I had no idea that this game existed. Like, I have seen it before but never stopped to smell its cybernetic roses before. And quite frankly, that was my loss.
Observer – System Redux from developer Bloober Team is a cyberpunk noir mystery that plays off a roughed-up and scared world, in the same vein as Blade Runner, where hope is in short supply, as is about everything else that humanity needs. The game is led through the life of a detective Daniel Lazarski (played by the late Rutger Hauer), who is investigating a sudden lockdown in an apartment complex, a terrible murder, and a missing piece of his life he is desperate to find.
As stories go, Observer – System Redux’s narrative is thick with plot points, twists and turns, and plenty of psychological horror to last a lifetime. It’s a well-constructed story that leads the way and plays off the talents of Hauer as the lead detective. It’s one of those narratives that grabs your attention and, even in the game’s faults, keeps you interested in what is going on. And, again, as I said above in my opening statement, I can’t believe I missed this the first time around. It’s worth the adventure solely for the story.
On the gameplay side of the tracks, Observer – System Redux mixes old concepts with new ways to play. The old concepts are drawn from games like Snatcher and Rise of the Dragon, where the player investigates a horrific crime against a futuristic backdrop, primarily by finding clues and solving puzzles. It’s an old-school cognitive cookie-cutter concept that asks the player to go as slow and steady in their search for the next ‘thing’ to progress the game. For example, right out of the gate, Lazarski will infiltrate a nasty apartment complex and find a horribly murdered resident lying on the floor in a highly secure room. Once he gets into that room and finds the body, the apartment goes into lockdown mode, which the detective has to find his way out of before proceeding.
The player will spend a good chunk of time examining bio and tech clues across different ranges of vision. Eventually, Lazarski will happen upon enough evidence that leads to a code that allows him to unlock the apartment. Going into this type of gameplay with a film noir mentality, which means knowing this isn’t an action game, will help players understand they’re emulating a true detective gameplay scenario. It’s going to be a slow and methodical experience, but one that is well worth the time and effort put into it. Clues and puzzles are cleverly designed and are incredibly difficult to figure out at times.
To help keep this from being just a search-and-find experience, the game also throws branching dialogue into the mix. Occasionally, Lazarski will interview a character and be given choices on how he wants to interrogate them. While the gameplay element isn’t treated like branching dialogue you would find in games like Knights of the Old Republic, where the wrong answers shift the story in a dramatic direction, knowing when to treat people right and what reaction a player can expect from an NPC is vital to the gameplay experience with a minor amount of impact on the overall adventure. Now, that said, it fits snugly with the film noir type of gameplay elements. It helps to break up the monotony that can come out of the detective work, and it adds a bit more player agency to the flow of the story.
Old-school gameplay elements aside, Observer – System Redux features a hefty amount of new-school elements of horror to up the value of the mysteries that unfold. Honestly, I didn’t expect the psychological horror to be as thick and present as it was with this game. While a player will see right from the beginning how broken the world has become and how over-stimulated it can be on the cyberpunk side of the tracks (lots of noises, broken down buildings, tech/electronics glitching everywhere), getting into the true horror of the game is something else.
The first run-in players will have with this side of the game is finding a dying body in a different apartment. Instead of going the usual old-school route of collecting elements and finding out what happened with clues lying around, Lazarski can connect with the dying body through a wire plugged into the back of their head, which sends the player through a very trippy and traumatic set of controllable mashed memories that they will have to sort out. The player will move in a first-person vantage point around rooms, find glitchy clues, take them in, and then turn around to find that they are no longer in the same room they started in. It’s visually unhinging to see in motion, and impressive to see it work so seamlessly on the Nintendo Switch 2. I didn’t know that the system could deliver this amount of quick-changing and complex psychological horror fix, but it did it quite well. Anyway, the trippy process ups the ante of the mystery considerably and pushes the game into the likes of an Outlast psychological status, where seeing isn’t necessarily safe to believe. All this adds so much to the film noir gameplay experience.
All the above elements laid out, the game does have an issue. Yes, just one issue. To be blunt, I am not sure I have ever played a Nintendo game in first-person perspective that has ever truly felt comfortable. I remember my first go-around with Call of Duty on the Wii U, and it ended up being my last go-around with it. The controls feel sensitive, off, and a bit loosey-goosey at times. While it isn’t unmanageable and not even remotely close to a Wii U CoD experience, I can see how a mouse and keyboard might be a better route with this game. I was on the struggle bus during clue finding and puzzle solving with getting pinpoint accuracy with my Nintendo Switch 2 JoyCons. It did get better with a Pro Controller, but this game just wasn’t built for anything less than a mouse and keyboard. Don’t get me wrong, it does work, but players will find the need/want to use something more accurate with its movement. It just drove me a little nuts. Granted, it was nice to see the first-person vantage point work so well on the Nintendo Switch 2, and it was comfortable for the most part, but it just wasn’t as accurate, and it was a little frustrating when it came to the actual gameplay. It’s not a dealbreaker by any means, as I am sure players will handle this better than my old shaky hands, but it was still present.
Overall, the gameplay elements mixed with the story make for a fun film noir-type experience. If you’re looking for a slow and methodical mystery with a heavy dose of psychological horror, then look no further than Observer – System Redux. It’s well worth your time, money, and effort.
On that sweet note, let’s wrap up this review.
Conclusion
Observer – System Redux from developer Bloober Team is a psychological horror gameplay experience driven by old-school and new-school gaming concepts, while also being led by a fantastic story with a great lead actor. It’s not perfect, but it’s quite good.
