Those are fun to find, and they make this world feel a little less empty.Īnd I can’t forget the game’s strongest point by far: the Rot. You’ll find spiritual ‘mailboxes’ wherein Kena can deposit random Spirit Mail she finds out in the wild to free trapped spirits and get access to locked-away areas. Besides this little Metroidvania-esque touch, Kena’s strongest point in exploration are the little collectibles scattered around the map. Oftentimes, you’ll run into gates and doors blocking your progress, only to come back later on in the story with the tools to open them. You don’t run into many loading screens, and you grow more and more familiar with this world the further you explore it. This quest takes Kena to the aforementioned abandoned village and the forest area around it, all of which are connected - which I actually quite liked. Kena doesn’t do much to stand out from the pack. The Pathless and Horizon Forbidden West fit this template just recently, for example. This isn’t exactly a novel premise - hordes of games big and small come out set in desolate worlds where nature is slowly being destroyed by mysterious forces that always seem to come in varying shades of red. Kena’s mission is easy to follow: stop the corruption from spreading, and restore her world to the lush beauty that has been stolen from it. This corruption spreads around an abandoned village, turning its lush foliage into red poison that doesn’t just hurt Kena, but summons hostile spirits that attack her at first sight. Everywhere she goes, she finds mostly empty villages that are either occupied by ghosts in need of assistance or creatures in need of…more painful assistance (read: a good whack on the head). When we meet the young spirit guide, her world has begun to be corrupted by hostile forces she struggles to understand. It’s no exaggeration to say Kena’s story is all about death - but that doesn’t mean it’s dredged in tragedy all the time. Kena: Bridge of spirits has you play as the titular Kena, a spirit guide in a fantastical world where the dead need a little nudging to pass from this world into the next. I know that’s a hot take, but let me explain. For example, an emphasis on visuals over gameplay that makes it look stunning on PlayStation 5 felt like it was made for the PlayStation 2. That makes this game a stunning achievement no matter which way you look at it, but it also explains many of its flaws. This is developer Ember Lab’s very first game, as the studio only worked on commercials and short films before switching over to game development. ![]() ![]() Kena: Bridge of Spirits had an impressive debut for an indie platformer, dazzling us with its Pixar-like animation and adorable visuals - and by adorable visuals, I am specifically referring to the little monsters that follow Kena around like little Pikmin. ![]() Kena: Bridge of Spirits fails to take risks but at least it's cute
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