I reviewed this game with a key provided by the publisher.
Back in 2019, a mysterious early access unreal engine project by the name of Bright Memory appeared on steam to wildly positive reception. Though little more than a tech demo at the time, Bright Memory drew eyes for its gorgeous visuals and exciting first person combat. Finally, almost 3 years later, the game is finished. Made by a single man, Zeng Xiancheng, Bright Memory Infinite combines fast paced first person shooting, responsive swordplay, mythological China and near future sci fi to create an incredibly fun, if unpolished, campaign.
Players take control of our no-nonsense protagonist, Shelia, who has been called in by a top secret organization to stop a terrifying phenomenon in the sky. A black hole of sorts has appeared, sucking in whatever and whoever is unlucky enough to be near it. A militia is racing to beat Shelia to the black hole, because inside of it is supposedly an ancient artifact that can reawaken the dead. To reach the black hole , she must travel to the land of Sky, a network of floating islands above the earth which are home to a host of monsters from Chinese Mythology. It’s not much of a narrative to be frank, but this game isn’t about story. Shelia is given a reason to run and shoot, and by god you start running and shooting.
Bright Memory Infinite feels great to play. That’s not an understatement, and I don’t say that lightly. The shooting feels great, and ranks up there with Deathloop and Destiny 2 as some of the smoothest first person gunplay out there. Shelia can sprint, dodge, slide kick, jump, and even double jump - these basic moves aren’t too different from anything you’ve played before. However, Shelia also has a light blade, a sword with the power to send powerful slashes flying at a range to cut enemies down. You also use the sword to counter and parry attacks, both physical and ranged. The countering feels unbelievably good. The feedback is great and the timing window feels exactly fair enough. You can also level up your sword and secondary abilities as you progress through the game to fit your playstyle a bit more.
All of it comes together so easily to produce exciting, varied combat. You simply click on the mouse to aim sights and shoot, but you don’t need to actively switch weapons to the sword. Just hitting or holding E will bring out the sword immediately, so you can swap back and forth smoothly between swords and guns without ever having to think too hard. You can, of course, scroll the mouse wheel to switch between different types of guns and different ammo. It reminds me of a better feeling version of Shadow Warrior 2, although Bright Memory is definitely lacking in personality in comparison.
You can make a judgement for yourself, but Bright Memory Infinite is also one of the nicer looking games I’ve seen recently. There’s excellent lighting work and particle effects going on, as well as the rain effects and a fairly robust physics engine. I love the artwork, and I’ve always said we don’t have enough games that actually showcase Chinese mythology. Well, games that have been translated into English, anyway. I love the monster designs, and there is something reminiscent of Sekiro in the boss fights - of course with a lot more guns. I’m honestly impressed it runs this well, although my PC did begin wheezing a few times when I had multiple monsters on screen. Still, other than a few stutters, it held a very consistent 60 FPS on high settings without ray tracing or DLSS. I gave the ray tracing a try but it wasn’t enough of an improvement to justify the overheating strain on my rig.
While fun, this game could certainly do with a good polishing. There weren’t too many frame rate issues, but there were a lot of enemies and bullets clipping through buildings or other obstacles clearly meant to be solid. It is a bit frustrating to get sniped through 2 walls while crouching behind a wooden building. I had only one crash to desktop, and I still can’t figure out what prompted it. There are a ton of in-game text descriptions that are still in Chinese, as well the subtitles sometimes coming up in Chinese. Speaking of which, this game has pretty bad English voice acting all around. Shelia is barely serviceable and every other major character is flat out not good. The Chinese voice acting sounds better, but I had to soon switch back to English as I couldn’t keep taking my eyes off the action to read the subtitles. It’s a low budget project, so I understand to a degree.
I really enjoyed the variety of music in the game, although it didn’t stand out to me as one of the best soundtracks of the year, I loved the chinese influence and EDM beats underlying the set pieces. It’s nice to hear some softer instruments in the harmonies for a high octane action game.
Overall I really enjoyed my time with Bright Memory Infinite. It wasn’t even really on my radar until I saw it was coming out soon, so it’s been a pleasant surprise. While it’s clearly an indie unreal engine project and comes with a few low-budget qualities, it’s one of the my favorite first person shooter campaigns to come out in the last decade. The story is kind of dumb and Shelia has about as much personality as a bottle of ketchup, but if you’re here purely for gameplay I cannot recommend Bright Memory Infinite enough.
Back in 2019, a mysterious early access unreal engine project by the name of Bright Memory appeared on steam to wildly positive reception. Though little more than a tech demo at the time, Bright Memory drew eyes for its gorgeous visuals and exciting first person combat. Finally, almost 3 years later, the game is finished. Made by a single man, Zeng Xiancheng, Bright Memory Infinite combines fast paced first person shooting, responsive swordplay, mythological China and near future sci fi to create an incredibly fun, if unpolished, campaign.
Players take control of our no-nonsense protagonist, Shelia, who has been called in by a top secret organization to stop a terrifying phenomenon in the sky. A black hole of sorts has appeared, sucking in whatever and whoever is unlucky enough to be near it. A militia is racing to beat Shelia to the black hole, because inside of it is supposedly an ancient artifact that can reawaken the dead. To reach the black hole , she must travel to the land of Sky, a network of floating islands above the earth which are home to a host of monsters from Chinese Mythology. It’s not much of a narrative to be frank, but this game isn’t about story. Shelia is given a reason to run and shoot, and by god you start running and shooting.
Bright Memory Infinite feels great to play. That’s not an understatement, and I don’t say that lightly. The shooting feels great, and ranks up there with Deathloop and Destiny 2 as some of the smoothest first person gunplay out there. Shelia can sprint, dodge, slide kick, jump, and even double jump - these basic moves aren’t too different from anything you’ve played before. However, Shelia also has a light blade, a sword with the power to send powerful slashes flying at a range to cut enemies down. You also use the sword to counter and parry attacks, both physical and ranged. The countering feels unbelievably good. The feedback is great and the timing window feels exactly fair enough. You can also level up your sword and secondary abilities as you progress through the game to fit your playstyle a bit more.
All of it comes together so easily to produce exciting, varied combat. You simply click on the mouse to aim sights and shoot, but you don’t need to actively switch weapons to the sword. Just hitting or holding E will bring out the sword immediately, so you can swap back and forth smoothly between swords and guns without ever having to think too hard. You can, of course, scroll the mouse wheel to switch between different types of guns and different ammo. It reminds me of a better feeling version of Shadow Warrior 2, although Bright Memory is definitely lacking in personality in comparison.
You can make a judgement for yourself, but Bright Memory Infinite is also one of the nicer looking games I’ve seen recently. There’s excellent lighting work and particle effects going on, as well as the rain effects and a fairly robust physics engine. I love the artwork, and I’ve always said we don’t have enough games that actually showcase Chinese mythology. Well, games that have been translated into English, anyway. I love the monster designs, and there is something reminiscent of Sekiro in the boss fights - of course with a lot more guns. I’m honestly impressed it runs this well, although my PC did begin wheezing a few times when I had multiple monsters on screen. Still, other than a few stutters, it held a very consistent 60 FPS on high settings without ray tracing or DLSS. I gave the ray tracing a try but it wasn’t enough of an improvement to justify the overheating strain on my rig.
While fun, this game could certainly do with a good polishing. There weren’t too many frame rate issues, but there were a lot of enemies and bullets clipping through buildings or other obstacles clearly meant to be solid. It is a bit frustrating to get sniped through 2 walls while crouching behind a wooden building. I had only one crash to desktop, and I still can’t figure out what prompted it. There are a ton of in-game text descriptions that are still in Chinese, as well the subtitles sometimes coming up in Chinese. Speaking of which, this game has pretty bad English voice acting all around. Shelia is barely serviceable and every other major character is flat out not good. The Chinese voice acting sounds better, but I had to soon switch back to English as I couldn’t keep taking my eyes off the action to read the subtitles. It’s a low budget project, so I understand to a degree.
I really enjoyed the variety of music in the game, although it didn’t stand out to me as one of the best soundtracks of the year, I loved the chinese influence and EDM beats underlying the set pieces. It’s nice to hear some softer instruments in the harmonies for a high octane action game.
Overall I really enjoyed my time with Bright Memory Infinite. It wasn’t even really on my radar until I saw it was coming out soon, so it’s been a pleasant surprise. While it’s clearly an indie unreal engine project and comes with a few low-budget qualities, it’s one of the my favorite first person shooter campaigns to come out in the last decade. The story is kind of dumb and Shelia has about as much personality as a bottle of ketchup, but if you’re here purely for gameplay I cannot recommend Bright Memory Infinite enough.