Scarlet Nexus
PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series
Psychokinesis may well be the quintessential videogame power. Certainly, games are uniquely placed to communicate the physical exertion involved in controlling objects with your mind, and that particular sensation is at the heart of Scarlet Nexus’ wildly entertaining combat. As the aloof Kasane (one of two playable protagonists you choose between at the start; she gets the nod ahead of the blandly heroic Yuito on our first playthrough), we lift and throw barrels, boxes and even cars. By holding the right trigger, we automatically launch these at our target. With a longer squeeze of the left, we pull up a stone statue before thumbing the left stick downward to pound repeatedly on an enemy as if hammering home a stubborn nail. We swing a lamppost across the screen like a colossal baseball bat, swatting opponents aside. Soon after, we wrench a chandelier from its moorings and whirl it like a spinning top, grinding away a beast’s hard carapace.
This is merely one of a startling range of options available to you in battle, as you lead a group of psionics against an invading force known as Others – nearindescribable hybrids of plant, fungus, human, animal and machine that look like gene-splicing experiments gone horribly wrong. Developers Bandai Namco Studios and Tose deploy just about every character-action game trick in the book: launchers, air combos, backdashes, perfect dodges (which confer temporary immunity), break meters, an overdrive mode, and a range of cinematic finishers. And if that isn’t quite enough power, you can borrow those of your allies, too.
That’s possible thanks to the Struggle Arms System (SAS), a mental link that connects the group, allowing them to communicate with one another via a kind of cerebral Slack channel. In combat it lets you borrow up to three team members’ psychic abilities. Pyrokinesis and electrokinesis are two of the earliest and most straightforward, adding fire and sparks to regular attacks, but they can be devastating if you use objects to oil up and soak opponents respectively first. Sclerokinesis – which temporarily negates damage – is helpful when a boss winds up a powerful attack and you don’t have time to get out of harm’s way. The more exciting abilities are introduced as a way to deal with specific enemy types but prove useful in most scenarios. Teleportation replaces your dash-step, letting you blink out of an Other’s reach when attacking at close quarters, while zipping you straight to the next target when you attack after finishing off an enemy. Hypervelocity slows everything but Kasane down until she next takes a hit. Invisibility lets you reveal unseen threats or else sneak up on the most sharp-eyed monsters. And squad leader Kyoka’s duplication ability lets you hurl two objects for the price of one. Two later becomes three once you’ve grown sufficiently close. Fighting together, sharing gifts and attending ‘bond episodes’ with your squadmates
BOND. BRAIN BOND
Between missions, you convene at a (reasonably luxurious) hideout with the rest of your team, where you can give presents to team members to boost your connection with them. You can trade enemy drops and environmental data for these gifts, which hint towards hidden depths to each character’s personality, or encourage them to open up. Quick-tempered Shiden will soften when you present him with a feather duster or a pair of glasses, while Kagero responds to teddy bears and acoustic guitars, suggesting a more sensitive side. It’s worth taking the time to talk to them all, even if you skip the bond episode cutscenes: over time your team bond will improve, which makes revives and Vision moves more likely during battle. boosts those SAS links, giving you access to yet more active and passive abilities.
Such a glut of options leaves you spoiled for choice at times during these chaotic encounters. The stylised art keeps the action relatively readable, as its busy visual flourishes threaten to overwhelm your senses. And that feeling that everything’s getting a bit too much is reflected in Kasane’s ability to stretch herself beyond her already supernatural limits: once her brain drive is filled, she can take the battle into a vibrant, abstract space where her psychokinetic powers are unlimited, and floating objects can be swept or thrown by tapping a button rather than demanding enough time to hold it. You are, then, gloriously overpowered for a time, albeit with a fatal caveat: you need to disconnect before it overloads your brain and kills you. The action warping and blurring as you push it to the last possible second lends tension and visual drama to that rarest of things: a rage mode with real risk attached. And you’re not the only one who has this power: when it’s used against you, your priority shifts towards pure survival.
As exhilarating as the combat can be, it’s a pity the story makes the mistake of attempting to match it for sheer excess. It throws up one or two early surprises, but over 20-plus hours there are so many revelations, betrayals and changes of allegiance that the characters feel like pawns of the plot, rather than drivers of it. So keen is Scarlet Nexus to surprise that it fails to dig into the intriguing ideas set up by its opening act. It never properly interrogates the downsides of this internal Internet’s pervasive presence, for example, beyond showing its characters regularly needing to rest. Having 24/7 access to the thoughts of others is exhausting? Tell us something we don’t know. And when a schism opens up, effectively splitting the psionics into two opposing factions, the interpersonal conflicts make a mockery of the bond episodes. Watching one character trying to kill another before agreeing to meet up for a drink and a chat five minutes later feels deeply silly.
Those bonds are far better communicated through its systems. Battling alongside one another builds camaraderie: these are friendships forged in fire and blood. Teammates will sometimes heal and even revive you. Their SAS gauge will refill quicker, allowing you to call upon them more often, while certain attacks of yours are more explicitly connected to their powers. When one ally calls out, you can respond, inviting a vision of them to fight by your side. And occasionally they pull off that triumphant Fire Emblem trick whereby they step in front of you to intercept a potentially fatal blow. Scarlet Nexus’ overstuffed story might be fixated on the human brain – and when you skittle a line of Others with a train, you’ll be glad of that – but in these moments it recalls where its heart is, too.
We wrench a chandelier from its moorings and whirl it like a spinning top, grinding away a beast’s hard carapace