Ghostwire: Tokyo

What I thought this would be: A deeply self-serious urban exploration game. What it actually is: A buddy dramedy platformer with stress eating during combat. In a way, it's almost as gory as DOOM, complete with visceral finishing moves. That makes sense, since [i]DOOM[/i] (2016) combat director Shinichiro Hara was responsible for the action sequences here. Except everything explodes into glittering ghost sparkles instead of guts. I like the absence of guns. Magic hands (and a bow) are all you get, and these "weapons" always get "sheathed" quickly when not needed. This is very much a first-person shooter in rain-soaked clothes. Some people may see this as purely decorative framing, to me it does make a difference. While atmospheric, in that old-school Unreal tech demo puddles-and-rain way, the game is strangely low on "feels", no Vangelis synths; a standout track like [i]Alone In The Town[/i] is missing. (Masahiro Ito, the monster designer of [i]Silent Hill 2[/i], worked on [i]Ghostwire[/i].) There's a ton of stuff to hoover up. Some "pickups", like the floating ghosts, come with unique little flavour stories, which must have taken a huge amount of work. All the side quests are fully voiced, and are interesting as story sequences, but [i]Ghostwire[/i] doesn't offer a lot of interesting verbs besides collecting and shooting, which limits the scope of what you'll actually *do*. The game leans heavily on repetitive actions, which is unfortunate. Cleansing haunted trees, for example, never evolves beyond exposing a single weak spot and shooting it. The game rarely builds on its own ideas, even in small ways. Also, the endlessly respawning loot containers everywhere, smashable random cars, trash cans, ventilation fans, so many random objects in random places, often break the illusion of exploring a believable Shibuya. Somehow, the game still works, thanks in part to Akito, who is refreshingly empathetic for an FPS protagonist, and KK, that old grump. A reluctant thumbs up overall.