It doesn’t take much for me to point out the biggest fault in The MISSING: that at the end of the day, it’s let down by the quality of its gameplay.
That isn’t to say it’s an all-out failure. Everything works as intended in this puzzle-platformer -- spearheaded by Hidetaka Suehiro (Swery65) of Deadly Premonition and D4 fame -- so you can expect some challenges that demand you make full use of the mechanics. Minor technical hiccups aside, it’s smooth sailing from start to finish. Relatively speaking. The problem is that, while the gameplay isn’t bad or even mediocre, it’s still fairly plain and straightforward. Workmanlike, even.
There aren’t really any puzzles that force you to wrack your brain, and there’s not much of a difficulty curve forcing you to sharpen your wits or skills as you go. At most, you’ll only get platforming challenges along the way -- which, at their worst, are only challenging because you’re put into scenarios where one-hit KOs are a legitimate, prevalent issue. Basically, don’t get this game if you’re the type that needs technical acuity or execution barriers in your games. Dark Souls, this is not.
Instead, get it for everything else.
ALL THE SPOILERS INCOMING…which kind of makes this post impossible to read for those who want to go in raw, but whatever. If you’re worried, just…I dunno, go eat some donuts instead. I bet Swery would be fine with that.
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