First indie game in many years. It’s a wonderful experience.
I’m not much into maifa-gang culture so reviews about art and story is all based on my humble experience.
Easy guessing story. Boss tell you this you do this, boss tell you that you do that until the cycle ends. It’s all mafia stuffs and I strongly believe this was intended for the excellent combat system.
You get the first “Oh shit” moment when you realize this is more than a stealthy game, a “loud” stealthy game. Player and npc endurance are realistic and balanced. You mostly die in one hit, and they do the same. One more thing that make the stealth system hyped is that the guards do their jobs. Something moved in their eyes’ corner and that thing will be painted red. To get through the game, you have to be extremely focus on their line of sight and allocate your RAM for every enemies in the room.
Now throw that well-made stealth gameplay away, there are moments for your sleight of hand. Flick the wrist to kill 3 enemies face to face is a cowboy badass vibe!
Big win for the level design, there is always something new to beat or beat you.
There are some “ugly” as well. The shortcut is mood killing. I guess the manual is not optional after accidently pressed esc and have to start all over again. I have mixed feelings of the conversation system. Yes it is a pain to stablize your mouse on somebody face in order to talk(especially when you are impatient), but it wouldn’t make sense either if two rivals saying death sentence when standing at “kissing” range.
In short, the story is “conventional” but the combat mechanic is absolutely killing it when you are used to it.