A plague tale innocence đánh giá năm 2024

A Plague Tale: Innocence convinced me it was worth trying out when it just seemed to me that it was a gritty adventure game about children caught in the middle of war. Upon venturing further into the game, I quickly found much more in store for me: a harrowing, often horrific journey for two estranged siblings learning to love one other while braving a plague of bloodthirsty rats and the clutches of those seeking to profit from its devastating effects.

Plague Tale: Innocence released in 2019 by French developers Asobo Studio for Xboxes, Playstations, and for translucent apertures operating systems (Windows). Our story takes place during the Hundred Years War (1137-1453) but it quickly becomes apparent that this game is really just hanging out in the time period for its accoutrements and exoticism, as there’s very little historical accuracy attempted here. That’s not a bad thing, mind you, as it makes the game pulpy and fun, but if you were convinced by the marketing that this was some children of war historical epic taking itself as seriously as say, the Last of Us, you’re in for a surprise. That being said, the game is definitely not pulling any punches in the violence and gore department and it balances a potent blend of heartwarming and gut wrenching in equal measure.

The story stars Amicia and Hugo de Rune, two siblings of noble descent who hardly know each other due to Hugo’s chronic illness keeping him isolated since birth. The children’s mother Beatrice is a renowned alchemist who’s been using her skills to treat her son but she goes missing after the family’s castle is raided by armored fanatics known as the Inquisition who are after Hugo for an unknown reason. The two barely escape the clutches of these men, and Amicia finds that there is more to Hugo’s condition than their mother ever revealed, and which makes him a prize people would kill to obtain. To make matters worse, swarms of insatiable rats have infested the land and made traversal incredibly dangerous. Amicia and Hugo must venture across the hostile French countryside in search of a cure for Hugo’s worsening condition, cheating death from man and beast alike.

The player primarily controls Amicia, and you’re often accompanied by an NPC which is usually Hugo but you’ll get a chance to team up with most every side character at some point as the story dictates. Amicia’s character arc feels very much like Lara Croft’s in the Crystlan Dynamics reboot, a somewhat posh and innocent (not for long) young girl thrust into a nightmarish situation where she’s forced to kill to defend herself. Like reboot Lara Croft, Amicia is initially fraught with guilt after her first kill but quickly leans into becoming John Rambo as she’s moved to rage at the Inquisitors’ murderous actions. It’s not ludonarratively dissonant but it is perhaps a quick transition. Asobo Studio is likely intentional in not belaboring the emotionality of this transformation, though. A lot of the characterization had this economy to it, and while it’s probably not precious enough about some of these moments, I can appreciate the studio not milking them for all they’re worth like some companies that rhyme with Brony.

Other touches that feel Tomb Raider and Last of Us inspired are the prevalent callouts in combat from you and enemies alike and the cinematic camera angle as you take cover that frames the points of interest in the area you just entered. Most specifically inspired by those games, however, is the crafting system. You’ll be encouraged to pick up everything you can find from salpeter to animal skins to twine so that you can upgrade your sole weapon the slingshot, craft ammo for it, and buy passive abilities like using fewer resources to craft ammo or crafting faster inside of combat.

Amicia’s quite the crack shot with her slingshot and you’ll gradually unlock more satisfying and interesting ammo varieties to toss, such as being able to burn away guards’ helmets with acid to line them up for a headshot, or ignite torches so you can herd rats away from your path or even extinguish light sources guards are holding so that the rats attack them. The combat requires good reflexes and coordination and the sound of Amicia’s slingshot finding its mark substantially enhances the reward of the hardest sections.

Plague Tale is often billed as a stealth adventure game but that’s a little misleading, as the game trends more and more towards combat in the game’s second half. You’ll have your share of walking and talking sections and move some objects around in the environment to reach higher places, but the lion’s share of the game is this sort of emergent gameplay fulcrum of trying to stay hidden while knowing you may need to knock some heads to get through an area.

Early sections of the game have you performing the classic crouching and waiting for guard patrols to pass or distracting them with thrown objects so you can sneak behind them. Scenarios are cleverly balanced, especially the ones that factor in rats with guards that have helmets or shields or their own light sources. All these variables push you to try out the breadth of your arsenal as the situation allows but I did notice the last third of the game pushes you to try far more risky, proactive ways to progress, which proved very frustrating in several circumstances. Even fully upgraded, the slingshot has trouble when dealing with multiple attackers in open combat once your cover’s blown, and sometimes ranged attackers join the fray too so that dodging them while fighting these one-hit kill opponents makes the last level an absolute slog. But these are difficulty spikes, not the norm, and the average quality of combat, stealth, and puzzles are the right amount of challenging. No individual aspect is best in the industry but they are all well crafted and engaging, never overstay their welcome, and coalesce with beautiful alchemy, no pun intended. Few games can boast such cohesive design, where all the parts are on the same team creatively, and this is a major reason why Plague Tale is such a compelling creation.

While Plague Tale’s gameplay is certainly enjoyable, the real selling points of the experience are the clever set pieces and grimly alluring presentation. First off, Oliver Deriviere, the prolific French composer, delivers a chilling cello and violin based score that feels like the 1400s and matches the almost ridiculous tone of a medieval countryside overrun by impossibly large rat swarms with very likely supernatural implications. It all just feels right and any fans of his work on Vampyr will recognize and appreciate his contributions here.

As for the locations themselves, they pop with incidental detail and remind me of the meticulously crafted spaces in Batman: Arkham Asylum, Bioshock, and The Evil Within. Books and scrolls stylishly litter the halls of ancient libraries, torchlight dances across stained castle and dungeon walls, and human and animal corpses are stacked high across lonely farmer’s fields. It is no wonder I mistook the initial advertisements to mean the game would be a historical, realistic epic like Kingdom Come: Deliverance: its art style is authentic to the time period and setting but hyper realistic, each detail touched up with eye catching flourish. It’s also a welcome bonus that while much of the level design and assets are very linear and bespoke (trademark Nth Review), there are well hidden side passages housing landmarks which trigger observations and provide much appreciated context to the world.

The most impressive convergence of style and design are the game’s truly intense set pieces. The palpable tension of traversing a battlefield piled with dead bodies and swarming with rats with just incidental light sources is a majorly gruesome highlight. Another section in which you must escape a farm surrounded by rats who have killed so much livestock that they stack by the dozens across the fields is so horrific and unsettling that you soon feel as frightened as little Hugo does. Many more like this exist but they’re too fun to spoil for the first time player so I will merely urge you to go experience them firsthand.

Of course, the experience would not be half as gripping if the player did not enjoy or appreciate the characters. Plague Tale takes an interesting approach in that characters are often defined by their actions and not lengthy dialogue and cut scenes. Amicia, Hugo, and the alchemist, blacksmith, and pickpockets they befriend are all survivors in a world of increasing danger and they don’t have time to waste being sentimental or philosophizing. That said, Hugo and Amicia have a palpable connection that grows over time as their extreme situation allows them to make up for the time they spent apart and learn to appreciate one another more fully. Amicia is gifted with a subtly realized arc of her coming to terms with her own bravery and role as her brother’s protector. She possesses much vulnerability and lashes out at those closest to her before she comes to realize her own strength and begins to practice patience and kindness. Hugo himself is a little less appealing as he veers into whiny “I want my mummy” territory too often, but even he shines precociously at times while he maintains a charmingly sweet countenance in the face of the unrelenting darkness around him.

The side characters are more of a mixed bag for me except for Lucas, a gifted ward of an alchemist working on a cure for Hugo, whose abilities as an alchemist and loyalty as a friend make him both integral to moving the plot forward and also provide welcome reliability in a world of predators and opportunists. The other side characters are given too little personality, acting as powerups for gameplay with little else to offer, outside of the female thief who pretty much just curses like a Game of Thrones character and talks too much. Fortunately for the game, while your companions can be a little flat or feel a little gamey, I still liked them mostly fine and they suitably prop up our main characters.

Of course, the experience would not be half as gripping if the player did not enjoy or appreciate the characters. Plague Tale takes an interesting approach in that characters are often defined by their actions and not lengthy dialogue and cut scenes. Amicia, Hugo, and the alchemist, blacksmith, and pickpockets they befriend are all survivors in a world of increasing danger and they don’t have time to waste being sentimental or philosophizing. That said, Hugo and Amicia have a palpable connection that grows over time as their extreme situation allows them to make up for the time they spent apart and learn to appreciate one another more fully. Amicia is gifted with a subtly realized arc of her coming to terms with her own bravery and role as her brother’s protector. She possesses much vulnerability and lashes out at those closest to her before she comes to realize her own strength and begins to practice patience and kindness. Hugo himself is a little less appealing as he veers into whiny “I want my mummy” territory too often, but even he shines precociously at times while he maintains a charmingly sweet countenance in the face of the unrelenting darkness around him.

The side characters are more of a mixed bag for me except for Lucas, a gifted ward of an alchemist working on a cure for Hugo, whose abilities as an alchemist and loyalty as a friend make him both integral to moving the plot forward and also provide welcome reliability in a world of predators and opportunists. The other side characters are given too little personality, acting as powerups for gameplay with little else to offer, outside of the female thief who pretty much just curses like a Game of Thrones character and talks too much. Fortunately for the game, while your companions can be a little flat or feel a little gamey, I still liked them mostly fine and they suitably prop up our main characters.

What shouldn’t go unsung before we leave this section is how much fun the Inquisition are as bad guys. They’re run by a rogue clergyman and his lackeys are covered in themed Templar style armor and the average acolyte looks like a tattooed druid. Seeing the lengths they will go to in order to obtain Hugo’s secret is chilling. I appreciated the game didn’t irresponsibly conflate the evil of this sect with the Catholic church proper like most movies do, as there are clear examples of a local priest and a high-ranking bishop denouncing this heinous cult as being against the will of God. It’s not preachy or heavy-handed and makes the Inquisition even more frightening because they’re acting completely outside the church’s jurisdiction on an unhinged mission with no attempt at religious justification.

So yeah, man. The game looks and sounds incredible for what was supposedly a small studio back in 2019. The clever scenarios give you fun ways to experiment with stealth and combat at your leisure, using your various ammo types or manipulating the environment to set traps. Throw in an emotional, intense, and often bone chilling story with likeable characters you want to succeed and villains you love to hate and you’ve got quite the experience.

An x-factor the game possesses that shouldn’t go unsung is that despite Plague Tale being a largely linear, cinematic third-person action adventure game like most of Sony’s recent exclusives, Plague Tale does one better by being far less interested in itself and respecting the player’s time more. While I respect the Last of Us and enjoyed its scavenging, crafting, and ending, I burnt out pretty quick as the game just kept going on and on, providing me little sense of achievement as I went. Plague Tale ‘s enemy AI is certainly dumber but the combat stealth scenarios are more unique and interesting to pull off. And as I mentioned before, Plague Tale doesn’t belabor its emotional moments like they’re pushing for Oscar nominations. This level of economy in storytelling and gameplay means it keeps up a good pace, never dragging even as it encourages you to be thoughtful and careful about your next move. The game’s also about 10 hours or less, which is probably half of what the Last of Us or Uncharted or God of War 2018 is, and that can be a big deal for some gamers who would like to feel like they aren’t playing the director’s cut of everything they buy. That’s not to rag on extra content, it’s hard to complain when more is given in our stingy times as a gaming industry, but tight design like this can make replays far more enjoyable and much easier to remember fondly as a result.

Overall, few games in recent memory have quite entranced me with their atmosphere, characterization, and set pieces like A Plague Tale: Innocence does. Its gameplay is tight, satisfying, and unique. Its characters and story have heart and depth that complement and motivate gameplay. I can safely say that this game entered my pantheon of favorite games ever and upon replaying it recently has only solidified its spot on the list.

Studio Asobo delivered an awesome experience and the good news is that there’s more coming. The main reason why I decided to dig up my 2019 review at this particular time was that a sequel called Plague Tale: Requiem is on the way October 18th. For those cool cats who have Gamepass subscriptions, you can play what will likely be one of the best games of the year day 1. So hopefully this review will compel you to go out and lose what innocence you have left playing the first Plague Tale so that when October 25th hits, you’ll be ready to swarm the fields of France all over again with your boy here. Till next time, au revoir!