‘Redfall’ is a Decent Looter Shooter With an Identity Crisis

2023 is a big year for Microsoft and Xbox. After acquiring Bethesda back in 2020, Microsoft (finally) has a slate of exclusive titles coming up, an area where it lagged behind Sony, its main competitor. Back in January, Tango Gameworks released the excellent rhythm action-adventure game, Hi-Fi Rush, and later this September, Bethesda is set to launch the hugely anticipated Starfield.

Wedged between is Arkane Studios’ newest project, Redfall, an open world first-person-shooter game that takes place in the eponymous town in Massachusetts. After a science experiment goes awry, the fictional town gets invaded by vampires and it’s up to four brave survivors to rid the island of bloodsuckers. Built with cooperative play in mind, Redfall has engaging combat, especially with a group of friends. But despite some fantastic worldbuilding and interesting lore, its open world often feels empty, and exploration can be frustrating.

In Redfall, players have the option to pick between four heroes: inventor Devinder Crousley, student Layla Ellison, combat engineer Remi de la Rosa, and former U.S. military veteran Jacob Boyer. Each of these characters has special perks and abilities that make them unique. For example, Layla’s abilities center on close combat, with an Umbrella Shield that reflects damage back to enemies. Jacob on the other hand, is great for those who prefer to use cloaking for a stealthy approach.

These characters roles synergize very well, making play with a friend group preferable to going solo. Nests are areas in Redfall with a high concentration of vampires and the surrounding aura makes them more powerful. The longer they stay up, the further the area spreads over time. The game’s most exhilarating missions see players invade these nests with their buddies to cooperatively rip enemies to shreds.

The shooting feels slick and responsive — I love the sight of a vampire stopping (dead) in its tracks with a staggering shotgun blast. Each enemy encounter drops just enough loot and ammo to maintain the tension of potentially running out of bullets, building toward immense satisfaction when you get out of situations alive.

The various pistols, assault rifles, and shotguns are separated into rarity tiers like those in the Borderlands games. Higher tiered weapons have special perks such as healing a percentage of HP whenever you stake a vampire with it or simply a straight damage boost. The higher the weapon tier, the more numerous and powerful the available perks. With tons to gain via perks, difference between the low tier (Standard) and the highest (Unrivaled) feels substantial.

In multiplayer, there is some nice attention to detail in the game’s presentation, like adding every individual player’s character to cut scenes during cooperative campaigns. Characters also often banter with each other when out in the open world, which helps to flesh out their dynamics and breathe additional life into multiplayer sessions over solitary play.

However, there are also some strange oversights in the quality-of-life options. For example, although players can open their maps and pin certain locations, everyone’s pin remains green, so having multiple active at once makes the compass at the top of the screen very confusing to read. Common sense would dictate that each player’s pin should’ve been a different color.

Another major issue is that when doing main story missions, only the host gets to save progress. That’s a disappointment considering that everyone else will have to do the same mission again back in their own games. These choices feel like issues from an older era of online cooperative play and can be a frustrating damper on the overall multiplayer experience.

While the main quartet generally don’t receive much in-depth characterization, Redfall leans on excellent tertiary worldbuilding. There are tons of notes and journals from the town’s inhabitants to read whenever you stumble across abandoned buildings. For example, one journal was about a man who tried to take care of his wife and baby after the vampires invaded. One by one, he then saw his fellow townspeople become cultists and worship the vampires and concluded that they only did so out of fear and survival. There are hundreds of these smaller stories scattered throughout the environment, which help bring life to a world that’s succumbed to the vampire apocalypse.

Sadly, Redfall’s open world is probably the game’s biggest letdown. Developers Arkane Austin are known for their often tightly focused level design. The Dishonored series has meticulously built levels and labyrinthian corridors. That design has been eschewed here with the implementation of an open world that is visually bland and physically empty when roaming around, especially if you’re playing alone. At times it feels like a Far Cry game minus that series mind blowing graphics.

It’s especially disappointing as one can see remnants of more interesting level design when players enter “psychic distortions,” which are interdimensional portals to special locales. The atmosphere here is more sinister, painted with red skies and spectral detail. I remember looking ahead in wonder and awe when I saw a giant house in the distance splitting in half like an open dollhouse as I approached. Moments like this help balance out the dull primary world and could be sorely used more.

The enemy variety is also homogenous, especially when it comes to the cultists. Cultists are just normal human enemies that will fire upon you when spotted. Redfall is littered with groups of these single note enemy types, occasionally accompanied by a single vampire to spice things up. Stronger vampires, like immobilizing Anglers and Siphons that drain player health are few and far between. Overall, the lack of diversity becomes stale very quickly.

Alongside the repetition, enemies themselves are incredibly hard to spot, especially at night. Lacking any kind of identifying silhouette, they often bleed into the background — which is a shame when the background itself isn’t worth noticing.

The current version of the game also suffers from some technical glitches. There were numerous times where I’d get stuck between rocks in the environment and would have to fast travel to a different location to get out. When there’s too many particle effects on screen, like the red flash that appears when staking a vampire, the frame rate slows to a crawl. Enemy AI is extremely dumb, with cultists also getting stuck on rocks making them easy to incapacitate from behind.

At times, Redfall manages to be an interesting game filled with great worldbuilding and gunplay, but it’s mostly just another generic open world shooter. Despite being best played cooperatively, glaring oversights in design, enemy types, and mundane environments mar the experience. As a solo outing, Redfall isn’t exactly a party but with the right group of people and tempered expectations, slaying vampires can be a short-lived blast.

Redfall launches on May 5/2 for PC and Xbox Series X|S.