Platforms: PS5, Xbox Series X|S, PC
Game development is a harsh business. Some developers struggle to ever make a mark, while others land such colossal hits that anything else they ever create is forgotten or ignored. Take Game Freak – you’ve probably never played HarmoKnight, Drill Dozer, or Tembo the Badass Elephant, but you definitely know Pokémon. How could you not? It’s a cultural juggernaut – and a standard that Beast of Reincarnation could never stand up to.
That’s not to say Game Freak’s latest is bad – far from it, in fact. This open field action game is a delightful blend of ideas, mechanics, and concepts that sees the developer operating far outside its decades-long comfort zone. However, it also feels as though the studio was so desperate to prove it can create something distinct from its monster-catching megahit that it’s taken inspiration from just about anything else in an attempt to avoid being typecast.
The game follows Emma, a “Sealer” in a post-apocalyptic world some 2,000 years on from our own. After a mysterious blight emerged in the distant past, corrupting the land and mutating creatures into aggressive plant-animal hybrids dubbed “malefacts”, most of humanity abandoned our weak meatsack bodies for robotic golems, awaiting the day they can cleanse the Earth and restore their mortal forms. Emma is one of the few still possessing a seemingly organic body, albeit one infected with a rare strain of the blight, allowing her to extend her hair into plant-like vines and combat the malefacts. She also has a strange connection to Koo, a wolf-like malefact who seems to bear some degree of sentience, and who aids her in combat. He’s also a big fluffy pupper you can pet between missions, and the goodest of boys.
Summoned to the Capital to investigate reports of the titular beast awakening from a century-long slumber, which could have dire consequences for the remnants of humanity, Emma and Koo travel the ruined world, tackling the colossal Nushi – overgrown malefacts who rule over each region – while uncovering the secrets of their past. This is the core path of the game, and also where its plethora of influences becomes increasingly obvious.
This open field action game is a delightful blend of ideas.
The world itself is beautiful, but clearly a result of taking the wild, rural, feudal setting of Princess Mononoke and transplanting it to some time after Judgement Day – right down to a first boss fight ripped right from the denouement of Miyazaki’s masterpiece. Combat liberally lifts from Soulsbornes, a dance of weapon strikes, deflections, parries, and dodges, with enemies respawning each time you rest at a campsite – the same campsites where you spend points from levelling up to improve Emma and Koo’s attributes. Yet it also has elements of Monster Hunter and even Shadow of the Colossus, with its battles against gargantuan opponents that leave you feeling as though you may have done something terribly wrong in their aftermath.
Exploration takes notes from Horizon: Zero Dawn, with plenty of components to craft and the addition of ranged weapons and stealth kills to manage enemies without directly engaging, although there’s also a dash of Death Stranding, forcing you to think about how to traverse impassable terrain. That often involves Emma’s hair, which can propel her into the air, create bridges, or grapple her to anchor points like Batman or Spider-Man swinging between skyscrapers. Those same follicular abilities then bleed back into combat, to increasingly Bayonetta-esque effect.
To Game Freaks’ credit, it does a surprisingly good job of juggling all those disparate elements. Everything gels well here, even when the individual components seem an odd fit, and it’s clear the studio is enjoying creating for hardware more powerful than Nintendo usually offers. Players who get drawn into its oddball mythology or who put the effort into mastering its speedy combat and signature boss battles will undoubtedly have a good time. However, there’s also nothing about Beast of Reincarnation that particularly stands out – it very much is the sum of its parts, nothing less, but sadly nothing more.
