ones more suited to the area you’re currently exploring, but the quest system could have been fined tuned for a much smoother experience.

"What separates a good platformer from a great one are the gameplay mechanics"

One notable spot where the lack of information provided led to some frustration for me was the first time you come across a demon termination zone. Wielding a giant floating sword “Lux”, that is essentially a shape shifting demon, means you can’t cross this zone without the sword taking damage, which could lead to the character’s death. While the game intends for you to stick the sword on the floor, run through the zone, and then summon it to you through a wall, Blade Chimera doesn’t even hint it to you that this is an option. I managed to accidentally sidestep the puzzle entirely by teleporting to its end. In this instance, having a simpler version of the same puzzle earlier in the game would be of great benefit in training the player to think about the demon sword as its own entity that can go through walls for the difficult puzzles down the line.

With all of that out of the way, the gameplay in Blade Chimera is definitely some of the best in recent times. The controls feel incredibly responsive, and the game makes good use of its unique demon sword mechanics to present fun and interesting platforming and exploration challenges. These abilities range from the relatively mundane, like being able to swing across a large gap by using the demon sword as a grappling hook, to more complex ones, like summoning a bridge that existed at the spot at some point in the past, allowing you to cross the gap. The abilities that Lux provides you with are what contribute quite a bit into making Blade Chimera feel like a traditional platformer.

Much like you would expect from the genre, quite a bit of your time will be spent exploring the game’s labyrinthine map. In the process, you will unlock new abilities for yourself and Lux, allowing you to enter previously-inaccessible zones. The game also locks off a few areas behind having you hunt down collectibles shaped like puzzle pieces, but at no point in the main story do you actually need to go out of your way for them. Instead, exploration tends to be rewarding with quite a few great pieces of equipment hiding in obscure corners.

"Much like you would expect from the genre, quite a bit of your time will be spent exploring the game’s labyrinthine map."

Speaking of skill points, Blade Chimera features a relatively simplistic form of progression. Killing demons gets you experience points, which in turn will level you up, rewarding you with a new skill point. These skill points can be spent in a small tree to unlock new abilities, which can range from having niche uses like having Lux shoot out a barrage of projectiles at enemies at a significant MP cost, to skills that feel absolutely mandatory, such as one that allows you to fast travel between different points in the map.

The game’s combat also works pretty well despite its simplicity. While there aren’t many complex combos that you will have to learn, most melee weapons only tend to have 2-3 hit combos. However, the depth in the game’s combat instead comes from the types of enemies you’ll be facing. Just about every demon has its own quirks, and you will be constantly switching between your swords, guns, Lux, and even magical abilities to take them down depending on the situation. This also carries over into boss fights, which tend to be a lot of fun without being obnoxiously difficult. Bosses tend to have complex move sets that can be easily learned in the course of a single fight, and these moves tend to be satisfying to avoid or even exploit.

Tying all of these aspects up together is the story. Blade Chimera is trying to be a gritty cyberpunk story with hints of a neo-noir vibe, and it largely tends to succeed. While there aren’t any grand plot twists, the game’s story still manages to be quite interesting thanks to some surprisingly intricate world building. As noted earlier, Blade Chimera takes place in a cyberpunk version of Osaka which is seemingly ruled by a cult that has taken it upon itself to cleanse the land of demons. Players take on the role of one such demon killer named Shin, and in the wreckage of the fight against a particularly big demon, finds and befriends a seemingly innocent shapeshifting demon named Lux.

"Blade Chimera takes place in a cyberpunk version of Osaka"

Together, Shin and Lux set out to complete more demon hunting quests. After a mission where Shin finds himself embroiled in complex scenarios (like can a person be killed based on just a suspicion whether they are a demon or not), the duo set out to further explore to find out what happened to the world and their loved ones. Generally speaking, Blade Chimera’s story gets the job done when it comes to sending players out to explore its world. The voice acting is also well done, as is the fact that you don’t really need to piece things together by yourself.

All in all, Blade Chimera is a fantastic platformer, and is an easy game to recommend to fans of the genre. For players that might not be too familiar with some of the genre’s more esoteric elements, however, the way Blade Chimera tends to hide some crucial gameplay information might just end up feeling obtuse and annoying for some players. Thankfully, these issues are relatively minor, and don’t spoil what is otherwise an intriguing experience.

This game was reviewed on PC.

FYQD and Playism have announced Bright Memory: Infinite Mobile, a new version of the first-person shooter set to release for iOS and Android devices on January 17 for $4.99. According to the developer, the mobile version is based on the game’s original PC release. It can run at up to 120 FPS on Android devices and will also support Xbox controllers, gyroscopic aiming, and virtual button customization, as per the developer.

You can view the announcement trailer below for a glimpse of what the game will look like on iOS and Android platforms. 

Bright Memory: Infinite is currently available on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch, and PC. Read our review of the game through here.

Recently, we were able to send some of our questions about the game to its developers, asking about Rusted Moss’ development, how meaty its content update will be, how it’ll be different and consoles, and more. Below, you can read our interview with Emlise and happysquared, two-thirds of Rusted Moss’ three-person development team.

"The development of Rusted Moss was quite improvised – its core idea, the grappling hook, came about as a coding exercise and was not even intended to be added into a game."

As a sidescrolling Metroidvania twin-stick shooter where players navigate the environments with a grappling hook, Rusted Moss clearly goes out of its way to offer something very unique in the crowded Metroidvania space. What inspired the core idea behind the game?

Happysquared: I think part of what led to Rusted Moss’ uniqueness is that we did not start the game with the idea of “I want to make a metroidvania, how do I make it stand out amongst others?”.

Emlise: The development of Rusted Moss was quite improvised – its core idea, the grappling hook, came about as a coding exercise and was not even intended to be added into a game.

Happysquared: Emlise, our lead developer and originator of the concept, did not actually want the grappling hook in a game as though she was quite proficient at it, she was not sure if other players would enjoy it due to its steep learning curve. However, we convinced her to move on with the idea and she set out to make a game that resonated with her personal taste.

She’s always made games without the intention of appealing to the wider gaming audience and her game design philosophy has always been deeply personal – less about making sales – though the riskiness of such a unique grappling hook still gave her pause.

It isn’t just the grappling hook though that I think leads to the unique feeling Rusted Moss gives when compared to other metroidvanias. After all, Rusted Moss is also an amalgamation of smaller games Emlise has made “just for fun” and by extension her own unique perspective.

Emlise: Rusted Moss’ main character for example, came from a code project because I just wanted to explore procedural animation and it was not meant for any specific game. As mentioned before, the grappling hook was also made as a completely separate project that was meant to be nothing more than a training exercise; it wasn’t meant to be a playable game either. The robot enemies were part of another training project to explore leg animations. A lot of Rusted Moss’ juice and feel started from a 2019 game I made called Ecila and that I iterated on across the years.

Happysquared: All this patchwork code in Rusted Moss that had long existed in her previous projects have all led to Rusted Moss being made of what Emlise considers the highlights of her older work.

As for the setting and story, I helped develop it after the aesthetic and mechanics were established so a lot of it was inspired by artwork Emlise had already done for the game rather than on existing metroidvania tropes. I was already interested in making something based on traditional fae folklore so it became a unique blend when faced with Emlise’ artstyle of industrial post-apocalyptic ruin.

With the improvised way of development (there were many mechanics that were actually deleted from the game), Rusted Moss unintentionally ended up standing out even though we were less interested in making something unique and more focused on having fun and just being honest to our own personal tastes.

For starters, how has the post-launch period been for you, especially given the positive reception Rusted Moss has enjoyed from players since its PC release last year?

Emlise: It’s been nice. I’m economically stable now and don’t have to worry about rent and stuff. I can’t hold a 9-5 job because I don’t have the attention span for school or work. Just for indie game development when I can dictate when to work.

Happysquared: She spent at least 12 hours every day working on Rusted Moss. It was really normal to see her online at 5AM still working on the game. She’d go to sleep at like 6AM.

Emlise: I don’t know what I would have done if Rusted Moss didn’t do well because I spent more than a year on it and I wasn’t making any money in the meantime.

Happysquared: Maybe you should make games that appeal to other people so you don’t have to worry about money.

Emlise: No.

Emlise: I guess it worked out in the end. As someone struggling financially I probably shouldn’t have made the game.

Emlise: Considering my financial situation you think I should have just made a Vampire Survivors clone or something.

Happysquared: She used to support herself by doing art commissions for like ten dollars an hour.

Emlise: In 2019 I used to walk to 3 different grocery shops so I could buy the cheapest onions and potatoes. So I managed to get it to like 10 cents per dinner.

Happysquared: Ok but how do you feel about the positive reception post-launch?

Emlise: People liking the game?

Happysquared: She used to just read the negative reviews on Steam. She’d message me a minute after one was posted saying “we got another negative review”. To be honest, I think the initial post launch for all of us was rough because we had never gotten this much attention for something we made before. Emlise’s last big game, TWWWR, has 0 negative reviews even though overall it only has like 50 reviews. So even though Rusted Moss has been received very positively, it is also technically the game with the most negative reviews for us. I think we spent some time dealing with that and have felt a lot better since.

Emlise: Most of my games are published on Itch and there’s less negativity on there compared to Steam. I’m used to getting almost all 5 stars on Itch. I am glad people have enjoyed Rusted Moss though.

Happysquared: We knew it was a unique game with a steep learning curve so we are very happy it has resonated with so many people.

Was it always the plan to bring the game to additional platforms, or was that something that came about as a result of feedback from the community?

Emlise: This is more on the publisher’s side. I have no experience with bringing the game to an additional platform. I don’t even know how to get started on it. I guess we have controller support so that’s part of it?

Happysquared: I mean the vast majority of the porting is handled by PLAYISM. I think without them we would not have been able to get Rusted Moss on additional platforms so we’re very grateful. I think we didn’t have a plan to bring the game to additional platforms because we aren’t very business minded and so didn’t really think further.

Emlise: I don’t own any consoles so I didn’t think about that stuff. I own an Xbox controller though so I am aware of the Xbox’s existence.

"I mean the vast majority of the porting is handled by PLAYISM. I think without them we would not have been able to get Rusted Moss on additional platforms so we’re very grateful. I think we didn’t have a plan to bring the game to additional platforms because we aren’t very business minded and so didn’t really think further."

Rusted Moss’ console launch will be accompanied by the launch of a major new update. Can you talk to us about how the new content is going to be integrated into the base experience? Is it meant to be post-game content, or will players have the option to tackle it during the course of the main game itself?

Emlise: There’s a little bit of new main game content but it is mostly post-game. There are some new optional areas players can tackle pretty early but most is for people that have beaten most of the game.

Happysquared: A large section of it is a challenge area that was removed from the main game because we thought it might be too hard but decided to re-implement it and expand it. The major new update contains 300+ rooms.

Emlise: The other sections that aren’t the challenge area can be accessed during the course of the main game. They’re easier and a good time for those that just want more of the main game experience. As for the challenge area, it was a good chance for us to explore and further develop parts of the main game. A lot of the Rusted Moss main game has a lot of untapped potential in terms of how complex the challenges are so the challenge area was a good place to explore how far we could push it.

Happysquared: How far we could push the players up for the challenge.

Emlise: Not really for the players in mind specifically. I wanted to make the challenge area like the main game’s energy but cranked up to 11 because I thought it was fun.

Happysquared: That’s true. I guess a lot of our development philosophy was to make a game we enjoyed and then find players who also enjoy the same thing rather than adding what we think players would like. I think we were successful in that as we did reach out to our community to help playtest these challenge areas and the feedback has been positive. So lucky us that we found an audience with similar tastes!

Emlise: Odds are that if you make something you really like you’re also going to find similar people who will also really like it.

What can you tell us about the new Maya mode? What kind of an impact will playing as Maya have in terms of the mechanics and moment-to-moment gameplay?

Happysquared: It started off as a joke.

Emlise: I can’t recall what made me decide to add it to the game.

Happysquared: We kept making stupid jokes about it and you said you wouldn’t add it in unless you had a good reason.

Emlise: I don’t remember what the reason was.

Happysquared: Maya mode is accessible after you finish the main game and it goes by our speedrun mode rules – so all dialogue and text is hidden, it is just pure gameplay.

Emlise: With Rusted Moss having been so improvised, getting to create a character with the knowledge of what type of game it already is was fun. The challenge of making the player character after you’ve already designed everything after you already designed everything (every obstacle…) is a fun challenge.

Happysquared: She plays very different from Fern.

Emlise: A lot more aggressive and fast paced. We tried to give her a very high skill ceiling and she’s a glass cannon.

Happysquared: She’s really fun and best experienced after playing the game as Fern as she makes the game feel completely different.

Emlise: She’s more explosive. For the main game, you have to take your time to get acquainted with Fern and ramp up your skills slowly, but for Maya she hits the ground running and is an immediate powerhouse but very volatile.

"There’s a little bit of new main game content but it is mostly post-game. There are some new optional areas players can tackle pretty early but most is for people that have beaten most of the game."

How large are the new areas that you’re adding to Rusted Moss going to be, and how will they differ from the game’s existing areas in terms of their design and visual style?

Happysquared: There’s 300+ rooms.

Emlise: The challenge area follows a more traditional linear 2D platformer in terms of design. We reworked the visual pipeline. After the experience of making the main game, we learned a lot so we made changes in the programming and rendering to make it look good and were able to do it much faster.

Happysquared: Emlise developed the visual style more. I think it looks a lot better. She got better at making assets.

Emlise: Also we added slopes!

When porting Rusted Moss to consoles, did you have to make any kind of adjustments to things such as the controls or the UI?

Happysquared: Rusted Moss demands a lot from its players. We had an accessibility update in the past to help players that rather not engage with the game in that manner. With Rusted Moss coming to consoles, we also rethought some accessibility options with controller players in mind. For example adding in an auto-shoot ability so players who rather focus on the grapple can do so without worrying about also aiming to shoot. This helped reduce the multitasking some players have trouble with. I think with accessibility options, when we first launched they were pretty heavy handed with invincibility options so we wanted to give more of a variety so players could customise their game experience more.

Emlise: At least when we launched for PC we already had controller compatibility for Xbox and PlayStation with the ability to rebind controls.

On both Xbox Series X/S and PS5, Bright Memory: Infiinite will feature two graphics modes- one supporting ray-traced reflections with a frame rate of 60 FPS, and another mode that will run at up to 120 FPS. Owners of Bright Memory on Xbox will also get a 20% discount on Bright Memory: Infinite on Xbox Series X/S, while an exclusive emerald green weapon skin will also be included for Xbox players. On PS5, meanwhile, the DualSense’s adaptive triggers will be supported.

On the Nintendo Switch, Playism confirms that the game will run natively and not via the cloud, as is often the case with multiplatform releases on the platform now. Temporal anti-aliasing upsampling will also be supported on the hybrid device, and gyro controls will be available as an option. Finally, all three console versions will also contain all cosmetic DLC released for the game’s PC version.

Bright Memory: Infinite launches for PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and Nintendo Switch on July 21.

The versions of Bright Memory: Infinite seem to be named differently. The PlayStation Store and Nintendo eShop list Bright Memory: Infinite Gold Edition. On Xbox, however, the game is listed as Bright Memory: Infinite Platinum Edition. It is currently not clear whether there will be any difference between the releases on the three platforms.

The PlayStation 5 and Switch release for Bright Memory: Infinite was originally announced in June. The Xbox Series X/S version, on the other hand, was announced back in 2020. The PC launch happened in 2021.

For more information about Bright Memory: Infinite, check out our review of the PC release, where we gave the game a score of 8/10.

It launched last year for PC, and has had an Xbox Series X/S version announced since 2020. Now, in a new trailer premiered at Future Games Show, PS5 and Nintendo Switch versions have also been announced. Plenty of gameplay is also shown off, and yes, it continues to loo impressive once again.

Bright Memory: Infinite will launch for all consoles sometime later this year, though a more specific release date hasn’t yet been announced. Whether the Nintendo Switch version will be native or cloud-exclusive also remains to be seen.

In our review of Bright Memory: Infinite’s PC version last year, we awarded it a score of 8/10, saying, “Bright Memory: Infinite brings the ideas of its predecessor to a much more satisfying conclusion and comes within striking distance of many of the games it’s inspired by.” You can read the full review through here.

Gnosia is about the titular beings which are bent on destroying humanity. As part of a crew on a spaceship, the player is tasked with finding and destroying the Gnosia. The twist is that they can infect different crew members and blend in. It’s up to the player to identify the impostors and sentence them into cold sleep before they can kill too many people.

Mixing elements of visual novels, role-playing games and social deduction, Gnosia also incorporates time looping elements. As you complete different loops, you’ll learn more about the Gnosia and level up different stats like Charisma, Charm, and so on to better convince crewmates, suss out impostors and use logic to win arguments.

Once the release date has been finalized, a separate announcement will be made later. Originally released in 2019 for PlayStation Vita, Gnosia rose to prominence when it released for Nintendo Switch earlier this year. Set on a spaceship, the story follows several characters on-board along with a Gnosia, an alien that seeks to kill them. Speaking to different NPCs, it’s the player’s job to find out who is the Gnosia.

This isn’t a one-off task though – there’s a story to play through which involves time-looping and different roles that helps narrow down the Gnosia. If a single-player version of Among Us with an anime art-style appeals to you, it may be worth keeping an eye on for PC. Stay tuned for more details on its new release date in the coming months.

Elephant in the room number 1- Bright Memory is largely made by a one-man studio on Unreal Engine 4, and this would be worthy of praise even if the game was mediocre, but it isn’t. So, while I won’t really factor that into my review of it as a finished product, it’s definitely worth pointing out for context. Elephant number 2- the game is insanely short for the genre. I was able to complete the game twice in just about 4 hours, and even though I adore the genre, I’m not what I would consider a master at it. I died plenty, but still managed to roll credits twice in less time than it takes to get half-way through most other FPSes. Considering that the game is priced accordingly at just under $10, I don’t think that its short length is an inherently bad thing, but again, it’s good food for thought if you’re on the fence about picking it up.

Fans of the new Shadow Warrior games or Bulletstorm should immediately recognize most of Bright Memory’s ideas. From the grappling hook that has the dual purpose of bringing vulnerable enemies closer to you and zipping you to new areas, to the wildly fast and satisfying sword slashing, Bright Memory Infinite certainly has borrowed from the best, which is the best way to borrow if you’re going to do it. That’s not to say that Bright Memory doesn’t feel like its own thing though, because it does.

"Bright Memory Infinite certainly has borrowed from the best, which is the best way to borrow if you’re going to do it."

The time-warped world that combines mythology with military technology is one that immediately grabs you from the jump and doesn’t let go until the credits. Despite only getting to see Shelia talk a handful of times, she’s a character that I feel like I can easily root for, and despite only being introduced to the main villain halfway through its unsettlingly short story, I still felt the conflict between him and Shelia’s SRO organization brewing in a genuine way. Outside of that, the story rarely moves at all until the very end, but just as the game intends, you’ll usually be having too much fun to really care.

Bright Memory Infinite plays like it knows it’s only got a couple hours to show you everything it does, which is to say it rarely feels stale. In fact, if it weren’t for one completely unnecessary contrived stealth section, I’d say its pacing was pitch-perfect. Sure, the meat and potatoes of its gameplay is largely made up of “go to the next area and kill all the bad guys”, but it’s the arrangement of said bad guys, the variety of them, and the fact that Shelia’s arsenal often gives you multiple legitimate paths to victory over them, that keep it all consistently fun. One area might be pretty straight forward, with armed guards of different types rushing you and playing to their strengths, while the next, might have some deliberate distance between you and them, forcing you to either whip out your sniper rifle and pop them from across the arena or grapple them to you and blow their heads apart like grapefruit while they’re in stasis. There’s rarely a wrong answer in Bright Memory, and you got to love it for that. Some enemies do seem to pop in right behind you with no indication other than the shots you take before you notice them, but outside of that the rollercoaster ride of Bright Memory’s combat rarely derails. You have a fairly standard set of weapons, each with alternate firing modes and all of which are a literal and figurative blast to use.

As a guy who tends to overuse shotguns in shooters, I found the shotgun here to have a nice personality to it. It has a rather satisfying thunk that makes it a bit understated, but still boisterously destructive in any situation, and the sheer chaos that it’s alternate firing mode unleashes just makes it all the more wonderful. Your grapple and punch attacks are tied to the same meter that automatically recharges after a short rest, as does your health. Outside of that, and your sword slashes which make short work of most enemies within range, your attacks mostly stay the same. There are a few abilities and upgrades to be had in the game’s very conservative skill tree, but given how short the whole affair is, and how fun your basic arsenal is to use, it might not even occur to you to mess with it.

"Bright Memory Infinite plays like it knows it’s only got a couple hours to show you everything it does, which is to say it rarely feels stale."

Enemy types range from standard SAI soldiers, to heavies that may or may not have shields, to a couple types of undead warriors from eons past that have been reanimated, capped off with a small handful of mythological-themed bosses that you’ll fight a couple times each. If this were a 10-hour game, the variety of enemies might have felt a bit lacking, but here, it’s just right. By the time I fully mastered how to reflect flaming arrows from these roman soldiers back at them, the game would throw five of them at me at once, forcing me to step up my adaptation once again. My only gripe I have with the game’s combat would be the aforementioned stealth section that feels uncharacteristically tacked-on and rushed.

Forcing yourself to slow down and engage in tedious trial-and-error while Shelia inexplicably holds her meat cleaver in the middle of the screen was an odd low-point for the game and seems to contradict everything the other 95 percent of it stands for. That said, it is over quickly, which is good, but also just underlines my confusion as to why it was even included. Outside of that, there are some great set-pieces like a battle that takes place on top of planes and a driving section that lets you blow up some tanks. Suffice it to say, any AAA developer out there working on a shooter right now should take notes from Bright Memory’s pacing, and be wary of launching their game alongside whatever this guy makes next. There are also some extras thrown in like alternate costumes and weapons skins and multiple difficulties, but even for the price it does feel a bit lacking here. A simple horde mode could have really sealed the deal, but as it is, the amount of content for the price is debatably middling.

Bright Memory is not as graphically demanding as you might think. It only requires 8 GB of RAM and an NVIDIA GTX 960 to run. But recommended settings suggest you bump it up to 16 GB or RAM and a 1060, which isn’t too demanding. Although based on my experience, where I did have multiple hard crashes despite being well above those recommended settings, I would suggest keeping the resolution at 1080 unless your rig is particularly beefy. If it is, you can also enjoy the game’s ray tracing which does admittedly look phenomenal when everything is firing on all cylinders and working as intended. V-sync is also an option that might help with stuttering or tearing, but I honestly didn’t run into much of that at all. All things considered, the game does seem to run generally okay, but given that I struggled with crashing notably more than I usually do on arguably just as intense games when coming back from a death or loading up a save file, I also think it’s pretty clear there’s a bit more ironing out that needs to occur, and I’d be derelict in my duty as a reviewer if I didn’t mention that as well as how it dragged on my overall experience. Few things bring the fun of a ferocious action game to a halt quicker than having to fiddle around with frame rates and texture options just to get your save file to load.

"While other modern shooters offer expansive open-worlds, colorful well-rounded characters, and broad multi-faceted themes, Bright Memory Infinite serves as yet another reminder that you don’t necessarily need any of that."

While other modern shooters offer expansive open-worlds, colorful well-rounded characters, and broad multi-faceted themes, Bright Memory Infinite serves as yet another reminder that you don’t necessarily need any of that. Sure, deep gameplay mechanics and profound storytelling all have their place in the genre, as do many other styles, but there’s also always going to be room for fun, bombastic experiences that burn bright and burn fast – especially when the price is right.

Having a particularly well-done set of sound effects and an appropriately heart-thumping action movie-style musical score is a nice cherry on top of it all. Despite a couple of small headscratchers and a PC version that clearly could use some more time in the oven, Bright Memory Infinite, more often than not, manages to come within slashing distance of the games it’s so clearly inspired by. Whether the friendly price balances out the short length and unpredictable performance for you is going to be for you to determine, but I generally found experiencing the game’s strengths to be more than worth dealing with its shortcomings.

This game was reviewed on PC.

There’s quite a lot to unpack about the combat with ranged options like firearms and a katana for melee combat. Several enemies can be taken down with bullets whether it’s an assault rifle or handgun (which can also fire explosives at a slower rate). Others take slightly longer to whittle down due to armor but deflecting their attacks with the katana leaves them wide open.

Along with juggling foes in the air, protagonist Sheila can charge up her blade and send it out in a spinning arc which travels back and forth between foes. Of course, even the traversal is highly stylish with wall-running and a grapple hook for longer distances. Bright Memory: Infinite will be a free upgrade to owners of the original game on Steam and is also coming soon to Xbox Series X/S. Stay tuned for more details in the coming weeks.