Product Info

Platform

Switch, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC

Publisher

Humble Games

Developer

Studio Pixel Punk

Genre

Action, Adventure, Platform, RPG

Players

1-2

File Size (Minimum)

2.5 GB

Release Date (NA)

Sep 30, 2021

Purchase From

eShop

PSN Store

Microsoft Store

Steam

Official Store

Unsighted is a nonlinear platformer developed by Studio Pixel Punk and published by Humble Games. It features pixel-based, retro gameplay that fuses the metroidvania style with a bit of Zelda. Follow an automaton named Alma as she explores the vast fallen world of Arcadia, improves her weapons and stats, preserves her and friends’ life force, and battles automatons that have turned bad. It’s a quality, fine tunable experience, so get ready to spend hours combating the weaning sands of time.

Fallen World

The story focuses on an automaton named Alma, who awakens in a laboratory to a dilapidated world caused by a war between her kind and humans. There is a finite resource called Anima which provides automatons with consciousness, but when depleted of this resource, they turn into killing machines known as Unsighted. With time of the essence, Alma must explore the world and rescue as many of her friends as possible before they turn into Unsighted.

Visually, this dilapidated world is full of details and maintains a dreary environment in various settings. For example, the opening scene takes place in an abandoned underground laboratory full of broken vials and other scientific equipment, and desks with papers and tools scattered all over. Upon reaching the ground level of the world, Alma discovers a rainy, concrete city left in ruins with broken windows and doors and huge plant roots growing through it. The music that plays matches the visual style, going between freeform jazz and synthesized elevator music, but it won’t exactly blow you away. The sound effects are the same: they match the theme but do not dramatically change the experience. Plus, there are certain cutscenes and areas where the music and sound effects tend to be sparse in nature, which feels a little empty from a sound standpoint. It’s a tough world Alma’s traveling across.

Block and Repeat

Basic movement in this isometric world is fairly straightforward. Alma can also dodge and proceed into a sprint, which consumes stamina. While stamina is limited when utilizing attacks and special evasive maneuvers, it recovers quickly with rest. For short battles, you don’t have to think about it too much. For longer battles, however, this can be quite difficult to monitor. Alma may need to save enough stamina for dodging to avoid taking damage or for situations where escaping an enemy attack may not leave her enough to approach and counterattack. While combat starts out fairly basic in terms of hack ‘n’ slash, the focus quickly shifts to a conservative/strategic style of play.

One of the most heavily utilized combat skills is the ability to block attacks, if timed appropriately. While the window is fairly large to block, the character may be able to perform a perfect block, which has a narrower one. The perfect block can render enemies temporarily stunned and vulnerable to attacks, return ranged blasts back to the enemy, and even lead to critical attacks for a short time (i.e., increased damage temporarily due to vulnerable enemy states). Within about 20-30 minutes of gameplay, it becomes the sole means to progress through enemies without taking excessive damage. One challenge with blocking is the instances where Alma is surrounded by a large number and/or several varieties of enemies in which different attack cadences occur (i.e., the cooldown between blocks leaves her vulnerable). In those instances, cautiously pick off enemies one-by-one in the available space away from the crowd or even bypass these combat situations entirely if possible.

Final Countdown

Upon losing all HP in battle, Alma will return to the last known terminal station/saved location and potentially lose some currency as well. (She keeps her items, weapons, chips, etc., though.) Terminal stations can be used to recharged Alma to full HP. However, doing so may result in the Unsighted enemies returning. These terminal stations can also be used to quickly move between discovered terminal stations since the world map is quite large to navigate by foot. Alma has access to one syringe to recover her HP during a battle, which is rechargeable by hitting a green tank until it breaks. Use it well.

Upon reaching the automaton village, it becomes evident that each automaton has a limited duration until they turn into an Unsighted. The only means to save an automaton is by utilizing a meteor shard resource to provide more time. However, this resource is limited to the degree that Alma must pick and choose who she saves, which may lead to missed resources given by these automatons if not saved in time. Nonetheless, the game does a great job with difficulty customization, and these automaton times can be turned off, which is a good thing for casual completionists.

Automaton Arsenal

Along the journey, Alma quickly starts acquiring a vast number of weapons to equip in her two weapon slots. In general, one slot is typically a close-combat weapon, such as a sword or large axe with slightly different range, speed, and damage profiles. The second slot is dedicated to a ranged weapon, such as a pistol or shuriken. The ranged weapons tend to serve other purposes in regards to puzzles, such as hitting a switch in the distance to trigger a platform or open a gate. The shuriken particularly tends to be interesting since it allows for temporary manual control of the weapon flight to hit targets or switches that may be around a corner. Many weapons can be found in treasure chests around the world, which, in general, require solving a puzzle to reach them. They can also be obtained through a crafting system and even upgraded with the corresponding materials to improve their stats.

It’s not just weapons that can be improved. Alma has access to a customizable chip system which imparts perks to the character, such as increased HP or increased damage with swords. Chip slots can be slowly unlocked through a currency of screws, and each chip varies in terms of the slot space it requires, usually ranging from 1-3 slots. Chips can be found throughout the world and mostly in treasure chests. Lastly, there are cogs available. Consuming a certain type of cog provides a temporary bonus to stats, such as increased defense or damage for 20 seconds. Alma can carry up to six different cogs at one time, which stack up to a varying max amount (e.g., 20 attack cogs vs 3 defense cogs). Cogs can be found throughout the world and even crafted quickly at the crafting tables located at dungeon entrances, near terminals, and at the automaton home base.

Vast and Dangerous World

The sheer size of Arcadia is impressive, and the world is jam packed with puzzles. At first, the game introduces you to the varying gameplay styles in the first 20-30 minutes after you start. However, after that, it quickly settles down into an adventure of its own kind. In addition to the large map size, the world is full of various dungeons, which are quite similar to those found in Zelda (i.e., going room to room solving puzzles to look for a key to get access to the boss room). Even on the lowest difficulty setting, the puzzles can be quite challenging, such as needing to time a jump between fast-moving platforms and coordinating the opening and closing of gates to get a mining cart across an area.

The boss battles are quite enjoyable and require a delicate balance of attacks mixed with blocking and dodging. For example, the first dungeon boss consists of four Unsighted statues moving in a coordinated fashion and combining mixed attacks. Expect close-range area-of-effect (AOE) attacks, long-range targeted blasts, and spawned minions that make it difficult to perform counter maneuvers. For those who may find these battles on a challenging side, Alma can activate her cogs to make the battle easier to manage. Good luck!

See It Your Way

Overall, Unsighted is a solid nonlinear platformer with ample depth and content. While the start is a bit bumpy, the game quickly finds its rhythm and provides enjoyable gameplay with a retro feel. The timer and stamina systems may be frustrating to some players, but the game provides more than the typical customizability to scale the difficulty for casual players. In short, it’s hardly an un-sightly experience; it’s well worth a good long look!

A Nintendo Switch code was provided for this review and gameplay footage.