Parents' Guide to Redfall

A hit and a miss. Unfortunately, Redfall's many game design and technical glitches hurt the overall experience. It feels like it was rushed out the door way too early, which is especially disappointing given the developer Arkane's impressive line-up to date, including the Dishonored series, Prey, Prey: Mooncrash, Deathloop, and others. Ultimately, Redfall is a hard pass -- unless it can be fixed with downloadable patches. While the premise is an interesting one, and the personality of each of the vampire hunters shines through, it's plagued with far too many issues. The first being simple interface problems, such as opening a window to see information (like weapons), and then not being able to close it (instead, the game had to be shut down and restarted again). When the first skirmish took place about fifteen minutes into the game, the A.I. enemies either just stood there, humorously ran side to side, or only took a couple shots while you hide among the objects scattered around the large outdoor scene. You can opt for a more challenging game experience by amping up the difficulty with a slider bar in the menu, but the vampires and cultists don't put up much of a fight. For example, as a sniper, you can peg off enemies from afar, but those beside them don't react. The map design does get better about halfway through the campaign, as there's more verticality and memorable moments in Redfall's neighborhoods (and the loot gets more interesting), but still, the enemies don't put up much of a fight (and because the co-op multiplayer mode doesn't allow humans to play as vampires, you're stuck with this A.I.). It can be fun to figure out how to get from one area to another -- like other Arkane titles that do a good job in making you feel like you've got options -- such as climbing through a window, running along a rooftop and looking for a hole to jump, through, or picking a door lock while on the ground.

Whether you prefer to play this game like a first-person shooter or hide in the shadows for a more stealthy approach (and use melee attacks, like wooden stakes, to take out unsuspecting enemies), neither gameplay option is very gratifying. Weapon selection is decent as are the color-coded rarities unlocked by looting areas, but the moments of "wow" are too occasional to have a lasting impression (though the UV Beam that turns vampires to stone was a fun one). Along with the bugs -- including disappearing items, game crashes, and not being able to close pop-up windows -- the game has a sluggish frame rate (30) and the graphics (including character models) seems outdated for a 2023 title. The four heroes are fun to get to know, the storyline is good, and the level design and weapons get better over time, but overall, Redfall seems half-baked. Perhaps another few months on the A.I. and bug-testing would have made this horror-themed looter-shooter more polished, but as it stands now, it's simply not worth the price of admission.