The Impact Factor

Beautiful Spectrum

Review

Hyper Light Drifter, Heart Machine (PS4)

Abstract: Hyper Light Drifter is a new classic. The game’s stunning art direction and soundtrack compliment an immensely satisfying gameplay experience. Combat is a perfect balance of simplicity with depth and fluidity with strategy. Hyper Light Drifter creates a world that is easy to get lost in and is filled with hidden secrets. The game does so much with so little and respects the player’s intelligence and perseverance throughout. Hyper Light Drifter should not be missed. It is easily one of 2016’s best.

Hyper Light Drifter makes me jealous. Not as a game designer, not as a critic, but as a scientist. In many ways, Hyper Light Drifter resembles the perfect kind of research manuscript. The game sets itself a goal and accomplishes it with resounding success. And, with what feels little effort. More than that, though, Hyper Light Drifter does so much with so little – it is the perfect combination of small parts that delivers an extraordinary experience. Hyper Light Drifter is simple, but underneath that simplicity (as any good research scientist knows) there almost certainly was an excruciating struggle and peerless work. Hyper Light Drifter is everything I want my own thesis project to be: intrigue, complexity refined into perfect simplicity, and something that immediately grips its audience and doesn’t let go.

A fluorescent-steeped and moody prologue begins your adventure into Hyper Light Drifter. The textless exposition sets the stage of a world destroyed by giant monsters, a deadly disease, a sealed off power, and a people forced to rebuild. The quasi-medieval setting quickly unfolds into something much deeper, with echoes of a lost technological age. Your protagonist is a silent wanderer, donning a flowing cape, glowing sword, and small pistol. He finds himself in a small town with adventure waiting on all sides. The drifter seeks to explore the ruined world and uncover its truths. Along your journey you’ll fight monsters of all shapes and sizes, tyrannical bosses and treacherous terrain. Hyper Light Drifter’s narrative leaves a lot up to the player for interpretation, but by so confidently establishing both mood and lore I was immediately sucked in.

The world calls to me.

The game’s zoomed out isometric perspective gives a great view of its gorgeous world. Usually I wait until later in the review, but I can’t help myself. Hyper Light Drifter is an astoundingly beautiful game. From its animations to its highly detailed pixel art, the game’s aesthetic shines through. Snowy mountains, verdant forests, barren deserts are all wonderfully realized through Hyper Light Drifter’s unique perspective. The world has a certain indefinable charm that exists as a combination of art, music (by the amazing Disasterpiece) and enemy design. In all honesty, the art is what drew me from the start – as early as the game’s embryonic (i.e. Kickstarter) stages. I was so relieved to see the full realization of the designers’ vision in the game’s final release.

Hyper Light Drifter is a 2D action RPG. Gameplay divides nicely into a couple key areas: combat, upgrading your character, and exploration. Hyper Light Drifter’s combat is superb. Fights occur naturally when exploring, in set combat arenas, and against bosses. The drifter has a number of tools to deal with the monsters that flood the world. Your primary weapon is the sword. Enemies can be hit with quick single blows or, if you’ve read their patterns correctly, can be punished with a three-hit combo. Firing your sidearm can damage enemies at a distance. The damage is minimal, unless charged up for a big shot, and ammunition is limited (it refills slowly upon attacking foes with your sword). Your opposition is aggressive, so Hyper Light Drifter also provides the player fantastic tools for escape. You have access to a lightning fast dash move, which can be used offensively or defensively depending on your situation. The player is invulnerable for a short time while dashing, increasing the skill threshold as whole attacks can be mitigated by a well-timed dodge.

Nothing should be underestimated. Hyper Light Drifter
keeps you on your toes.

Combat starts slow as you learn the language of the game. Fluency comes rapidly, though, as your fights become a flashy choreography of dashes and sword strikes and weapon swaps. Mastery feels always just out of reach, perfect for a skill intensive game like Hyper Light Drifter. There’s always more to learn. Your skills are put to the test in boss fights. Bosses run the gamut of shapes and sizes but they always force fluency in some aspect of combat, whether it be pattern recognition, short punishes, or chain dashes. Hyper Light Drifter’s combat also quickly opens up to player customization. You’ll unlock new guns to bolster long distance or close range engagements and new abilities that make battles even more fluid. Combat is a perfect combination of simplicity and depth, risk and reward, and I couldn’t get enough of it.

 

Time to show what you've learned.

Speaking of unlocks, Hyper Light Drifter lives up to its RPG name by featuring a nice suite of methods to power up your hero. Gearbits can be found throughout the world and used as currency to unlock new abilities. Your sword can gain a charge strike to deal massive damage, or a dash strike to attack after a dash. Your dash can gain the ability to chain into itself infinitely and the ability to reflect enemy projectiles. While there are no stats to manage, Hyper Light Drifter does allow for the hero himself to be powered up. You can unlock the ability to carry more health packs, which is essential, as health never regenerates. As you progress through the game, you’ll also come across new outfits for the drifter. These are often more than just an aesthetic change as they can grant bonus abilities like faster ammo recovery or an extra point of health. Hyper Light Drifter is a great RPG while making your RPG-experience as streamlined as possible.

Streamlined or not, I enjoyed Hyper Light Drifter's RPG elements.

Exploration is where Hyper Light Drifter truly shines. Hyper Light Drifter has a world you want to get lost in. Tranquility belies a setting rife with intrigue. Tucked into every nook and cranny of the world is something interesting to see or some new item for your playthrough. The nonverbal communication of the game to the player is fantastic. You’re never told where to go or what path to take—everything is discovered through playing. You’re never told to look for secrets, nor are you told what to do with those secrets. There is a system in place that indicates where a secret hides, but Hyper Light Drifter relies on a player’s intelligence and perseverance to find the pattern. I hate comparing one game I’m reviewing to another, but I can think of no better way to put it here: playing Hyper Light Drifter evokes the same feeling I got playing the original The Legend of Zelda on the NES. The game is a puzzle box that can be solved as rudimentarily, or as meticulously, as you desire. The joy I felt moving from screen to screen scouring for paths is unparalleled in modern gaming. Exploring Hyper Light Drifter is part epic poem and part learning a new language, and the two combine to create something spectacular. There are a precious few games I wish I could erase from my memory so I could experience them again for the first time – Hyper Light Drifter is one of them.

In the spirit of the mostly wordless Hyper Light Drifter I attempted to keep this review brief. I could go on for another thousand words about the satisfying gameplay loop, the hidden bonus challenges, or how the real world around me dissolved while playing. Hyper Light Drifter is one of the most supremely well-designed games I’ve played all year. Hyper Light Drifter not only lived up to expectations, it created a new classic. Hyper Light Drifter is a wide spectrum of excellence not to be missed.

Hyper Light Drifter

5/5