You fight through a city that is dissolving around you, using a sword that can pause time so you can plan out a full sequence of attacks before executing them all at once. Different abilities called functions can be combined in various ways to build your own attack style. The pacing is slower and more thoughtful than most action games, with a melancholy story and soundtrack running underneath the combat.
Gameplay video
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Screenshots & review notes
Why it lands
Supergiant's follow-up to Bastion is colder and more melancholic, trading some of its predecessor's charm for a moodier, more ambitious systems-driven story. It's a tougher, stranger game.
How it plays
The Turn mechanic lets you plan out entire combos in a pause, giving fights a tactical puzzle feel beneath the real-time action. Function combinations reward real experimentation.
Style and score
Its dissolving cyberpunk city and Darren Korb's vocal-led score create one of the most distinct moods in the genre. Visually and sonically, it's a knockout.
Who it's for
Shorter than Bastion but denser mechanically, it rewards a second playthrough on higher difficulty. Recommended for anyone who wants their action RPGs a little more cerebral.
Frames captured from the gameplay video above; notes are our own take on the game.
What it's like to play
You play a woman named Red who has lost her voice and gained a talking sword called the Transistor, fighting robotic enemies in a glowing, painterly city by freely moving around in real time or pausing the action entirely to carefully plan out a chain of attacks. Once you plan your moves in that frozen planning mode, you hit a button to execute them all in a quick burst, after which you are briefly vulnerable while your abilities recharge. Every ability the sword grants you can be slotted in three different ways, as a main attack, as a modifier on another attack, or as a passive bonus, so the same power behaves completely differently depending on where you put it.
Your goal is to explore the city, uncover what happened to it and to Red, and steadily unlock more of these interchangeable abilities, each of which also reveals a short story fragment when you try it in different slots. Encounters get more demanding as new enemy types appear that punish sloppy positioning, and the game rewards experimenting with new ability combinations rather than sticking to one favorite setup. A first playthrough runs around six to seven hours, and a tougher new game plus mode called Recursion extends that considerably.
The soundtrack, including sung tracks tied to your sword, is a highlight that many players remember long after finishing, and the story is told with restraint, through overheard fragments rather than long exposition. That restraint means the plot stays somewhat mysterious and will frustrate anyone who wants everything spelled out clearly. It is best suited to players who enjoy tactical pausing combat, moody atmosphere, and music, over those chasing constant fast action.