Neon White feels like a spiritual successor to Mirror’s Edge with the narrative sensibilities of a game like Catherine. As “sinners” you’ve been tasked with slaying demons to keep heaven safe for the true believers. If you slay enough of them, and quickly, you may even earn a space for yourself at the pearly gates.
The gameplay is a mixture between parkour simulator, FPS, and deck builder and it all works brilliantly. In a bid to raise your neon score, you are encouraged to beat each level as quickly as possible. At first, this is simply a matter of execution. Follow the obvious path (marked by brightly coloured platforms and don’t miss your shots. But, as you beat your score and earn yourself a medal, you’re tempted to try again… Upon returning, there is a gift hidden in the level, but it can only be found through thorough exploration. Now you can compete against your ghost and improve your score, then you see hints for alternate, faster routes through levels, then the leaderboards open up… The soul cards (which provide you with guns) function in much the same way. You begin with a handgun/double jump, but eventually graduate to a rocket launcher/zip line which requires much greater precision to handle.
This is a game about speedrunning and the mechanics take the daunting goal of being THE fastest and break it down into tiny, incremental steps. Without meaning to, you’ll find yourself thinking and performing like a speedrunner until you are the one driven to get a run that’s just a few milliseconds quicker than the last.
The backdrop for this frantic gameplay is a fantastic OST written by Machine Girl that is one of the best I’ve heard in years. It’s catchy, it matches the aesthetic of the game perfectly, and most of the tracks are great to listen to on their own. I think this is Machine Girl’s first game OST and I sincerely hope there are more to come.
The narrative of the game is often cringey, creepy, or weirdly kinky and I actively disliked most of these sections, but the setup for the game’s events was interesting enough to keep me engaged. Despite these negatives, the setting itself is pretty evocative and I found the interplay between the Angels and the Neons to be quite endearing. The narrative also feeds back into the gameplay by functioning as a way to unlock unique side missions for each of the main characters. Although this doesn’t excuse the dialogue, it’s no worse than the average JRPG most of the time.
If you enjoy precision platforming, have fond memories of Mirror’s Edge, or have even a passing interest in speedrunning, play this game! I can’t wait to see what this team does next because Neon White feels like one of the most unique gaming experiences I’ve had in recent memory.
The gameplay is a mixture between parkour simulator, FPS, and deck builder and it all works brilliantly. In a bid to raise your neon score, you are encouraged to beat each level as quickly as possible. At first, this is simply a matter of execution. Follow the obvious path (marked by brightly coloured platforms and don’t miss your shots. But, as you beat your score and earn yourself a medal, you’re tempted to try again… Upon returning, there is a gift hidden in the level, but it can only be found through thorough exploration. Now you can compete against your ghost and improve your score, then you see hints for alternate, faster routes through levels, then the leaderboards open up… The soul cards (which provide you with guns) function in much the same way. You begin with a handgun/double jump, but eventually graduate to a rocket launcher/zip line which requires much greater precision to handle.
This is a game about speedrunning and the mechanics take the daunting goal of being THE fastest and break it down into tiny, incremental steps. Without meaning to, you’ll find yourself thinking and performing like a speedrunner until you are the one driven to get a run that’s just a few milliseconds quicker than the last.
The backdrop for this frantic gameplay is a fantastic OST written by Machine Girl that is one of the best I’ve heard in years. It’s catchy, it matches the aesthetic of the game perfectly, and most of the tracks are great to listen to on their own. I think this is Machine Girl’s first game OST and I sincerely hope there are more to come.
The narrative of the game is often cringey, creepy, or weirdly kinky and I actively disliked most of these sections, but the setup for the game’s events was interesting enough to keep me engaged. Despite these negatives, the setting itself is pretty evocative and I found the interplay between the Angels and the Neons to be quite endearing. The narrative also feeds back into the gameplay by functioning as a way to unlock unique side missions for each of the main characters. Although this doesn’t excuse the dialogue, it’s no worse than the average JRPG most of the time.
If you enjoy precision platforming, have fond memories of Mirror’s Edge, or have even a passing interest in speedrunning, play this game! I can’t wait to see what this team does next because Neon White feels like one of the most unique gaming experiences I’ve had in recent memory.