First and foremost, a disclaimer: if you’re sensitive to flashing, don’t watch any of the embedded videos below. While HEVN has been improved in a handful of areas, its wonky physics that send you flying into the air when walking over objects remain intact, and there are a few points where I found myself wildly oscillating between two points. Naturally, this manifested as screen flashing, and the videos below consist of three separate (uncut) attempts to get back into HEVN. As for why it took three attempts, that really comes down to the near-constant softlocks. Every single video that I’ve embedded ends in a softlock that disables the menu and requires force-closing the game, and while some of the changes here are definite improvements, it’s hard to say that the game is in a better state when I found myself softlocked three times in a little over an hour.

This actually isn’t the first time I’ve gone back to HEVN. After one of its first updates, I loaded up my old save game and tried to climb a ladder, only to watch as main character Sebastian Mar continually failed to latch onto it no matter how many times I tried. After that, I wandered around the world a little bit and encountered an enemy, and right after it was defeated, I automatically zipped across the world (through mountains and everything) and finally latched onto the ladder from 5-10 minutes prior. Naturally, I have video of this.

That was enough to convince me to drop it and wait for more updates. Looking back, though, I can’t help but wonder if using my old save game had something to do with it. That’s an arguably generous assumption given HEVN‘s issues with non-responsive ladders that date all the way back to its original release, but I decided to start from scratch this time anyway.

HEVN doesn’t appear to use version numbers, so its current incarnation is simply referred to as the “third major update.” Some text on the main menu promises a bevy of improvements to the sounds, graphics, and performance, but the changes to each proved subtle enough that I didn’t really notice the difference. The menus, on the other hand, are definitely a big change. Everything is more compact, and one of the early updates reduced the inventory size to keep you from carrying around several weapons of each type without penalty. It took awhile to get used to the new menus, but there’s no denying that they’re more convenient when you’re trying to quickly switch to a different weapon or item. Just when I was starting to become comfortable with everything, however, I interacted with a computer and ended up softlocked. Sebastian didn’t even make it out of the starting area before HEVN glitched, wiping out over 20 minutes of careful inventory planning and other such progress.

When I loaded back to my last save—the very first save point you find in the game, unfortunately—I found myself missing a card needed to reboot the quantum power. Thankfully, this appears to be optional and I was able to quickly rush my way through the starting area and out into the world.

The last two of these videos appear to be slightly corrupted (it’s Christmas and I was rushing), but the rundown is that HEVN‘s new ammo system feels painfully limiting early on. Rather than weapons relying on energy restored at recharging stations, you now have to find rare items hidden around the world that allow you to recharge them. Most enemies are immobile and can be ignored, but you’re incentivized to shoot them with the promise of your new auto-aim leveling up in the process. You’re pushed to pursue two incompatible approaches at once, and there’s just not enough ammo.

Then, at the end of the video, I finally found and equipped a helmet with a flashlight, only to realize that the flashlight doesn’t work for some reason. After standing next to a recharging station, HEVN‘s popups insisted that it was fully charged. It just didn’t work, leaving me to explore nearly pitch-black caves without a light source. Of course, I didn’t even make it that far, as the game glitched out right after I saved. It seems that all terminals that take away control of your movement run the risk of trapping you between the “terminal” and “normal movement” modes.

Glitching out immediately after saving is lucky, but the possibility of softlocking the game when interacting with a terminal in a game that revolves around finding codes hidden on multiple terminals is a troublesome one for obvious reasons. Still, I decided to give HEVN one more chance because there was a much greater sense of direction and purpose compared to its original incarnation, which allowed the story to come together in a more cohesive and compelling way.

My first location was a cave, unfortunately, but I remembered the layout just well enough to navigate to the terminal. This time, I softlocked the game less than 15 minutes in and realized that this simply wasn’t a playable experience. There are a lot of good things about HEVN‘s current incarnation, from its voice acting to the underlying sense of exploration, but having to force-close it every 15-30 minutes is untenable.

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