Remember Me Review

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Imagine Assassins Creed had a wall climbing, futuristic baby with Deus Ex and you have a pretty good idea of the brand new IP Remember Me from DONTNOD Entertainment and Capcom. But with such prestigious names to draw influence from, does Remember Me live up to all the hype? Well, the game has a plethora of ambition and creative ideas to go with some interesting choices by the developer in relation to how the game is actually played. Do these ideas pay off? Or do the many pieces of the game just seem unable to fit together?

The game is set 2084 in a futuristic Paris which is now known as Neo-Paris. A company called Memorize has invented a brain implant called the Sensen, which allows the population to upload and share their memories over the web as well as get rid of bad memories. This gives Memorize a huge amount of control over everyone and enables them to establish a surveillance state. There are those who oppose Memorize and seek to bring them down. They are called “Errorists”. You play as Nilin, a former Errorist who has the ability to steal and remix people’s memories. She has had her memory wiped and cannot remember anything but with the help of the Errorists she is promised to regain her memory in exchange for helping them take down Memorize. A promising premise no doubt, but does the rest of the game share that promise?

First of all, let us discuss the most important thing, gameplay.Does this futuristic action-adventure game based around scaling walls and hand to hand combat handle well? Well it does and it doesn’t. The combat system of the game has its flaws but gets much better as the story progresses. It is unique because you can almost customize your combos, however, the combos you are given are very limited which makes combat a little dull at the start of the game. You only start off with one combo but progressively earn more as the game goes on but before you learn more combos the combat is very repetitive. You will be fighting against a bevy of enemies that vary greatly as your arsenal of moves and weapons grows. The enemies range from human to mutant and all the way to robots which allows for later battles in the game to feel much more unique than those of the first few chapters. If the combat really bothers you, push through to about the 2 hour mark of the game and your opinion should definitely change as you acquire guns and many more combos. You can fill these combos with Pressens. Pressens are essentially effects you can apply to different buttons within the combo. For example, if you were to have an X-Y-Y-X combo, you could apply a Pressen to the first Y of the combo and that Pressen will give you health if you complete that far into the combo. Other Pressens include power, which gives your strike more damage, a duration Pressen, which decreases the cooldown time of your special moves which allow you to perform powerful attacks to incapacitate large groups of enemies at one time, as well as a Pressen which increases the power of the previous Pressen in the combo. This allows you to customize your moves to have different effects on you as well as the battle but the lack of actual varied combos and repetitiveness definitely takes away from this unique combat system.

Does the climbing system also stand out? Sadly no, the climbing system is very generic and doesn’t stand out from any other game. The paths you climb are also all completely linear. You are not given the traditional climbing style of climbing however you want and being able to climb just about anything. Instead you are limited to whatever paths will progress you forward in the game. This takes away from what this style of transportation is meant for, exploration. If you were able to explore the various areas of Neo-Paris then you’d be able to see so much more of its lovely environments and that would definitely add to the experience that is Remember Me.

The overall look of the game has a lot of strengths. Neo-Paris looks absolutely stunning and every single place you visit within the game fits the mood of the level and the feel of the game. It really convinces you that this is indeed a futuristic France and makes you want to explore the city but that is something that the game doesn’t really allow you to do. The game is surprisingly linear considering its incredible environments and how your main mode of transportation throughout the city is you scaling the walls of buildings. There are multiple sections that cut you off from certain areas and you are forced to proceed towards your objective, this linearity takes away from what could have been a lovely exploration experience. The graphics as far as the characters is considerably average, Nilin is definitely the best looking character which should always be the case but other characters just seem kind of rushed and almost not human with how their skin is incredibly shiny and almost leathery but there was definitely some thought put into the various characters and their designs you meet throughout the game. Every character, whether it be a villain or an ally attempts to be very original and have a very distinct and unique personality to them but a lot of it just seemed to be lost in translation. The score is something to behold. It manages to blend orchestral music with a futuristic feel to it to create something lovely to listen to. Each track is of outstanding quality and absolutely drives home the feel of every scene, whether it be Nilin fighting off a large pack of enemies or when experiencing an emotional twist in the story.

The game has an insane amount of ambition and creativity thrust into it but with so much desire to create something out of this world, certain things were just clearly missed and poorly done. The game delves deep into the morality of the idea of storing and sharing memories as well as the ability to change them. This can be used to turn any tragic memory into one of happiness or vice versa. This is showcased through the various “Memory Remix” portions of the game. This is where you enter someone’s memory and alter a specific event in order to sway a person to do what you wish. These scenes are typically full of emotion and as you’re doing them you feel awful about it. If the scene is not packed with emotion then they usually reveal huge twists to the plot that will leave you with your mouth wide open in shock. These sequences are incredibly creative and interesting because you have the power to change little things about a memory yet completely change the outcome.

These remixes and plot twists stand out among a poorly paced and very random story. You will find yourself fighting random bosses that come out of nowhere and have no real context within the story. They are very out of place other than a few. There are even moments within the story where you think the game is done but the game then throws another chapter at you. This happened to me personally about 3 times. It’s not that I wanted the story to be over it’s just that it just seemed to be such a pivotal moment in the story that they technically could end it right there but they throw an even more colossal story moment at you the next chapter. It allows them to tie up any loose end. Although the 6-8 hour story does have some distinct lows there are just too many incredible moments that you have to experience for yourself.