In South Of Midnight, track athlete Hazel is better suited to running and leaping through the game’s depiction of the Deep South, and gaining magic powers only boosts her abilities. Yet in practice that adds up to a familiar suite of double jumps, air dashes and wall runs. As for the warrior Khazan, he looks to established Soulslike techniques to destroy his foes.
On the upside, this all works because it’s tried and tested; there’s a competence that comes from building on proven formulae. And arguably these ideas endure because they’ve been distilled over years of experimentation and refinement. But at the same time, the déjà vu isn’t entirely welcome. Playing The First Berserker, we can’t shake the sense of ‘been there, done that’, and the returns are diminishing. And if South Of Midnight is more compelling because of its inspired world-building, that richness also serves to highlight the plainness of its mechanics.