So I don’t play a LOT of video games. My favorite ones are generally simulators or RPGs. Pretty mainstream stuff, but this sweet little rouge-like game has been a bit of a favorite of mine since it came out. For a number of reasons. So lets do a little bit of a review.
Story
First off, it seems a little weird, but it actually has a pretty compelling story. A lot of roguelikes don’t spend a lot of time on Storytelling, you could honestly play an entire Dark Souls game and not get ANY of the context of what’s going on. If your fine with that, your fine with that. But in this game the main story is given to you very simply. Your goal, is to find a champion from your tribe that disappeared some time ago. How does this line up? Well it quickly becomes clear that something your champion got mucked up in, caused the apocalypse, which in this case is a giant invasion of monsters who have almost entirely assimilated the entire planet.
And that’s just the beginning.
In terms of world building, Remnant does a lot of work just getting the vibe of the world. This is an earth that had an apocalypse in the eighties and as you roam around you see this empty overgrown world that’s been taken over. And strangely enough, the crumbled remains of the earth is just level one in this dimensions spanning epic.
Gameplay
I don’t generally like super hard games. I got maybe three levels deep in Celeste for example. I also don’t like super EASY games, Pokemon Scarlet and Violet was almost dully easy in it’s gym leader battles. Remnant hits that sweet spot for me of being JUST challenging enough to feel rewarding. It also helps a lot that it’s a guns based rogue like.
Equipment
This is a game that loves guns. Rapid fire guns, single shot guns, small guns, big guns, grenade launchers, this game has a ton of guns. You fight a boss, you can make it’s new bits into a new gun. You complete a hard side mission, you can find a new gun, their everywhere and they accommodate a ton of different playstyles. Then you add in the mods.
Mods are things you attach to guns, and it’s the games entire magic system. You get two equip at a time, you can change them out on your normal guns while boss guns all have their own special mods but they all create unique and interesting builds to play around with. Add in different armors that give buffs and you got a unique style to play around it.
The actual play style is generally, you go through one or two dungeons, then you fight a boss. You always get rewarded with something for fighting the boss but there is also rewards for just exploring. Every world is procedurally generated, so replay value is very high. You don’t even have to start a whole new game to do it, you can reroll a world in story mode to see different variants to get different side quests or go into adventure mode separate from the story just to run through all each world has to offer you.
Survival Mode
Survival mode is separate from the main story and adventure mode. It’s basically a time and inventory management game that starts you off with only a bit of money, no clothing, and one gun. Then you run through, kill a boss, then get put back at the start with whatever you gained from that dungeon and so on. It’s a brutal play style, because it counts how many bosses you do in a run and it resets every time you die. So why bother with this? Because the longer your chain of defeats, the more goodies you get on your account. Not your current character, your account. You get account wide extra items that are excellent. It’s also good practice for your main game play since it makes you more cautious since death has a more tangible consequence.
Multiplayer
Remnant does multiplayer, very well. You can have at most, three people playing at a time but the games interface to work with multiple people is very good. And with some of the bosses, very necessary. Teamwork is the dream work and a lot of builds work with that.
Overall
I love this game. It’s a comfort for me because it never bores me. Even though I think I’m pretty good at it, I will sometimes get smacked up side the head enough for it to still be a challenge. With the sequel coming out, I thought I’d like to highlight this neat little game that kept me company during the pandemic.