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The best (and best-looking) Metroidvania since Hollow Knight - Afterimage Quick Review

18K View2023-04-25

PLAY IT OR SKIP IT?

If you’ve got any appreciation for the Metroidvania style of game at all, then you owe it to yourself to play Afterimage. Coming off a successful Kickstarter campaign just a year ago, developer Aurogon Shanghai has released the next masterpiece in a masterpiece-heavy genre. With tight controls, compelling progression and exploration, and especially a stunning hand-drawn art style, Afterimage pays homage to the classics while also undeniably forging its own strong identity via a fascinating and diverse fantasy world. It’s really good.

TIME PLAYED

I’ve spent nine hours with the PlayStation 5 version of Afterimage over the last week. In that time, I’ve explored about a dozen different areas, defeated a handful of bosses, unlocked a bunch of new powers, and leveled main character Renee almost to level 40. If the size of the in-game map is any indication, however, I still have lots to go, and the developer has promised an experience that lasts around thirty hours.

WHAT’S AWESOME

• Visuals. There’s no way this couldn’t top the list of pros for Afterimage. A look at any screenshot or video should leave no doubt of that. This game’s hand-drawn look is absolutely stunning, to the point that I’d say it’s maybe one of the best-looking 2D games I’ve ever played. The environments are full of details that play out across the background and foreground as well as the playing space itself. Meanwhile characters are showcased through big beautiful still art for dialogue as well as gorgeous, fluid animation for movement and attacks. It’s a wonder to behold.

• Challenging, fast-paced combat. Afterimage’s approach to fighting feels right at home next to genre mainstays like Castlevania: Symphony of the Night and Hollow Knight. For the uninitiated, that means combat that starts out with simple hacking, slashing, and dashing away to avoid damage, but blossoms from there to become increasingly complex as Renee discovers new weapons and unlocks a wide range of abilities.

• Varied world design. Afterimage’s world of Engardin is filled with a wide variety of incredible spaces, from caves populated by bouncy mushrooms to a massive well where the souls of the dead are gathered and laid to rest. The sheer variety and inventiveness of the different zones is impressive. My personal favorite was the Town of the Exiled, a haunted village where a magic experiment went wrong and turned the entire population into restless spirits. I loved exploring this creepy space and piecing together just what exactly went wrong here.

• Intriguing story ideas. Speaking of piecing things together, Afterimage takes a multilayered approach to how it delivers plot. Fully voice-acted dialogue does a lot of the heavy lifting, as Renee banters with her cutesy fairy sidekick Ifree and meets the eccentric denizens of her struggling world. The real draw for me, though, is how backstory and lore are slowly revealed through the environment, short journal entries, and item descriptions. Even though the world isn’t quite as messed up, I got a very Dark Souls feel from the satisfaction of slowly picking up bits and pieces of what has gone wrong here.

YouTube video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UKa3BdeBiPM

• Progression. Afterimage presented me with a lot of options for improving Renee’s capabilities. I was able to find, equip, and upgrade weapons and armor that increased her base stats, but I was also able to earn levels and talent points, which could then be spent in an intimidatingly large branching talent tree. Beyond combat and survival, Renee also earns access to new forms of mobility, such as a double jump, an air dash, and much more. All of these directions for character development bring together the best of both worlds—numbers-heavy RPG systems and more action/exploration-oriented Metroid-style progression.

WHAT SUCKS

• Sometimes it’s too pretty. This is actually a surprisingly common issue with really beautifully animated 2D games, but Afterimage occasionally falls prey to it as well. With so much effort put into creating a world that looks completely gorgeous, including hyper-detailed backgrounds and foregrounds, I sometimes found my vision overloaded by everything. Loot drops, attack indicators, and sometimes even Renee and her enemies themselves can blend into certain backgrounds, especially those that are super bright or active with movement.

• Level-based difficulty. Since Afterimage has an RPG-style leveling system, it also has areas of its map that are made inaccessible primarily due to the artificial barrier of the level differences between Renee and enemies. The game does a great job of making this clear—whenever you enter a zone, the zone’s average enemy level flashes on screen alongside the area name—but I was still a little annoyed by a number standing in the way of my exploration from time to time. For better or worse, the RPG system also encouraged me to just grind if I ever felt stuck on a boss or frustrated by the level of challenge of enemies in a new area.

💬 Are you going to give this fantastic new Metroidvania a try? Or will you be skipping Afterimage? Share your thoughts in the comments!