I like games that use brain power. I'm taking a look at the general features of this production, which came to dive into the game world with brain power. It is a brand new action - role-playing game developed and published by Bandai Namco. Let's take a look at Scarlet Nexus, the new game of Bandai Namco, which entered the game world full of remakes and sequels with a new IP, and a brand new genre called Brain Punk.
Pluses
+ Both characters have their own unique story
+ Socialize with team members
+ Graphics
+ Brain Punk world
+ Fluent combat system
+ Music and voiceover
+ Character designs
+ PC price is fine
Cons
- Presentation of some scenes as slides
- Constantly annoying hint window
- Some sections designed to increase the duration
- Hard to appeal to those who don't like anime
- Kasane's woodshed attracts a lot of attention at first
Scarlet Nexus takes place in the very distant future, in a world very different from the one we know. A world where people increase their brain power to an unimaginable level, and those who can use this power correctly acquire various powers. The only defense between humans and creatures called "Others", who fell from the sky for an unknown reason and are hungry for the developed brains of humans, is the organization called "Other Suppression Force" (OSF). Members of this organization are psionics with enhanced powers and long-lived due to the anti-aging treatment they receive.
Welcome to the world of Brain Punk
Our story has two main characters. Yuito Sumeragi, a descendant of a great hero and whose family is in charge of the city, and Kasane Randall, the adopted daughter of the Randall family, who has considerable influence in the arms industry. Our characters, who have just joined OSF, meet as a result of an attack in the city, and then we embark on a long adventure that changes according to the character we choose.
Our characters, both of whom are new candidates to OSF, are actually the types we are used to seeing in anime and Japanese games. Yuito was rescued by an OSF agent as a child and later joined OSF, working to make the world a better place. A skilled melee, Yuito wields a katana and has psychokinesis abilities. He's the relaxed and fun type we see in anime main characters, who can trust everyone quickly.
Our other character, Kasane, is a girl whose family was murdered by Others when she was a child and came under the protection of the Randall family. Kasane, whose only human step-sister Naomi is his favorite, is a character suitable for both close and ranged combat, thanks to a special weapon consisting of flying knives. With the exception of Naomi, who joined OSF with him, Kasane is a character that we can literally call wood, who is cold and distant towards everyone. It's actually a mix of Cloud (the early game version) and Lightning from the Final Fantasy series. It is a bit disturbing at first, but as the story progresses, it is possible to see the reasons and character development.
Throughout the story, we encounter many side characters, gather a large team for ourselves and constantly struggle with different enemies. Each of the characters in our team has a different personality. Among them are strong warriors who still look like children because they took the anti-aging medicine, and veteran soldiers who are slowly retiring because they have been taking drugs for so long. Again, it is a game full of character types that anime viewers can solve immediately, but even if you know what you will see, it manages to make you wonder "let's see how they did it".
Our only enemy is not Others, the story goes to different places with different factors such as political conflicts, power struggles, a religious group about which we do not know much. I liked the general flow of the story, we go in unexpected directions and learn the reasons behind the events. But what I liked most was that the two characters had their own stories.
We know that playing the same story with two main characters with only minor differences can be annoying (like Nier Automata). Scarlet Nexus made a good choice here, deciding to advance the story of the two characters separately. Even though our paths cross from time to time, Kasane and Yuito's stories are drastically different. Sometimes things happen out of nowhere, for example, someone in the same organization attacks you and you have to fight. Your character flees the scene and the characters do not have the opportunity to learn the cause of the incident. At this point, the other story comes into play, the other character learns the background of the event and why it happened.
Team members and social relations also change according to the character you choose. When you finish the story once and start over with the other character, you get the opportunity to see live events that you only heard about. It's also nice to see your teammates' social interactions with each character, which includes different events. The best part of the job is that if you want to continue after finishing the game once, you don't throw away the character you developed, all the improvements and the things you get come to the new game.
There are various ways to use your brain
Scarlet Nexus is a game with both action and role-playing elements. We adopt a close or mid-range fighting style depending on the character we choose, and we attack the enemies we encounter by using the powers of both ourselves and our teammates. First, let's take a look at our main characters, Kasane and Yuito. The brain power that our characters fighting with katana and flying knives can use is called psychokinesis. Thanks to this power, we can lift the objects around and throw them on the enemy's head, control and drive large vehicles to the enemy, or cause the explosion of trucks loaded with gasoline. The "brain crush" ability, which we can use when we pierce the enemy's armor and make it defenseless, allows us to finish most enemies in one move.
Our teammates join us during the fights. Two team members can be found in the fighting area, which we can change at any time. The characters in our team can connect to us and share their power with us through the “Struggle Arms System” (SAS). We can use abilities such as slowing down time, teleporting, equipping armor and supporting our weapon with elemental powers. There are also powers we can use to become invisible, increase the number of objects we throw, and spot enemies that are hiding. While we can activate only 1 character's power at the beginning, we can activate 4 powers at the same time towards the end of the game. In this way, combinations such as attacking the enemy can be developed by slowing down the time and turning on the electric ability.
We can develop the bond between us and team members. Thanks to the various gifts we give them and the conversations we have, our friendship bond increases. The better we get along with our team members, the more our SAS capabilities develop. Our friends, who only lend their strength at the first level, offer advantages such as protection from hits, performing complementary attacks, and ability-specific bonuses at later levels. It is also a nice detail that the gifts we give each other appear on the tables in the shelter and add vitality to the environment.
Weather Others shows precipitation
Let's not pass without mentioning the visual and auditory parts of Scarlet Nexus. First of all, I played the PC version of the game on a relatively powerful system with a 2060 graphics card, and your comments will be accordingly.
With the Scarlet Nexus on the highest settings, I had almost no technical issues. You can play the game by choosing one of the "30 - 60 - Unlimited" FPS options. In the Unlimited FPS option, I've seen it get around 100 FPS in normal areas, while it rarely drops below 80 in crowded fights, where abilities explode in a row. It would not be wrong to say that it has done a very successful job in terms of performance. If you are playing in full screen, do not alt-tab, the screen loses itself and you cannot get rid of the game without closing it.
The visuals are reminiscent of Code Vein, which is also a Bandai Namco game. I think it's because of things like grotesque enemy designs, the similarity of the color palette used in the spaces from time to time. I'm very happy with the visuals of the game, both in-game footage and cutscenes looked pretty good. I also fell in love with Brain Punk world-specific designs, where Japanese anime style and western science fiction world are brought together. However, if you have a particular dislike for anime style, you may not like it.
At first, I found Scarlet Nexus very strange in its storytelling way of using characters that speak over scenes such as slideshows as well as cutscenes. After a while, one gets used to it, but I would love for some scenes to take place with video or in-game animations instead of slide shows.
There are wearables in the game and they completely affect the visual characteristics of the character. Although there is nothing but 2 extra sets of clothes, 2 masks and small mascots according to the version of the game we bought at the beginning, we can produce bags, glasses, masks, ribbons, helmets and strange objects that we can wear on ourselves in the future. Each character has 1 outfit and 3 equipment slots. Moreover, the items we wear appear on our character in almost every scene. My biggest problem with the item system is that we don't have a chance to see what an item looks like before we make it. After all, I feel sorry for the materials I spent when what I did as a mask turned out to be a dog head.
Now it's time for my last and biggest complaint about the game. The game is constantly trying to give us information. I'm not talking about our telepathic helper who tells about the weak points of the enemy, or his teammates who say "there is water, should we throw electricity". Whenever you activate a character with SAS, a TIPS box opens that says what that character is doing. I played the game for thirty hours at the hardest level, I have a character that can unlock four SAS abilities at the same time, and the game gives me the clue "If the enemy is fast, you can use the character that slows the time". There is no way to turn it off in settings. Distraction aside, I'm taking great pictures, with the huge TIPS window popping up on the side.
My Result
When Scalet Nexus was announced, it was a game that only attracted my attention with its masked characters, and I did not expect its release very excitedly. The story is more interesting than I expected, the fights are both fluid and enjoyable, the character/enemy designs are nice and the performance is smooth. I reached 32 hours of gameplay with only one character, which I can't say I grind too much. With the second character, it has a total of over 65 hours of gameplay, although it ends in a bit shorter time than I continued from the previous save file. We also learn a little more about the story with the second ending.
Scarlet Nexus was an unforgivable game thanks to its pros such as the dynamic combat system, the unique story of each character, a good job on voice acting and music, even though I was annoyed by the unnecessary lengthening of the game, especially in the last chapters. It is a game that I can recommend to everyone, keeping the players who don't like animes or who don't like this graphic style separate.
