The forced stealth sections in which you have to avoid being caught and killed by a monster during a mind implant hack are still here and, whilst they have been made slightly more manageable by the game’s other improvements, they are still one hit kill sections and I would have hoped we’d be past those by now. So far, so good, but the game does retain a couple of issues from its original release in 2017, which prevent it from being a truly great game. They have attempted to streamline it in System Redux, but it’s still less than optimal, so the option to remove that particular barrier to enjoyment is a very welcome one. This was a pain in the arse in the original game which could very jarringly pull you out of the game’s feel through sheer frustration alone. The second improvement I personally appreciated was the option to remove the hacking minigame associated with the various numerical keypads dotted around the game. Of course, this can be a difficult motion for those with certain disabilities, so Bloober Team have helpfully added the option to have this motion done by a single button press. The default way to do this is hold RT and then push the right stick either forwards or backwards. The first relates to something you’ll be doing a lot of – opening doors. The two most useful ones can also have a direct effect on the gameplay itself, both of which affect interaction with objects in the world. The other major changes in this updated version are, by and large, quality of life improvements, some of which are available through an expanded accessibility menu. Rutger Hauer himself, for example, now looks like the troubled and world-weary old man he portrays, which makes characterisation much more effective. Krakow in 2084 – decimated by disease and civil war – is a grimy, dirty part of the world, and >Observer_: System Redux does an excellent job of reflecting that, from the dinginess of the apartment building’s darkest recesses to the pock-marked and time-ravaged faces of the character models. The washed turquoise glow of the flickering neon not only contributes to the overall aesthetic of the game, but it also serves to shed a little more light (literally) on the increased detail of the world around you. What was already a dark and oppressive atmosphere is now even more so, and no longer as a direct consequence of the limitations of the hardware. In fact, the nicest thing I can say about it is that it makes the original >Observer_ – a pretty good looking game in its own right – look almost primitive in comparison. The first thing you’ll notice as soon as you get past the opening sequence is that the new lighting model is tremendous. Instead, I’ll focus on those graphical upgrades and gameplay improvements. Given it’s only three years old at this point, and there’s already a review on the site, I’m not going to discuss the story at any great length, other than to say that it holds up now, the cyberpunk motif gives it a very different vibe to your more standard horror games and the three added side story missions provide some nice new moments. Now, in 2020 with the launch of the new consoles, Bloober Team have brought > Observer_ back with a fresh lick of paint and some gameplay tweaks – do those tweaks take it from good to great?
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