How hard is Returnal?

[Solid-Fisch]

Hey guys, I need your feedback. Thinking about playing the game but I don't know what to expect from it.

 

So here are some questions from my side:

• How hard is it?
• I heard it's a "rogue like" game? I'm familiar with The Binding of Isaac though I'm really not good enough in that game. Is it comparable to Isaac?
• Can you name similar games like Returnal?
• The DLC is free?
• Can I play the whole game in coop?

 

Feel free to relate about your experiences with Returnal! I could use some insight very well. Thanks in advance!

[DrBloodmoney]

20 hours ago, Solid-Fisch said:

 

• How hard is it?

 

Its' tricky, but not insurmountable by any stretch - I had a quick look at your profile, and you've done significantly tougher games, for sure!

 

It's also a great game - super atmospheric, fun, plays great, and looks fantastic!

 

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• I heard it's a "rogue like" game? I'm familiar with The Binding of Isaac though I'm really not good enough in that game. Is it comparable to Isaac?

 

Not in terms of difficulty, as I understand. I haven't played Binding of Issac, but I do play a fair number of rogue-likes, and I'd place Returnal on the lower end of difficulty for the genre - and I know from general chatter that Issac is a real tough nut!

 

Rogue-like is purely used as the genre trope with Returnal - as in, when you die, you return back to the beginning and start a new run - and you don't retain your progress. 

 

However, Returnal is a little different, even in that regard, because it has a "half-landing" - there are 6 areas, and once you get through the first 3, and enter the second three, you can restart from that point, rather than going all the way back to the beginning.

 

Also, Returnal has certain parts that don't need to be repeated in each run - for example, once you beat a boss of one biome, you don't necessarily need to beat it again - in fact, you can just rush through the area, find the exit, and move on (though it's usually beneficial to fight most enemies, to gain power and weapons for the next one.

 

 

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• Can you name similar games like Returnal?

 

 

It's fairly unique, but it takes a lot of Housemarque's previous, more arcade style games (Nex Machina / Matterfall / Dead Nation etc.) and applies a lot of their sensibilities to a much more fleshed out story (it's a good narrative), and 3D action gameplay. 

 

I tried to find a game with a similar feel on your profile, and the best I could come up with is that the combat has some similarities to Control's combat, during it's more frenetic, larger-scale fights.

 

That's not a perfect analogue, but the movement feel is a bit like that, although certainly faster, and more weapon based.

 

 

 

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• The DLC is free?

 

Yes, I think it was. It's pretty good too!

 

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• Can I play the whole game in coop?

 

I didn't play much co-op, but it seemed like you could play a lot in co-op, but some story stuff might not be able to - or at least, would require disconnecting and re-connecting quite a bit... though I'm not super well placed to answer that one.

 

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Feel free to relate about your experiences with Returnal! I could use some insight very well. Thanks in advance!

 

 

I wrote a review of it here (the last one in that post):

 

 

...and also a second review of the DLC here:

 

if you fancy reading one douche-bag's opinions!

Edited December 6, 2022 by DrBloodmoney

[HardModeTrophies]

Hey, don't mind my account - I platted Returnal on my previous ID a couple of months ago. I will be playing it in the future once again as part of my challenge, but definitely not in the upcoming months.

 

48 minutes ago, Solid-Fisch said:

How hard is it?

 

How good are you at third person shooters? 

 

I took a quick look at your account and you've platted two since 2020 - Spec Ops: The Line and Uncharted: Golden Abyss (coincidentally, I've just platted the latter, and I'm playing the former). You don't seem to be an aficionado of those kinds of games. 

 

In my opinion, the game is an 8/10 without save scumming and 5/10 if you do decide to save scum. It's not exactly easy, but if you possess any significant TPS experience, it's not too bad. 

 

48 minutes ago, Solid-Fisch said:

I heard it's a "rogue like" game? I'm familiar with The Binding of Isaac though I'm really not good enough in that game. Is it comparable to Isaac?

Can you name similar games like Returnal?

 

There aren't many similar titles. The closest comparison I can draw are previous Housemarque games (e.g. Resogun or Alienation) or Hades. The game does draw some similarities with Isaac, but I would say that it's easier to plat, especially if you abuse PS+ save uploads. 

It's not a full-on roguelike, as the game is divided into two separate parts: Biomes 1-3 and 4-6. If you die in Biome 1, 2 or 3, you go back to the beginning, but if you die in 4, 5 or 6, you don't have to start from scratch, you respawn in Biome 4.

 

48 minutes ago, Solid-Fisch said:

The DLC is free?

 

Yes, it is.

 

48 minutes ago, Solid-Fisch said:

Can I play the whole game in coop?

 

Yes, you can. I'm not sure how it feels, as I played the entire game solo.

 

48 minutes ago, Solid-Fisch said:

Feel free to relate about your experiences with Returnal! I could use some insight very well. Thanks in advance!

 

In my opinion, it's an underrated title. I had a great time with it. It's overlooked mostly because it's Housemarque's first AAA game, and it got a bad rep at launch for being too hard. 

Google "Returnal too hard" and you'll see there are a ton of articles bashing the game for being unfairly difficult, but imho it's mostly a case of individuals not wanting to "git gud". The game can be tough at times, but it's mostly a fair challenge. There aren't many instances of players dying to bullshit or broken mechanics. 

The developer added a suspension feature, which led to the platinum being much, much easier and faster to achieve than it was at launch. 

Edited December 5, 2022 by HardModeTrophies

[vinster]

I just 100% the game and DLC a few days back so it is still fresh in my mind.

 

I played entirely solo for the 100%. The initial experience was very unnerving and I took it really really slow, exploring everything, backtracking to check or pick things up, and doing backup saves very frequently. While I don't mind the RNG when it comes to the room and tileset, what really riled me was that items can spawn as malignant with varying degrees of how high the probability to inflict a malfunction on you if you pick it up. You can use ether to clean it but the latter is rare and you don't want to waste ether on that. What I resorted to is to save/reload until I can pick up the malignant item without being afflicted. This is tiresome and irritating and I gave it up after completing Act 2. I know this is not how it's meant to be played but going in mostly blind, I had no idea what to expect and wanted to have the best build possible and the best chance of surviving to the end.

 

The game is "old school" in that you need to replay many many times to get good. Knowing enemy firing/bullet and evading patterns will help you more and more as you get familiar with them. Even then, it gets hectic as enemies not in view will also aggro on you and you won't know what hit you sometimes. Have you played those 2D vertical or horizontal scrolling bullet hell games? Well, it's something like that except in a 3D space.

 

My hands don't usually sweat when I play games, but after 100% this game and the DLC, I needed to thoroughly wipe down my controller! It became too disgusting to hold! Yes, during the heat of battle, your hands/fingers will burn more calories than any Thanksgiving dinner can replenish.  You'll know what I mean when you do the DLC, which by the way, has no suspend save so you'll need to be able to go all the way to the Phase 3 boss in one go. And again, lots of RNG for the DLC run as you could get all crap items and bad enemy spawns. The DLC guide gives it a 4/10 but personally, it was a 6 or 7/10 for me.

 

Honestly, I was quite dejected midway in the game, as I thought I wouldn't be able to even complete it. After persevering and getting better at it slowly, I became more confident and can see the "beauty" of the game. Sure, it is still hard but I will recommend the game for sure. The save scumming definitely helped me out and while diehards may scoff at it, I don't know that I would have attempted this game without it.

 

Also, this game doesn't explain or tell you much and I had to frequently Google or check the fandom wiki for info on weapon traits, artifacts, etc.

 

One good thing about the game is that nothing is missable for the trophies, so just play however you like initially and enjoy or sweat out the experience! Take breaks and don't be upset if fail a few times here and there. It's all part of the game.

 

Lastly, I decided to join as a visitor in a co-op game. I didn't like the experience. For example, when the host picks up the health item, it was then no longer available for me to pick up. You have to stay close to your partner or you will be tethered back to the host. If you have a good friend to help you out and be patient as you explore, that might be way to go, otherwise I recommend just playing solo and suspend your cycles as and when you like.

 

Good luck if you decide to pick up the game, and enjoy the journey!

[AvariceInc]

17 hours ago, Solid-Fisch said:

Can I play the whole game in coop?

 

I played through it both solo and in co-op and I can say that the co-op is much harder because of enemy scaling and you have to share resources and healing pickups. Of course skill levels matter and you can carry someone through it but still it's quite a bit more challenging unless you find one specific gamechanging item (Adrenaline Leech) that will make any run and especially co-op muuuuch easier because with it sharing healing pickups won't be that big of an issue anymore.

[Darling Baphomet]

It's not that hard. Your guns become more powerful as you play, and the game is kind of a half assed rogue like. You only need to fight each boss once, and unlike BoI the map generation isn't balanced for scarcity so if you 100% each floor you get OP very quickly.

[Solid-Fisch]

Thank you all for the feedback guys, appreciated it! Since I wasn't really sure if this could be a game for me even after your comments I tried it on my dummy account to get a feel for the game. Was the right decision. Played for about 2 hours and made it to the first bossfight into 3rd stage but died there and a few other times later too. Dying is part of the game, I got that. But rediscover everything again and fighting all the enemies again... that's no fun to me. Turns out this is not my cup of tea, it is what it is. So I decided to stay away from it. Respect to everyone who has 100% in this.