If No Man's Sky is the ambitious, boisterous member of the Hello Games family, The Last Campfire is the subdued, charming one. Released to very little fanfare, this simplistic puzzler does enough to provide a weekend's worth of enjoyment. Just don't expect anything too impressive from those two days of fun.
The hazy fairy tale puts you in the shoes of Ember -- a lost soul tasked with helping Forlorns regain consciousness by completing different types of brain teasers. You will rummage through each and every colourful environment in search of them, overcoming simple obstacles and talking to lovable creatures as you go. The puzzles themselves aren't all that original though, mostly revolving around pushing boulders in the correct sequence and sliding jigsaw tests ripped straight out of Resident Evil 4. A device introduced a few hours into the game allows you to control objects and platforms from afar, but it too hardly pushes the boat out in terms of both complexity and originality.
And that's what is holding The Last Campfire back the most. It appears content to recycle the same sort of brain teasers we've been solving for years now, but it does so in such a chill manner that maybe it doesn't matter quite as much as usual. Your puzzling capabilities will be tested the more you progress, although tranquillity always remains at the heart of the experience.
However, watch out for the technical setbacks that lead to slowdown on PlayStation 4 when interacting with other characters and dodgy animations that see Ember completely clip through the world. The former is a consistent issue that breaks immersion a little too often, but there's always a delightful NPC or puzzle on the other side to draw you back in. Despite not doing anything new, The Last Campfire is a lovely palate cleanser in between the bigger games this year.
Comments 9
Yeah, as above comment says, this just strikes me as a 'whatever' game. Wouldn't pay a penny for it, but if it ever comes to PS+ I might download it.
Looks really charming to me, so it's a must buy. Just not at launch. Hope it does well. The heavy hitters get more than enough sales, so I'd rather support such games instead.
Review is very much my thoughts exactly. The gameplay that we've all seen before really is supported by the nature and presentation of the game which is very nice. It's not the longest of games either but it's a short sweet memorable game that won't be forgotten quickly. Worth a play at least for sure.
I really enjoyed this game despite it's technical flaws. I do love puzzle games so this was an instant buy. Strangely, they have left the debug menu in the game. If you press L1 and R1 you're treated to a few options, graphics detail, level select, puzzle rooms (though not fully playable) and cutscenes that I never witnessed during my playthrough.
I’ve been playing this, I really like it. Nice change of pace from ghost of Tsushima.
I really like these small mid road games but I'm in agreement with most here. The games need a gamepass style service to finance and support them. Its just not worth punting the cash on a little game with so many games available for a small monthly fee
I think we need more smaller games that can rake risks without massive monetization or a liveservice too pay for the insane budgets.
The triple A has some great stuff but so much games wants too own your time or money just because of that.
So instead of crying about indies be happy play something else something fresh. Something that can take a risk without destroying the company or workers because of the risk.
Looks like a cute game to play when they do a discount on it.
What does the technical flaws on PS4 mean ? 🤔
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