- Tested on Nintendo Switch, mainly in TV mode.
- Some parts performed on Switch Lite.
- Game bought on theShop.
- About 25 hours of play, insufficient to unlock the second end.
- Earning, at a minimum, the gold medal in all the events of the game.
- Screenshots home.
Subtil mix of Platformer, First Person Shooter and Speedrun, sprinkled with a touch of Deck Building, Neon White is certainly a game apart. Available since June 2022 on PC and Nintendo Switch, before investing the other supports of the market, the title of Angel Matrix, edited by Anapurna Interactive, can boast of a rather unanimous critical success, even though its singular style has chances of dispelling. Here, in any case, after long intriguing, he absolutely did not disappointed, on the contrary.
False departure
Of all the practices that revolve around video game, I think the Speedrun is the one I least understand. I find it hard to figure out how someone can take pleasure in looping the same levels in the idea of finding the way to go ever faster. And that's precisely why Neon White, which I bought shortly after its release, more to support the work of the studio for which I had the greatest respect even before touching it, seemed destined to remain at the bottom of a backlog extending year by year, right next to Paradise Killer and Citizen Sleeper. Finally, it was boredom that caused me to try at last, convinced that an hour or two would be enough to irritate and push me to move on. Twenty-five hours later, I tell you, and in spite of the fact that I greatly appreciated Silent Hill 2 Remake (read our review), I think Neon White is the best game I've ever played in a long time. To the point that I still think about it often, and intend to embark on another of the practices that I have long disdained: getting 100%.
Although the soundtrack had already typed in the ear, so that she had already shot it several times in its entirety even before I had the opportunity to start the game, it wasn't going very hard. Everything that affects the Speedrun cooling me fast enough, as set out above, I was hoping that the story, which I knew was quite fleshy, could catch me in my fall. Unfortunately, it all starts with an amnesia hero, a great classic of the video game that I find more and more intoxicable, and that I feel like I've met too often. Which is probably true since the Japanese RPG, my favourite type, is full of it. Fortunately, history discovers itself quite quickly, telling us straight away that we are dead, and were ripped off from Hell to try to win a year of pleasures in Paradise, participating in a competition whose goal is grossly to kill the most demons. Nothing extraordinary on paper, and you should not expect anything very original, but it is nevertheless intriguing enough to make you want to know the ins and outs of White's story, our protagonist.
Before that, it is mainly the casting that will interest us, and occupy the clearest of our free time between two missions. Because everyone is doubled, first, and nicely elsewhere, by anglophone actors that you feel invested. In particular the protagonist, played by a Steve Blum at the top of his form, whom I had personally met via several Logic albums, and whose presence here touched. Although almost all of history and moments of life are sorely lacking in staging, since contenting themselves with dialogues in fixed view visual novel way, we quickly attach ourselves to the small gallery of characters that is presented to us. To the point that, as a personal matter, the death of one of them, occurring quite quickly, shook a bit. Yet humor is omnipresent, everyone goes from his small character to play the bid, starting with White himself. Which should have defused the stakes of this fairly basic intrigue. Yet I tried to make a frank investment in this little inventive story. Perhaps also thanks to an original general design, especially at the level of the characters.
Anyway, the game seems to know that its characters represent one of its greatest strengths, since it will often reward us for our efforts on the ground through dialogues to be unlocked. Dialogues that can be an opportunity to learn more about White, his past and his involvement with the different characters present, from which one quickly learns that they know, for the most part, our hero before their death, adding a small layer of delectable mystery. But they may also have the sole purpose of getting a joke out, which is not unpleasant either. Especially as humor, sometimes typing in geek references, but mostly contenting with situational gags, seems to me quite universal. Finally, the highest quality of Neon White At this level, it is that he will be able to be chatty if you are interested in what he has to tell and his characters, but that it is also possible to quickly skip his dialogues if you have no cure. A good way to satisfy all players, even those who came only for gameplay.
Uranos
And the gameplay, precisely, is both easy to access and quickly jubilatory, but also strangely precise and generous for a title sold less than 25 euros. Everything responds well, from the movements of our character, which runs by default, to jumps, and it is never frustrated by a physical defect or similar problem. Our defeats come from our lack of skills, and not from a poorly constructed set, or from hit-box problems. The principle revolves around more or less linear levels, which we will have to cross from one end to the other by killing all the demons present, as quickly as possible. This means calculating each of its movements, to avoid any unnecessary action that could lead to the loss of precious seconds in the final time. Several medals are to be obtained, from bronze, simply indicating that we have reached the end of the level, to the platinum, requiring a total investment, or the use of shortcuts not always obvious to find. This causes obvious stress, but above all represents a first carrot making the experience addictive. It is, however, far from having gone around what these levels propose.
Because each of them puts at our disposal several types of maps, which will be to find on the route, representing different weapons, arriving with a defined number of munitions. Each can be used simply to shoot, which can kill demons on the way, or explode some large barrel of powder painted in red, hard to miss in these fairly rudimentary decors and uniform colors. But it will also be possible to discard them to immediately enjoy a special skill. For example, the gun will allow, at the waste, to make a jump, even when White does not touch the ground; The rifle, on the other hand, offers a large speed boost over a defined distance, allowing to cross vacuum spaces, and destroying everything on our way. You understand the idea. Now, if there is of course a predefined way to cross each level, understandable quite quickly by determining the location of enemies, barrels and cards to collect, the game constantly pushes us to experiment to improve our time or discover secret gifts (appearing to get any medal), sometimes damn well concealed.
However, it seems to me quite inevitable to have to draw my hat from the developers, who have managed to set up environments at the absolutely exemplary Level Design. While it is true that the last levels are more difficult to read, sometimes even deliberately tortuous to lose us, we nevertheless have a good vision, throughout all adventure, of the path we must follow, and free to us to depart for some reason. And if we often die in Neon White, whether it is because our character has only three living points going very quickly, or because we fall into the void at the least false step, this is never really frustrating since we quickly raise the levels, like a Die n-Retry, and the loading times, even on Switch, are minimal. Moreover, the said levels are very short, usually travelling in thirty to sixty seconds (except for the last ones, again), which means that it has never really seemed to waste its time unnecessarily. In any case, each attempt is a way to learn the course and observe the surroundings to discover alternative potential paths, thus saving time in the next run.
If it takes hardly more than eight hours to see the end of the adventure in a straight line, and probably less than that if it is not interested in the scenario, Neon White Nevertheless has much more to offer and can easily keep awake three to four times this time if you cling enough to his proposal. First thanks to the conquest of the medals, of course, which personally occupied for a long time, obstinate that I was to start again in loop each level until getting the platinum. Well, we're not going to lie, there's still a few missing, on the big hundred levels available, just because past a certain stage, the challenge becomes quite imposing, and the cognitive load (which I feel like I've been talking about in all my articles since my test of DOOM) extremely heavy. In any case, the most important will finally be to acquire the gold, obviously more affordable, in order to make our ranking rise. Ranking that will be necessary to obtain new missions, initially. Concerning me, since I was at heart not to go back to the bercail without having at least got the gold, I was never bothered by this system, which I found a little too large in the end. But there is no doubt that a less experienced player, the genre that has pained on the platform sequences of a Metroid Prime (read our review), will soon be forced to return to the levels where he was the least performing.
The quest for gifts, including the earlier talk, is also an opportunity to unblock auxiliary missions, which it will not be possible to try again once closed, and whose challenge ends up being laughably full. These missions are to be obtained from the different protagonists of history, each bringing them a kind of specificity. For example, in Neon Yellow's levels, cards can't be undone, which totally detracts when you just spent two hours throwing down our guns to enjoy extra jumps. A fortiori when the routes in question come with a package of trapous sequences, letting us believe, again thanks to a subtle and judicious Level Design, that the waste is the only way to progress. Neon White So don't hesitate to break its own Game Design codes at times, just to test us, which works wonderfully, and makes the accomplishment all the more jubilatory. Even though, I prefer to point out, some auxiliary missions are to tear off the hair, to the point that I never want to hear about it again (yes, it is to you that I speak Neon Violet). In the same order, the title offers some very interesting boss fights, where each mistake leads to the Game Over, although perhaps a little too long for their own good. As long as we are in the length, finishing the game for the first time we unlock a mode chaining all levels... that I have not personally yet tried, for lack of will.
There is finally very little to say about Neon White, which I only emerge with a grisly sense of accomplishment, somewhat similar to that felt at the fall of a boss of Dark Souls. I would have liked it to be more consistent, certainly, because I'm afraid I'll never find this kind of sensation again in a game, or the developers don't offer us similar experience in the future. I'll almost regret having finished Neon White, so much the pleasure of discovery has been intense, and knowing that it has disappeared forever has something melancholy. A fortiori to the extent that I strangely attached myself to his few characters, even our hero a little pataud, who finally had very good reasons to stay in hell. I also grant myself the mission of unlocking all the gifts in order to discover the second end, which requires to have seen all the memories of this (anti) hero before beating the last boss. Even the readability, on which I would have loved to type story of having at least one reproach to make at the game, is finally exemplary, and this on TV as in portable mode. I was surprised to revive the game on Switch Lite by writing these few lines, and to discover that I had no problem closing the levels, beating even some of my personal scores. Finally, the only one « problem » Which comes to my mind, it's the need to pay the Nintendo Switch Online to access the world timers, and find out how bad we are... but is it really harmful?
At the crossroads between the platformer, the FPS and, to a certain extent, the rhythm game, Neon White is a title of an unsuspecting richness, whose extremely precise gameplay is quickly addictive. Despite a very honest lifetime, and a very decent content, I will almost be tempted to blame him for this feeling of « too little », which often affects when you come out of an extraordinary work. Because that's certainly what Neon White is. A title of which one does not come out unscathed, which has every chance to divide with his radical proposal and his particularly strong challenge. If you adhere, however, it will be part of the games of your life, no doubt.
For
- Very successful artistic direction
- Example readability
- Easy access and addictive gameplay
- Very decent content
- Entries and doublers invested
- A rather unique proposal in the video landscape
- OST absolutely divine
- Very low price (less than 25 euros)
- Impeccable Switch Version
Against
- A feeling too little, because too good
- Obligation to pay online on console to see world rankings
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