Underwater settings can be a difficult challenge to make fresh and interesting from a game design standpoint. More often than not they rely on a player’s fear of the deep and the unknown entities within for cheap thrills, as is the case with games like SOMA. Even in-house Nintendo studios have a tendency to just make it a place for you to run out of oxygen and watch Mario drown in a particularly gruesome fashion.
Abzu doesn’t rely on such tired tropes, and instead, emphasizes the beauty and splendor that the depths can contain.
Let’s get this out of the way right at the start: Abzu is a beautiful game. 2016 has been a year filled with gray shooters and all sorts of grit, so the bright palette of vibrant blues, yellows and greens is oddly refreshing, and compliments the game’s simple, rough, somewhat jagged aesthetic, much in the same way a game like Journey did with it’s design decisions. It’s a real sight to behold, and at times I found myself wishing there was some sort of idle/screensaver setting for it, because it’s just that nice and downright soothing to look at.
If you felt the gameplay and presentation is reminiscent of ThatGameCompany’s 2011 title Journey, you wouldn’t be wrong. Abzu developer Giant Squid includes several former Journey developers, and in a lot of ways, it shines through as the game really does feel like an evolution and spiritual successor of sorts to that type of experience.
Speaking to avoid spoiling the experience, the game seems to take direct influence in various ways to the Babylonian myth of creation in the Enûma Eliš, as is evidenced within the game itself as well as on the game’s official soundtrack. As such, it touches upon the myth’s exploration of the concepts of life and death and the conflict between the ocean and freshwater. However, as I said this all feels as more of a loose back story to what is essentially a pretty chill underwater exploration game.
The majority of your time in Abzu is spent lazily swimming around and exploring until you stumble upon the right thing to trigger the next plot sequence. It’s bound to sound boring to some, I’m sure, but it’s an incredibly relaxing and zen experience, swimming around the ocean and taking in the game’s sights and sounds, which rarely cease to be beautiful. Somehow, the visuals manage to be both incredibly stylized, but still have a level of realism that is hard to explain, but nevertheless impressive to behold, especially when it comes to ocean life.
Swimming through massive schools of small fish as they swirl around in unison, massive whales and sharks, lobsters and the like scurrying around the sea floor, it all feels alive in a way I’m not really used to seeing in games. The sense of scale becomes even more apparent when utilizing the game’s meditation mode, which swaps the third-person perspective for a first-person view, allowing you to really get a good look at the beauty in the world that Giant Squid has crafted.
While I didn’t really use meditation mode much in my initial playthrough of Abzu, I’ve since gone back numerous time and just explored in first person, looking at fish and flora as a means to just zone out and relax to the game’s ambient soundtrack.
I mentioned earlier that the game tries not to hand hold you too much and instead gently nudges you in the right direction in its general theme of minimalism, but there are definitely times that approach doesn’t work in its favor. There are numerous points in the game’s narrative that major points feel like they just happen completely independent of player actions, making things like the game’s emotional climax feel like a wash, as I felt like I had no agency. While I would have much preferred a bit more in that regard, I do respect the specific minimalist design choices that led to that particular shortcoming.
Abzu is a beautiful, zen-like experience that is definitely worth taking two or three hours out of your day to explore its depths. While not without it’s share of surprises, it still manages to be an pleasant and relaxing experience.
This review is based on a retail PSN code sent to SideQuesting by the publisher
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