Amnesia: Rebirth Devs Want to Do More Than Just Terrify You

The next chapter in Frictional Games' iconic horror series, Amnesia: Rebirth, is just over the horizon, and with it, the team has revealed a new gameplay trailer highlighting a dense chunk of what to expect. You can see for yourself in the exclusive first look at the gameplay above. This new outing in the franchise follows a new protagonist stranded in the Algerian desert who must survive the horrors lurking below the sand when Amnesia: Rebirth launches on October 20 on PC via Steam, GOG, and Epic Games Store, alongside the PS4. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=amnesia-rebirth-screenshot-gallery&captions=true"] Speaking with IGN, the developers behind the decade-long series explained how their approach to horror has changed since their debut with Amnesia: The Dark Descent, citing a desire to ratchet up the dread that's more than just white-knuckle terror as unknowable creatures hunt you down.

A New Kind of Fear

"Our main goal is not just to scare the living daylight out of people by throwing jump-scares, monsters or gory visuals at them for as long as possible," said Fredrik Olsson, creative lead and executive producer on Amnesia: Rebirth. "Rather, our goal is to stir up some really strong emotions and make the players question themselves and their view of the world outside of this game. "Fear is one of the more primal and strong emotions that we as humans have and gives us an easier pathway into people’s minds (and hearts) through which we can channel other emotions as well. Such as sadness, love, loneliness or panic over a decision you have to make. So you can say that while the horror in itself is really important, it is also a tool for achieving something bigger, something that will hopefully stick with people long after the end credits have rolled." [poilib element="quoteBox" parameters="excerpt=Our%20goal%20is%20to%20stir%20up%20strong%20emotions%20and%20make%20players%20question%20themselves%20and%20their%20view%20of%20the%20world%20outside%20of%20this%20game."] "While the game will have a bunch of moment-to-moment scares, that is not the only level we are focusing on," said Thomas Grip, creative director on Rebirth. "One crucial thing that we learned from SOMA was working with narrative pay-off on longer time spans. As the player plays more and more of the game, the deeper, longer-lasting dread will slowly creep up. Just like with SOMA we are taking quite a few risks here, but from what we have seen so far people who have tested it have come away deeply affected." "You really need to experience it yourself. The thing we are aiming for this time is thematically quite different from SOMA. Instead of SOMA's grand post-human exploration, in Rebirth, it is closer to home and deals with the things we are willing to do for our loved ones. The character of Tasi is also integral for making it all come through, so we worked hard on players crafting a strong bond with her." [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/09/15/amnesia-rebirth-release-date-trailer"]

Small Changes Make Big Impacts

But Frictional Games is adamant that at its core, Amnesia: Rebirth is still very much the Amnesia experience that you've come to know and deeply fear. The core loop of the game, exploration, your dwindling mental state, discovering secrets, overcoming obstacles, and sprinting down long, dark corridors in abject terror desperately searching for a closet to dive into – that's all still there. "The very basic loop remains the same, but the devil is really in the detail," said Grip. "Using the original Amnesia formula has been very important to us as we want the game to feel like a proper Amnesia game. We also want to make sure that it feels fresh though, and combining these two has been a challenge. Mostly it is about changes that might sound small, but have a huge impact." [poilib element="quoteBox" parameters="excerpt=Sanity%20was%20really%20just%20an%20ambient%20feature%20in%20The%20Dark%20Descent%2C%20it%20is%20a%20much%20more%20important%20aspect%20of%20Rebirth%2C%20both%20for%20the%20story%20and%20the%20gameplay."] The most visible of those changes might be the way Rebirth makes use of the familiar sanity system, which is now all about the new protagonist Tasi Trianon's fear as she plunges into the desolate sands of the Algerian desert. For one, the developers believe that fear just makes more sense than a generic idea of sanity. Beyond that, the team believes it will carry a lot more weight as the level of fear contributes to long-term narrative consequences. "Again, it might sound like a small change, but the way it jacks into the overall story makes it a lot different, Grip said. "Sanity was really just an ambient feature in The Dark Descent, it is a much more important aspect of Rebirth, both for the story and the gameplay."

Just Deserts

This time around, the environmental threat will come from the sun-blasted expanse of the Algerian desert, which, by their own admission is a difficult environment to make spooky. Instead, the team had to get inventive. On the one hand, you're going to be constantly reminded how scary being lost and stranded in an endless expanse of nothing can be: sand will constantly pour out of holes, dust storms will howl all around, and windows to the outside will reveal vistas of outstretched barrens. "When it comes to the actual environments," Grip said, "the main focus has been on variety. We want Tasi’s journey to have a strong sense of being a long struggle against the odds. We also thought a lot about what sort of places you could find in the desert: small towns, caves, an oasis, old forts, and so on. These are environments that give us a wide range of moods (from calm to oppressive), still have that desert feel to them, and have enough variety in look to give the feel of a long, harrowing odyssey." [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/03/06/amnesia-rebirth-announcement-trailer"] "We put a lot of effort into putting gameplay into the world itself, for example, unique monster behavior, or machinery the player needs to operate. We like the idea of a simple set of gameplay systems and then getting complexity from the world instead. There is a steady stream of new challenges that use the core loop in different ways, as the player progresses through the game. Things like getting an old piece of army artillery operational, or trying to disarm an explosive trap."

New Face, Familiar Fears

Building on the core of Amnesia while making it different enough to stand on its own is a chief goal of the team, and to that end, Amnesia: Rebirth is very much its own experience independent from the hours and hours of scares and tension that's come before it. The series has become an anthology, carrying the core principles from one story to the next, now with our new survivor Tasi Trianon. [poilib element="quoteBox" parameters="excerpt=Rebirth%20might%20answer%20some%20of%20The%20Dark%20Descent%E2%80%99s%20unanswered%20questions%2C%20for%20those%20who%20are%20paying%20attention!"] "You don’t need prior knowledge of Amnesia lore to understand [Amnesia: Rebirth]," said story lead Ian Thomas. "Of course, if you do have that knowledge, you’ll spot connections and references and perhaps have a deeper insight into some of the underlying principles of what Tasi is encountering. And it might answer some of The Dark Descent’s unanswered questions, for those who are paying attention! [But] Amnesia: Rebirth stands on its own. It is Tasi’s story, and her journey." "Tasi is from Paris, but has traveled a lot, and spent time in Algeria when she was younger. By profession, she is an engineering drafter and illustrator. In the past, she’s worked alongside engineering teams on projects across Europe and Africa. The journey that leads to the events in Amnesia: Rebirth is a relatively normal one for her, along with several companions who she knows well. But what happens to her here is beyond anything in her experience, and a lot of the game is about how she - or you, as her player - handles that." [poilib element="accentDivider"] Brandin Tyrrel is a Senior Editor at IGN. You can find him on Unlocked, or chat over on Twitter at @BrandinTyrrel. Lucy O'Brien is Executive Editor of Features at IGN. Follow her on Twitter.

The Pathless Is a PS5 Launch Game

The Pathless, from Abzu developer Giant Squid and publisher Annapurna Interactive, has been confirmed to be a PS5 launch game. Annapurna announced today that The Pathless will hit PS5, as well as PS4, Apple Arcade, and PC on November 12, the same day as the PS5 launches. Players take on the role of master archer the Hunter as they attempt to save a magical island from darkness spreading across the world. Alongside a trusty eagle friend, players hunt down evil spirits across the island's varied landscape. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="legacyId=800003409&captions=true"] Giant Squid originally debuted The Pathless at the 2018 Game Awards, and Sony later highlighted the upcoming adventure at both its PS5 reveal event in June as well as the most recent Sony State of Play, which showed off an in-depth look at The Pathless' gameplay. For more on what you can expect to play at the PS5's launch, be sure to check out our full breakdown of the PS5 launch games list. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/08/06/the-pathless-gameplay-overview-state-of-play-2020"] [poilib element="accentDivider"] Jonathon Dornbush is IGN's Senior News Editor. Talk to him on Twitter @jmdornbush.

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate's Next DLC Fighters Are Minecraft Characters

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate will add Minecraft's Steve, Alex, Zombie, and Enderman as upcoming DLC fighters. Revealed in an online presentation today, the fighters will appear alongside a Minecraft-themed stage that can seemingly change each time it's loaded. Steve's abilities seemingly include the use of in-game crafting to create swords, pickaxes, blocks and other familiar elements from Minecraft. It appears that Alex, Zombie and Enderman will be echo fighters for Steve. Series creator Masahiro Sakurai will present a second broadcast, 'Fighting with Steve & Alex' on October 3 at 7:30am Pacific / 10:30am Eastern / 3:30pm UK. Developing...

Fan Gets Skyrim to Run on a Keyboard's Tiny Display Screen

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim has been playable on many, many formats, but a fan has managed something new, by getting the game to run on their keyboard's tiny display screen. Courtesy of Reddit user Mr_Murdoc, you can see how the iconic opening scene of Skyrim looks when rendered in monochrome on a keyboard's OLED screen. Mr_Murdoc used a SteelSeries Apex 7 TKL keyboard to achieve the feat, which comes fitted with a small OLED display that can be modified using the SteelSeries Engine app. [caption id="attachment_2415091" align="alignnone" width="1920"] A shot of Skyrim running on the keyboard screen. Watch the video on Reddit.[/caption] Mr_Murdoc added in a reply that the game itself is running on a connected computer, using a script from GitHub that mirrors the user's desktop screen to the keyboard's OLED display to achieve the effect. Skyrim running natively on a keyboard seems absurd, of course, but given Bethesda's penchant for ports... never say never. Bethesda boss Todd Howard famously said in 2018 that if fans want the studio to stop releasing Skyrim ports, they should "stop buying them." In other Bethesda news, Zenimax Media was recently acquired by Microsoft, bringing franchises like Dishonored, DOOM, Wolfenstein, Fallout and The Elder Scrolls under the wing of Xbox. Check out our video wondering whether Bethesda games will be Xbox exclusives going forward. The real question we're left with is whether this is more impressive than the fan that got Doom running on a pregnancy test. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Jordan Oloman is a freelance writer for IGN. Follow him on Twitter.

Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time Review

Do you ever wish you could wipe a few underwhelming sequels from history and pick up where the last good one left off? You know, like what Superman Returns or Terminator: Dark Fate tried to do? Well, with Crash Bandicoot 4: It’s About Time, developer Toys for Bob actually pulls off the half-reboot, half-continuation idea. This is a direct sequel to Naughty Dog’s original trilogy that concluded in 1998, and this team really gets Crash. It’s all the characters and action platforming I loved about the old games but with a bunch of great new ideas mixed in so well that they feel like they were always supposed to be there. Crash Bandicoot 4 makes rapid-fire homages to Crash’s past, picking up where Warped left off and having Crash’s biggest and most delightfully hammy villains, N. Trophy and Neo Cortex break out of prison along with Uka Uka and trot out a typical video game villain plan to take over the multiverse. Crash has always been about the action, but the self-aware, amusing script walks the careful line of winking self-awareness that this sequel has come so many years later while also telling a genuinely funny, personable story. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=every-ign-crash-bandicoot-game-review&captions=true"] And it’s one that Toys for Bob tells well through Crash’s main campaign, which took me about nine or so hours to beat… but with only a 34% completion rating. The other 66% is, among other things, an entire gamut of challenges to complete. (More on that later.) Crash 4 keeps the main story progression linear, reverting to an overworld map similar to Crash 1’s rather than the hub rooms of Crash 2 and 3 that I personally preferred. My initial surprise with that decision aside, the setup works well enough to keep momentum going as I bounced from one pop-up storybook-esque time period map to the next, and Toys for Bob imbues even that overworld map with plenty of charm. From level landmarks to side characters waiting for their turn in the spotlight and obvious spaces for unlockable bonus levels, it’s not only easy to get around but a visual treat, too.

Time After Time

Of course, any Crash game worth its orange fur lives or dies by how fun, challenging, and rewarding its platforming is, and here Toys for Bob has not only recaptured the magic of the original trilogy but added to it in new, exciting, and seriously tough ways. Crash (and Coco, who plays identically to Crash and can be swapped to for any Crash level depending on who you prefer to play as) standards like double jumping, ground slamming, and spin attacks return, but the inventive ways in which Crash 4 forced me to improve on my longstanding skills with this arsenal is a treat. This is true from large scale decisions like building each level with more objectives (such as finding a certain percentage of Wumpa fruit, unlocking all crates, finding a hidden gem, and only dying so many times) to design choices like putting you through increasingly long and complex sequences that require perfect dashes, jumps, and spins against enemies. Those make Crash 4’s imaginative worlds some of my favorite of the series. One of the very best new ideas comes when the four Quantum Masks are thrown into the mix and you get access to powers like gravity bending, time slowdown, and more. Gravity alterations always break my brain, and I died while mistiming a quick gravity swap and falling or ascending straight into oblivion more often than with any other mask – but what could come off as passing gimmicks in a lesser game feel smartly integrated into the challenge and flow of levels of Crash 4. Toys for Bob finds more and more unique ways to kill Crash... I mean test my platforming skills as the difficulty ramps up at a reasonable pace. [poilib element="poll" parameters="id=e9c7d1d2-84ee-4f81-bba3-06a4f60de733"] New enemy types like hungry sand sharks and giant lightning locusts, twisty jumping sections, and all of Crash’s new moves blend together so it never has to resort to stale carbon copies of past challenges. If a memorable obstacle is repeated, it’s often creatively revamped in a more challenging way, such as the return of Crash’s surfing jet board from the original trilogy. Not every new addition is a winner; I am not a fan of the fire-spewing crates added throughout levels. They don’t add much in the way of complexity to the platforming, they just increase time spent waiting for the crates to cool down until they can be spun. The standard moving mine obstacle courses require more daring split-second decisions as TNT-throwing enemies and water currents affecting your speed are thrown into the mix. Also, some truly devilish endgame challenges use Crash’s full arsenal, including the Masks, in some of the most difficult levels the series has ever seen. I died more times than I cared to admit, but completing them led to some of the most satisfying platforming in recent years. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/devs-reacting-to-a-crash-4-demo-speedrun-is-the-funniest-one-yet"] And while Crash is tough, it’s also largely great at teaching you its new tricks, minimizing the feeling of progress by trial and error that comes with some platformers. Yes, there are still levels where you’re running toward the camera, and occasionally a hazard comes at you without warning, but nothing felt as mercilessly tough as Crash 1’s infamous Road to Nowhere. Crash 4 doles out its challenges in smart succession, ensuring it always feel fair. The smallest addition – a circular shadow that appears underneath an airborne Crash – exemplifies this. What could be perceived as a crutch by those who find estimating their position without it to be a hardcore challenge eliminates most of the guesswork that came with earlier Crash games for the rest of us. It allowed me to better put my focus on nailing a precarious jump, rather than trying to figure out where the landing point should or might be and hoping for the best. But don't worry, purists: you can turn it off in the options. Crash 4 even makes concessions depending on your progress. For example, if you die enough times at a certain spot, it may add in a new checkpoint crate to help you along. Not that I ever had that happen, of course. Definitely not.

How Much Time Ya Got?

There’s certainly no shortage of ways for deaths to happen, because Crash 4 adds in a host of new platforming tricks beyond the Mask abilities: rope swinging, rail grinding, and wall running are all present. None of them is necessarily revelatory, as they’ve all become staples of the platforming genre in the years since Warped came out, but their challenge is well integrated into the rest of his set of tools in such a way that that ensures timing and precision remains king. The only points at which I found it annoying were a few brief sections of rail grinding where the perspective of the camera caused me to mistime a jump over an obstacle. Crash 4 removes about 98% of the guesswork of the old games, but that last 2% can still burn when you’re trying to keep your death count low. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=crash-bandicoot-4-akano-screenshots&captions=true"] And there are plenty of challenges to tackle. Beyond the main story path, there are truly white-knuckle flashback levels: of the handful I’ve tried so far, all are pure platforming skill tests. These side levels take more turns at Crash’s ensemble of playable characters, time trials, local multiplayer and co-op, and the impressive N. Verted mode. Co-developed by Crash Team Racing: Nitro-Fueled developer Beenox, N.Verted is Crash 4’s take on mirror mode – and it doesn’t just invert the look, it adds a host of unexpected challenges that have tested me even on the levels I’ve played a dozen times already. Take, for example, the earliest levels – they turn Crash into an echolocating bandicoot (bat-dicoot?) whose every spin shoots out a burst of light that temporarily illuminates the level beyond his immediate vicinity. I had to more methodically plan each jump, time my spins so I didn’t accidentally fall off a cliff, and more. All of that is an added incentive I didn’t know I needed but now adore as I attempt to 100% Crash 4 as a whole.

A Little Help From My Friends

One of Crash 4’s biggest revelations is in widening its focus to an ensemble of playable characters, including Dingodile, Tawna, and Cortex. Each plays distinctly from one another, and that leads to some of Crash 4’s most intriguing levels. [poilib element="quoteBox" parameters="excerpt=I%20would%20play%20a%20spinoff%20for%20any%20of%20the%20new%20playable%20characters%20in%20a%20heartbeat."]Every of these new characters could be the star of their own spinoff game, and I’d play each of them in a heartbeat. Cortex foregoes a double jump for a long dash and a ray gun that turns enemies into platforms or jelly-like bouncing spots, which means his levels are more horizontally laid out. Tawna has a grappling hook that plays into combat but is also useful for crate smashing at distances Crash and Coco could never reach. Finally, Dingodile can hover but can’t actually jump to save his life but has Lugi’s Mansion-esque vacuum mechanics that can, for example, suck up and launch a TNT crate to destroy barriers. The only real downside is Cortex and Dingodile’s weapons can be a bit tough to aim, with no target reticle or way to aim with any finesse: you just shoot in the general direction your character is facing. It led to a handful of flubbed shots on my end, and is something a full spinoff or additional takes on these ideas should consider reworking.

A Whole New World

Part of what makes Crash 4’s levels both readable and fascinating to explore is the sheer level of detail Toys for Bob was able to cram into them compared to the original trilogy. These beautiful and memorable worlds, from the frozen tundra of the 1700s to a New Orleans-esque musical city and the prehistoric era, showcase Toys for Bob’s penchant for adorable, animated design. I loved the personality the developers injected into the Spyro Reignited Trilogy, imbuing those classic adventures with more charm and personality than I ever thought possible; Crash 4 is a natural evolution of that work. Crash’s more linear track through its levels, however, allows Toys for Bob to really flesh out these landscapes like never before in the series. This not only leads to epic introductory shots of levels with a wide scope that tease trials to come, but also means every character, crate, and collectible has fun bits of detail slathered all over them. From the bits of exposed dynamite in TNT crates to the goofy designs of pirate octopi and the many wacky costumes Crash and Coco can wear, Toys for Bob has given this game the look of the Crash Saturday morning cartoon I wished I'd been able to watch as a kid. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/crash-bandicoot-4-its-about-time-gameplay-launch-trailer"] And that’s evident in the character designs. Crash stays true to his original form, but his dopey, happy-go-lucky attitude is in Looney Tunes-esque top form here, with Coco providing a more level-headed approach to the adventure. The new take on Tawna redeems the barely-there damsel in distress of the original, making this version a badass with a heartbreaking past. And Dingodile’s kind of just...there, but it works, as his personal endeavors to open and then repair his restaurant collide with the others’ story. How Toys for Bob integrates these characters’ full arcs is great — they make sense if you just blast through the story, but playing their specific levels offers deeper personality. It’s all aided by a level-appropriate soundtrack, which all sounds in step with the classic Crash scores’ affection for driving, jangly percussion tracks molded to fit all the various time periods. And, like much of Crash 4’s joys, the score has a few delightful surprises of its own: I’m a big fan of the twist on the sound that comes when you don any of the Quantum Masks.

Windows 10 Adding a Task Manager Dedicated to Gaming

Windows 10 is adding a Task Manager widget within the Xbox Game Bar to help you manage your computer's resources without leaving a game. As spotted by WindowsCentral, the new 'Resources' widget lets you monitor which programs are causing the most strain on your computer, assess why your in-game performance may be hitching and close programs quickly without tabbing out. You'll also be able to see how much load there is on your CPU, RAM, DISK and GPU, much like the traditional Task Manager application. It's a neat timesaver that means you won't have to alt-tab or hit CTRL+ALT+DELETE so often to figure out your in-game issues.   [caption id="attachment_241507" align="aligncenter" width="720"] The Windows 10 Task Manager Bar in action.[/caption] You can get access to the feature right now by enrolling in the Game Bar - SDK Development app within the Xbox Insider Hub on Windows 10. The Xbox Insider Hub allows Windows and Xbox users to preview new features ahead of their official launch. If you choose the potentially less stable preview of the Xbox Game Bar, after an update you'll be able to find the new Task Manager app by clicking the 'widgets' hamburger symbol in the top bar after pressing Windows Key + G to initiate the overlay. It's not yet clear when the feature will be rolled out to all users. In other Windows 10 news, here's how to stream Xbox One games to your PC, using the desktop Xbox app. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Jordan Oloman is a freelance writer for IGN. Follow him on Twitter.

Star Wars: Squadrons Single-Player Review

[Editor’s Note: This review is just for Star Wars: Squadrons’ single-player campaign. We’ll have a review of the PvP multiplayer once we’ve had a chance to properly try it out after launch.]

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Like the Force itself, the Star Wars: Squadrons single-player campaign is a balance. The balance between playing as both the New Republic and Empire, between arcade and simulation-style controls, and between fun and flashy action and blunt exposition dumps. It’s full of great references for fans and charming (if ill-used) new characters alike, all crammed into a series of cockpits that are accessible to jump in and pilot without dogfights feeling mindless.

Squadrons has found a sweet spot between the point-and-shoot simplicity of the classic Rogue Squadron series and the insanely detailed simulation of Elite: Dangerous. You can, for the most part, just pick up a controller and start chasing down enemy ships – but there’s also a nuance to adjusting your throttle for better turning, swapping power between engines, weapons, and shields in the style of the grand old X-Wing games, and countering missile locks. Things like that make flight more engaging and give good pilots a chance to shine without requiring you to literally learn how to fly a spaceship in order to play.

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The Empire Strikes Back

The campaign spends its roughly seven-hour run of missions jumping between the dueling perspectives of a crumbling Empire and a freshly formed New Republic just after the events of Return of the Jedi. The way it weaves the stories of two rival squadrons together sets up clever scenarios, sometimes letting you spring ambushes on your other half only to have the next mission swap perspectives so you can deal with the aftermath of your own actions. It’s very cool, and developer Motive Studios continues to prove it knows how to make a game fit seamlessly into the Star Wars universe.

Part of that comes down to its cast of interesting characters, primarily made up of your squads on either side of the conflict. Whether it’s the war-torn Imperial Shen with a battle-scarred helmet he never takes off or the mildly Force-sensitive former racer Keo on the Rebel side, each one is distinct and well-designed enough to stand out in their own way – so much so that I could see any one of them as a Knights of the Old Republic or Mass Effect companion without them feeling out of place at all.

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In fact, I hope they do appear in an RPG some day, because they aren’t used very well here. Learning about them and their backstories is almost exclusively limited to optional conversations in your hangar between missions, which frequently feels ham-fisted for a getting-to-know-you exposition-filled info dump. Those stories are well written and acted, but they are just sort of inconsequential in the course of Squadrons’ events. I always enjoyed listening to them, but it’s unfortunate that you could skip every single one and it wouldn’t affect your experience of the main story at all.

That story is an entertaining one though, centered around the New Republic’s development of a new type of warship and the Empire’s hunt to stop that weapon from joining the fight. It’s undoubtedly amusing the whole way through, but it doesn’t strike me as especially memorable. Neither side really makes much of a point about the greater conflict, you aren’t asked to make any choices or even really question anything they do, and your two rival squads never even directly clash like I so hoped they would – now that would have been fascinating. It just seems like a missed opportunity not to do something more interesting with this unique campaign format, where we have perspectives from both sides of the conflict.

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That said, it does provide more than enough reason to hop into the cockpit and fly some very fun missions. Most objectives do boil down to “you’re in space and you need to shoot X thing,” (which is the entire premise) but the story’s setup for each one makes them feel more diverse than that – especially when you’re hopping between good guy and bad guy every stage or two. One mission sees you hijacking a Star Destroyer, while another has you weaving in and out of ship debris while using old power cores as a triggerable mine field. The dogfighting itself is so good that it never got dull, even if I did occasionally wish there was a bit more objective variety here – for example, it would have been cool to see more scenarios centered around piloting through tight spaces or maybe set closer to the surface of a planet (or moon-sized space station, though the galaxy is short on those in this time period).

Thankfully, the places you do go always show off how incredibly gorgeous Squadrons is. Even if objectives start to feel similar, weaving through cloudy nebulas or around shattered moons differentiates them in stunning fashion. Missions are action-packed, but most smartly start slow and give you a chance to take in some of the grandiose sights they have to offer before the turbolasers start flying. That spectacle is present in cutscenes as well, which frequently upstage those optional hangar conversations and make them feel like an afterthought by comparison.

Climbing Into the Cockpit

Those decadent sights and sounds extend into the cockpits too, with each of the eight ships (four for each side) sporting a completely custom and impressively detailed interior. The UI is even built directly into the actual console of the ship, meaning you have to get comfortable reading each new interior when you first use them. I promise that’s more fun than it sounds though, thanks to the intuitive visual language that’s established for things like radar, power distribution, and throttle control. All that detail rocks, and goes a long way toward making each ship feel distinct – for example, the Imperial Support ship, the TIE Reaper, has you sitting on the left of a cockpit designed for two, initially causing me to have some minor collisions with things on my right as I got used to the fact that my view wasn’t centered.

And while the four ship classes – Fighter, Interceptor, Bomber, and Support – are shared between the Empire and New Republic, each faction has its own twists that go beyond cosmetics. The biggest is that the TIE Fighter, Interceptor, and Bomber have no regenerating shields whatsoever but generally make up for it with more hull strength and agility than the shielded New Republic fleet. Each ship also has different weapon, hull, shield, and engine options to further differentiate them, though what you can or can’t pick is up to whatever mission you are on at the time.

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There’s no progression or actual unlocks throughout the campaign – that’s left to the multiplayer – but it was still nice to have the reins slowly loosen as more options were introduced for me to choose from. Tweaking your loadout can have a drastic impact on the performance of your ship, and the normal difficulty allows for plenty of room for experimentation without being pushover easy. That means there’s not much in the way of replayability here beyond trying higher difficulties or different loadouts for your own amusement, but each mission does also have some basic achievement-style objectives to stretch for – there’s always one for not dying during a mission, one for completion time, and two for special mid-mission side objectives that can bring a neat bit of added challenge (though not a whole lot of it).

To Infinity and Beyond

Squadrons also has full VR support on PC and PS4, as well has full HOTAS (flight stick and throttle) support on all platforms, which is extremely impressive. I used an Oculus Quest with a link cable on PC, and apart from having to awkwardly watch cutscenes in 2D (which I imagine is partly why the hangar conversations are setup the way they are) it’s just a phenomenal way to play. You can take in every inch of its detailed ship interiors, track enemies with your head, and more easily marvel at the lovely space around you. The fact that you can play this entire game in VR is just incredible, easily earning it a place as one of the best VR games available.

Add a HOTAS into the mix and it gets even more impressive, and I almost never want to go back to a controller. It sounds cliche, but the immersion of slamming the throttle and twisting the stick to weave in and out of Star Destroyer debris is exhilarating. I’ve had a chance to try three common flight stick options out on PC with various effectiveness: The Logitech Extreme 3D Pro, the ThrustMaster T.Flight HOTAS 4, and the Hori HOTAS Flight Stick (the latter two of which were provided to us by the manufacturers for this review). Regardless of your choice, you will probably have to fiddle with remapping controls a bit, but Squadrons makes that pretty painless to do.

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Using the T.Flight was just incredible for this, with more than enough buttons to comfortably map everything important – Squadrons doesn’t have nearly as many inputs to manage as a sim like Elite: Dangerous – and compatibility on PS4 and Xbox One as well, depending on the model. I also loved that the throttle notches into place in the center position, which is important in Squadrons to let you turn tighter faster. The Extreme 3D Pro was a similarly solid option, though its small throttle and button layout does make it a little awkward to use. The Hori HOTAS, on the other hand, doesn’t feel suited for Squadrons at all. It doesn’t have that crucial stick twist you need in space flight, and too many of its inputs are mapped to double button presses seemingly designed with only Ace Combat 7 in mind (which it sort of was). To be fair, this is a stick primarily meant for PS4, and it even only showed up as a gamepad on my PC, so I’ll need to give it a shot on PS4 post-launch too.

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And for those who really want to get into the nitty gritty of their Star Wars sim dreams, you can extensively customize what UI elements do or don’t show up, tuning exactly how much you want to rely on your own eyes and the readouts of your dashboard. It’s the added touches like this – alongside a host of wider accessibility options – that make Squadrons feel like far more than the quick and dirty Star Wars-themed dogfighter it so easily could have been.