When Compulsion Games released We Happy Few, I never played it, not because it was originally banned in Australia, but it just never grabbed my attention. When the studio announced their next game, South of Midnight, they were saying the right things, but were not showing it off and I expected it to be similar to their previous game. Then they showed off gameplay and it looked like the type of game I would enjoy, so when Xbox offered me the chance to go hands on, I knew it was an easy yes.

Weaving a unique tale

Preview builds of games are interesting, as we often have to skip through opening story moments to get into gameplay, but here things kicked off with Chapter 3. Hazel, that who you play as, has already lost her house and mother and obtained a few special items. As the chapter started, I basically walked into a combat encounter and while I was not successful on my first attempt, I did get through to meet the mysterious Catfish.

As Hazel had picked up the spindle already, she was using it, but Mr Catfish was the first to hint at what was going on. Hazel has the ability of a Weaver, someone who uses the mystical items that she has picked up, in order to rethread the stories of the world, back into the Grand Tapestry. By the time the pair meet, Hazel has been into fights, following ghosts and seeing a lot of weird stuff. Turns out the world is full of things called Haints, which are basically tragic stories that have impacted the world around it. While I won’t say what the story was in the chapter I played, I will say that once the first part was revealed, it was pretty easy to spot where it was going. However, there are some unique looking characters in the trailers, so I hold out hope for something really intriguing.

Get th-ready for some combat

I said before that when I started, I went into a space and was attacked and lost, in fact across my time with the game, I lost quite a bit. Hazel is ready for a scrap, she can use the spindle to throw a thread out and tie up enemies, or pull them towards her. In addition, Hazel can use the magic in the spindle to basically force push enemies away from her, though there is a catch to those attacks, they work on a cool down. This does not mean that Hazel is going to be left all frayed while they reset, as she can get in and attack like normal. Combat has a touch of the old school God of War games, mostly in that you have enemies all around you and they don’t wait for their turn.

The enemies that I encountered were distinct enough that I quickly learnt which ones annoyed me, hint they have a homing attack. The first fight had two other enemies, one of them shot out these little bugs that flew around and once they were close, they exploded. The other was the more dangerous one, it would lunge across the space and take around 1/3 of my health in a single hit, if it connected. Hazel is not at the mercy of these attacks, as you can dodge around, and after a lot of trial and error, I got the timing down, which meant I was dodging like a pro and then leaping back into the fray for another go. As the fights in the chapter progressed, they did get more complicated, with a sort of wave structure and multiple types of enemies appearing and it was a fun challenge to overcome. Given that I skipped the tutorials for combat, it would be interesting to see what other enemies are earlier in the game and of course, I can’t wait for some boss fights. The combat system might be challenging for some, but I am on board with it.

This world is sew interesting

Now one of the biggest draws for me was the world, because worlds of fantasy usually can present things that we don’t normally see. When your fantasy world is based out of a real-world location, then it becomes a bit of a game where you try to see what is original and what is inspired by. Now Prospero is not a real location, at least not that I could find, but its origins is that of the deep American south, with banjos, fireflies and alligators. Now I will freely admit that the bulk of my understanding of that region comes from Hollywood, so I can’t talk about the authenticity of what is shown, but I can say I was really enjoying it. The world in Chapter 3 is set around a small town that was cleared out ahead of the Hurricane, though it must have been in a hurry, as there are lots of things left behind.

The world itself though is fractured, there were giant bramble that annoying to touch, tree branches stretched across the ground, acting as makeshift bridges and there was much more going on. What I liked is that there were little hidey holes around the place, usually that provided upgrade points. Sometimes they would also drop back onto the main path, other times I had to climb back over bramble and large gaps. Thankfully Hazel does have a few special moves to help get around, a double jump for one. In addition to that, she can glide, which gives you a little extra time in the air and eventually in the chapter, Hazel learnt to wall run. Something that I thought was unique for the game, is that when she does wall run, she holds the spindle against the wall and that allows her to move up and down.

Thimbles that concern me

Now this was a preview build, so there were issues present and they are not what concern me. First is the camera kind of sucks and I don’t mean that because it was a preview build. In fact, due to the work in progress nature of the build, the camera settings were not actually adjustable, but they are there. What I mean by the camera not being good is that it sits a little to close to Hazel and when I was trying to control it, it felt like it was on ice, so I would often be slow to move and then just fly around after that. I often fell off narrow platforms and paths, because I was fighting with the camera to point in the direction I was walking.

The other concern I had is due to the number of things to do in the chapter. Now yes, this was just a single chapter from a much larger game, but apart from following the narrative thread, there was not much else to do. In fact, apart from hunting for upgrade points and looking at photos on the wall in someone’s house, I don’t think there was anything else going on. I do understand that the world is partly magical now and that a hurricane has come through, but I just hope that other chapters a little more to offer.

Final thoughts

I really liked my time with South of Midnight, there is clearly a richer story at play than what I got to see and I can’t wait to discover it. The combat has depth to it and with some boss fights show in trailers, I can’t wait to see how that shakes out. I do worry about the games camera, it just feels wrong in its default state, but who knows maybe some of those options will fix it. The games art style, combat and world are all coming together to offer up something fun and April cannot come soon enough.

Access to the preview build was provided by Xbox. South of Midnight is set to release on Xbox Series X|S and PC on April 8.