BABYLON’S FALL

Developer PlatinumGames Publisher Square Enix Format PC, PS4, PS5 Release 2021

Announced in 2018, due for release in 2019, pushed back to 2020, and then delayed again, PlatinumGames’ high-fantasy co-op actioner was still something of an enigma until Square Enix’s summer showcase. And, well, perhaps it should have preserved the mystery a little longer. Development was “progressing well” last year, the studio insisted; in that case, we wouldn’t like to see how it would have looked had things been progressing badly. Featuring some ear-scraping vocal performances, it looked more like the developer responsible for The Legend Of Korra and TMNT: Mutants In Manhattan than the one behind Bayonetta and Astral Chain.

Yet if the footage of this live-service game could be described as ‘rough-edged’, it’s clear what we initially wrote off as a dodgy stream is actually an artistic choice: the world is painted in brushstrokes, giving it a low-resolution look – which should at least aid performance in what looks a busy hackand-slash. And let’s spare room for optimism: at the helm is Metal Gear Rising director Kenji Saito, assisted by Nier: Automata’s lead designer Isao Negishi. An imminent closed beta should reveal whether this is one either will put on their CV. Maybe it doesn’t matter either way; as that shrill man in the trailer puts it: “We’re all prisoners of our subjective reality.”