Welcome to my review of Redfall, a game that intrigued me from the very first reveal all the way to the moment of seeing the ending credits.
Redfall is an open-world, co-op FPS from Arkane Austin, the award-winning team behind Prey and Dishonored. Continuing Arkane’s legacy of carefully crafted worlds and immersive sims, Redfall brings the studio’s signature gameplay to this story-driven action shooter.
The island town of Redfall, Massachusetts, is under siege by a legion of vampires who have blocked out the sun and cut the citizens off from the outside world. Explore the open world and immerse yourself in a deep story campaign as you unravel the mystery behind the vampires’ appearance. Ally with a handful of survivors against the creatures threatening to bleed the town dry.
Redfall blends single- and multiplayer options seamlessly, allowing the player to venture into the darkness alone or to squad-up for up to four player co-op. Teammates can try different hero loadouts and combine their strengths to find creative solutions to the vampire apocalypse. You will collect an arsenal of specialized weaponry and customize your character with unique upgrades and abilities to suit your playstyle for guns blazing, stealth combat, and everything in-between.
Created by science experiments gone wrong and gifted with psychic abilities, Redfall’s vampires will challenge you and your squad to get creative. You will choose from a team of diverse heroes – each with their own character-specific abilities – to overcome the vampire legion and their brood of maniacal followers.
Redfall is a true Arkane experience set in a rich world that blends the familiar with the extraordinary. Redfall’s open world is handcrafted by the master level designers behind Prey’s Talos I space station and Dishonored’s Dunwall. From the town’s once-bustling downtown and the haunted forest to the decimated seaside boardwalk and beyond, you will fight through cultist outposts and supernatural psychic spaces as you piece together Redfall’s many mysteries.
Redfall was actually one of my most anticipated games of this current year and with some of the heavy hitters that are inbound still, those were some incredibly big shoes to fill. The combination of Arkane Studios bringing us a vampire shooter, had me wanting it as soon as possible. Having adored the Dishonored series, I was curious to see what they would give us and I can only describe it as a fun yet hot mess of a game.
Throughout my game, I have had some unusual things happening, from minor bugs to all-around weirdness, but I would not even call them crazy as they just made this game a lot more spicy than it already is. Yes, Redfall is quite a challenge if you are not used to shooters and also, your character of choice does influence things a lot. I picked the lovely lady with the mental elevator. You know, she can just summon mental elevators that can lift her up onto the next level, and boy, it is a power that really befits Layla.
I will admit here that I was a long time due to really use it, I tend to love gunplay over the usual mechanics of a game and well, Redfall forced my hands to use all my powers. Like Layla’s former boyfriend Jason, an amazing help when you are cornered and such a failure on my own behalf for not using him more in the early half of the game.
Yes, I was being so fresh, thinking that I could do this without help and only my guns. Sure, once I figured out which gun really has which benefit, like how I love a sniper rifle with a silencer… I suddenly became very deadly, but they were also very scarce throughout the game, despite finding the tenfolds of guns all over Redfall, there were just a handful of them with a silencer, this forced me to become very skilled at very distant headshots. This is where stuff got weird.
The second I strayed from my “path”, I was usually overrun if not precise and despite the “free” roaming around nature of the game, most of the time, you do end up following said path. I died so many times from being overrun by enemies and even learning the Jason attack to be mandatory as part of your arsenal, the game handles itself very well to guide your hand to become the ultimate vampire slayer.
Redfall did catch me by surprise a few times. Despite being a shooter, there is a ton of storyline content. I had a lot more “wow” moments than I anticipated ahead of the game. The story may be the best part of the game, it all just clicked with me. From finding out who the Hollow Man is to helping fellow survivors escape from the clutches of whatever bad guys were at play. Helping friends deliver a baby and so much more.
For all those looking to play the game, allow me to give some aid, something I usually do not do, but trust me, some things are better known from the very start. Find the safe houses! You need a safe spot all over Redfall and it is truly important that you free up all the save points. There is no greater annoyance than having to walk another 1000m just because it is the closest thing to your destination. Trust me, more important than you might guess. When you get ambushed and trust me, you will, you want to walk the least amount to try again.
Last but not least, what is bad about the game? I personally would have settled for a slightly better balancing of the weapons. At one point I was level 17 and still had a level 11 weapon because it was the best one befitting to my play style. At the very end, level 20 and still had that weapon prior to starting the final run at the game’s big boss. The funny part, it was a gun made by the bad guys… Quite unusual but that is the appeal of the game.
In conclusion, more challenging than you would expect, Redfall is quite the rush to play, however. Looking at the game and its storyline and I would give it a clear 10/10, looking at the gameplay, I would go for around 8/10, just too many times was I ambushed or out of bullets to die without glory. The median score brings my final score to a 9/10
