If you can triumph over the save limitations, Returnal is flawless in delivering satisfying combat, endless builds to help you expose the truth of Atropos, all brilliantly fused with a drip-fed psychological narrative.
As much as I have dipped my toes in other genres lately, my bread and butter is the RPG in its many forms and fashions. Shooters? I’m pretty bad at those, and really don’t hone the skill for them much due to most of the games having never-ending content to where it’s overwhelming. Destiny 1 and 2 are sort of an outlier for me, as well as Borderlands. But they satisfied another aspect I enjoy, which is the loot. Another genre I’m not that well-versed in are roguelikes, despite liking the concept of them. So what happens when you put the two of them together?
Well, you get what might be my favorite PS5 exclusive thus far.
Returnal combines a tight, responsive shooter, with an ever-changing world that will revolve around your death, over and over again. Housemarque did a damn good job with the environmental storytelling, and the drip feeding of lore and contextual information that keeps you guessing what on earth, I mean Atropos, is going on. You play as Selene, a woman with heterochromia, who is an astronaut with the Astra Program. You discover a signal coming from the forbidden planet Atropos. As you are navigating the storms, your ship, Helios is struck down. Get familiar with seeing poor Helios hit by a Thundaga, cause you will be seeing it ALOT. Surviving the crash, Selene explores to discover the body of another scout here before her. But wait! The scout is actually her dead body. In comes the loop.
Dying is pivotal to Returnal, as some scenes or tidbits of lore will not be dished out until you die X amount of times, or a certain way. Luckily for you, you will probably die a decent amount of times anyways. I want to say off the bat that the game isn’t hard, but it can be very challenging. It becomes much more manageable once you learn your enemy’s patterns, their strengths and weaknesses as well as your own. Your weapon loadout is crucial to this as well, as a weapon with some neat perks can make you a walking deathmachine. My personal favorite was the Hollowseeker + Serrated, Portal Beam, Portal Turret, which just led to a joyous cataclysm of energy beams and laser beams from magical portals. What a treat to watch. Speaking of loadouts, having builds that are in sync with the way you play can make a huge difference. No sense in if you are a heavy melee user that you should be picking up a parasite that has a decent positive effect, but the negative is -50% melee damage or adverse affects to its cool down. I found myself creating some interesting builds, such as keeping malfunction-repairing items in my inventory plus parasites that improve integrity.
Returnal is bossy. It’s not generous like other games where every 15 steps an autosave icon appears, or checkpoints being thrown around like Covid stipend money. It demands your time and effort, and rewards you with doses of worldbuilding. Who is Selene? Why are you stuck in this time loop? Why is it ever changing? As time progresses, it seems even the fundamental aspects of Selene herself are called into question. It demands you are cautious and calculated, fearing every encounter in every chamber. Eventually, you’ll find yourself on one run where you’ve realized that the fear has subsided and it begins to feel almost divine to know that you are the one they fear in the chamber. Playing Returnal in bits and pieces is great to soak it in slowly, but it shines when you are in full command of it and make your enemies bend the knee.
Still, this game might not be for everyone. Due to the lack of saving ability and the fact that there’s really only two checkpoints, Returnal can feel very daunting or nigh impossible at first. I believe that Housemarque built the game concept around this, and to change it would certainly alter the difficulty and way the game works, but realistically for many people this is the barrier of entry for them. I can’t tell you how many times I had those butt-clenching “oshitoshitoshit” moments while rocking one of my kids to sleep. Multitasking at it’s finest. Yet, I’m very aware that this just simply doesn’t work for everyone and whatever responsibilities they have. If you can muster up the determination and challenge this game, I’m sure you will eventually triumph. It was awesome to not only get confident in taking enemies on, it was a rush once all of the mechanics melded into one and the game shines the way it is meant to be. Hands down, this is a fantastic game that I hope everyone has the chance to play. Housemarque did an excellent job and I wonder if we are in store for more Returnal content or a sequel maybe? I’ll dream on a bit.
SPOILERS Below:
I found that the game structure itself was a play on the entire concept of the story. Dying and looping, you become an extension of Selene. As she is stuck, so are you, constantly putting in one more run, or one more room in hopes of finding that perfect artifact and/or parasite. Initially, the story is cryptic and vague, but ultimately we are faced with a story of tremendous loss, pain and trauma. It’s a bit puzzling to determine what is true, and what is actually going on, as it’s clear that Selene may not be who is. She disobeys orders and flies to the signal being broadcasted by Atropos, but upon further analysis of scout logs, Selene apparently never made it into the Astra Program. These logs begin to give more details about every different experience that another “Selene” has had before they met their untimely end.
Helios also has significance in that its basically the only name for the child in the house, which coincidentally is the name of the ship. Helios the ship is shot down, and paradoxically its determined that you are the one that shot it down, thus constantly ensuring your loop continues on Atropos. I believe that this shooting down of Helios, and the car scene in which “Helios” is in the back seat, all represent the the moment of trauma and grief that the woman who clearly looks like Selene is experiencing. Cues in-game suggest she’s mentally unstable, on medications, and the home life is not a happy one. It’s not farfetched to assume that maybe she was driving and just…lost it. The car dives into the water and Selene is clutched, transported to Atropos by tentacles (oddly like the final boss..confronting your grief/acceptance perhaps?). This theory makes more sense when the additional ending implies that you are the astronaut. This changes everything because it is you haunting yourself in the replica home, stalking yourself and just being this foreboding prescence. Ultimately, Selene Vassos is the reason for her own destruction, and her trauma and shock has forced her to relive the events over and over, always ‘Returning’. Of course, that’s just my interpretation of it, but I feel the layers of metaphor and comparisons make it so easy to speculate and come up with theories.
SPOILERS End
-Game Info- Returnal Genre: Roguelike/Third-Person Shooter Developer: Housemarque Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment Release Date: 4/30/2021 Platforms: PS5 -GamerDad Info- Completed On: 5/15/2021 Played On: PS5 Time Played: ~70 Hours Rating: 9/10
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