When you get an exoskeleton that gives you superhuman strength and can wield badass giant weapons or move as fast as the bink of an eye, you will definitely ignore the fact that the world is in a really terrible shape. However, in The Surge you will face many enemies, encounter dreadful bosses, all in a decaying world filled with mystery. Developed by DECK 13 INTERACTIVE and published by FOCUS HOME INTERACTIVE, this PC/PS4/XBO title is a peculiar title to watch out for. Now with the latest expansion, A Walk In The Park opens its gate to you to give this horrible fate a bright side with of course, a theme park. How much of difference will this make? What about the base game? Let’s find out!

COOL, BUT WHAT DO YOU DO?!

You play as a hired exo-technician named Warren at the CREO (or as I like to call OREO, because why not?). This research industry creates machines that aid humanity, but of course things went side ways and now its you against everything that went haywire.

This action RPG revokes the common gameplay mechanic of exploring a map layout, fight your way through, open up shortcuts and eventually find a boss that will open up a new zone, but fail to do this and you will restart from the last hub will all enemies respawned. How does this work in terms of progression? Your character gets tech materials when killing enemies as well as leveling up your current equipped gear, once you go back to your hub you can cash in these materials to level up your exo-suit Power Core, allowing you to equip more energy draining gear and become more badass (this micromanaging seems a bit unnecessary but I suppose it’s the game’s way of balancing). On the other hand, if you get owned you lose your base tech materials and will have to run back where you got killed to recollect them under a time limit (if you want).

OKAY, HOW IS THE PROGRESSION SYSTEM?

The game offers an interesting way of upgrading your gear as well as unlocking it. When facing an enemy, you can choose which part of their body to attack, if its blue you do more damage, but if its yellow it is protected by armor pieces which you can hit and loot a schematic for that part. These schematics are crafted with looted materials and can then be equipped on your character, both armor and weapon pieces, but you have to earn them the hard way. Other lootable items can be found around when you explore, these can be audio logs for lore fans, crafting materials or implants; the implants can get equipped at the med-bay (or outside depending on their type) and give passive bonuses to your character like extended health, heavier damage, reduce energy decay, stimpacks for quick health regeneration, etc… Keep in mind that everything you equip will require power distributed among your exo-suit’s Core Power, so switching and experimenting with loadouts is a must, especially for these trial and error type of games. There’s a lot combinations you can do and gives The Surge a sense of accomplishment and experimenting worth checking out.

HOW WELL DOES IT PLAY?

At first I felt like the camera sensitivy was way too high, but setting it lower made them game immediately much clear. The Surge actually has some impressive combat mechanics that allow for easy controls. It feels quickly intuitive and with support of in-game tutorials makes it much more enjoyable. After learning the basics it’s all a matter of testing out your attacks, time them well against enemies and learn their patterns. The UI is fairly straight forward, and as for the menus they tend to be overwhelming at first, but simple after a couple sessions of gameplay.

A WALK IN THE PARK DLC

Ironically this was not a walk in the park, nor a piece of cake, but a very intriguing piece of content. Welcome to CREO World! The theme park DLC is a peculiar implementation for the game as one of the most curious things about it is that you can access this content just after completing the first level of the game. It feels like it’s supposed to be there and not just something that came to mind after the game released. It gives out some Dead Rising vibes due to the contrasting themes from the setting against a joyful place.

Fortunately this helps with the whole sense of difficulty scaling. It’s not a place where you feel you shouldn’t be after a specific gear level; it feels intuitive, strangely relaxing and yet at the same time, disturbing. While it doesn’t particularly offer new mechanics or something innovative to the base game, it makes following the story slightly easier and there’s always more hardcore action.

The map layout is confusing but after a while makes sense, as expected. Enemy placements are rough but memorable. As for the side story, feels slightly improvised. New gear and unlockables give the game some fresh air and light beneath the shadow of CREO. It has been months since the game was released, so featuring a new side campaign is very thankful and I’m sure people who thoroughly enjoyed the base game will appreciate the effort put into the A Walk In The Park.

SOUNDS AWESOME! OVERAL THOUGHTS:

The game like most of these in the genre rewards persistence. Explore as much as you want and learn the map layouts (since you don’t have a map, per se. Only guide panels here and there). Unlock shortcuts to make your game easier and don’t stress yourself for getting killed repeatedly by the same enemies. Figure out different tactics and plan ahead for different outcomes.

Enjoying this game makes it much more easier with the charming low-key soundtrack, that eventually cues in higher at climaxing moments. This aspect when merged with the visuals of a decaying world fused with high tech machinery give a lot of grunge to the general aesthetic. Although I will say that it may have too much detail in some places and can be a bit hard on the eyes for extended game sessions.

If you enjoy this particular genre, I highly recommend this title even though the story isn’t that strong or interesting, it is still a solid title for progression and hardcore RPG fans.