It’s the kind of presentation you wouldn’t mind in a much smaller game that couldn’t afford fully animated cutscenes, but in a triple-A title from Arkane and Bethesda, it’s far harder to forgive. The early trailers for the game showed off fully-animated cutscenes introducing each of the four playable characters, but in the actual game, you get static cutscenes, heaps of readable materials and even psychic echoes where blue outlines stand around and dialogue is piped in. The cool premise of the game’s storyline, though, is ruined by its lacklustre presentation. The Vampire Gods rule now, and under them are Cultists who are more than happy to serve their new overlords. It does, at least, lay the foundations for a cool world: the town of Redfall has been taken over by vampires who have somehow blotted out the sun and pushed the sea back before freezing it in place, cutting Redfall off and trapping everyone. Unfortunately, this isn’t just a stylistic choice and every other major story moment will be shown in the same way like a clip show with a few moving parts. Redfall doesn’t make the best first impression, introducing its world via shifting images rather than full animation. The only thing it shares with the undead blood-suckers is that it’s lifeless. Despite being about vampires, Redfall has no fangs of its own. And surely with Arkane Austin on development duties, Redfall should be a home run? No. Xbox has been struggling with a lack of strong exclusives to compete with Sony’s high-quality outings and Nintendo’s established names. It’s the first drop of blood extracted from the purchase of Zenimax in 2021, the first game that has been mostly developed under the purview of new owner Microsoft. There is no getting away from the immense pressure that Redfall has been under leading up to its launch.
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