3/5 ★ – shaww's review of Ghostrunner.

6/10 ; PS5 ; 2 - 5 - 22 SPOILERS I don’t think Ghostrunner knows what it wants to be. The core gameplay is fast paced, requires the player to map out a good route to kill enemies and prioritize targets. It is a very tight and precise game here. During platforming, it mostly relies on reflexes and how fast you can judge an oncoming platform. During cybervoid sections, the pacing slows completely down and becomes a drag to play. Puzzles are often unnecessarily lengthy and involve trial and error. It’s the opposite of what makes puzzles fun. A certain cybervoid level is barely functional and is one of the worst platforming sections I have had to endure in any video game I’ve played. Really, just one of the worst sections of ANY game I’ve played. The story is not exciting, which does not match the core gameplay which is really fun and energetic. This completely throws off the overall feeling. You’ll go from slashing a bad guy in half after doing a grapple hook, to suffering from voice acting and writing that is genuinely worth an execution. Seriously, who wrote this? It completely throws off the overall tone and feeling. To talk about the story a little more, the whole game is waiting for The Architect to be revealed as a twist villain. Jesus Christ, this was painfully obvious. Zoe’s character was also “built up” (poorly) and ended up amounting to absolutely nothing. Seriously, she had no effect on the story at all and genuinely served no purpose. She just left randomly towards the end, The bosses also throw off the tone and feeling. 2 out of three are jump rope simulators while the other is practically only parrying. I wish the game took more advantage of the fast and strategic combat from the rest of the game and implemented it into the bosses.Core gameplay needs the player to be fast and strategic. Bosses need the player to… have good timing with your jumps. It feels underwhelming going from such fast action to slow and tedious gameplay. Take advantage of how cool your character is! Don’t just have him jump rope and block attacks. Not to mention that the beginning of the game is a complete slow mess. For the first 1/3, the game did not properly ease me in to this kind of slow and strategic play style, which caused frustration. Also, the game does not take advantage of the awesome moves you can pull of (as in controlling an enemies mind, auto killing someone, explosion hand, electric wave thingy, etc.) These moves are awesome but we’re rarely ever used by me. Maybe that’s my fault, though. ALSO, there is no atmosphere. I don’t know how that’s possible when you are a lighting fast ninja running and zipping through a mysterious and abandoned cyberpunk city. This is the coolest concept ever. And it does nothing interesting with it. Because of this, I had no motivation to explore. So, the game is: Fast (paced and strategic) + (energetic platforming) = fun. Sounds good, right? Now add on the rest. fun + (cybervoid puzzles) + (horrible story and voice acting) + (rushed bosses) + (a slow first 1/3) + (a character that is nice to use, but is very sticky and feels like he wasn’t playtested) + (overall pacing issues) = disappointment. Ghostrunner, decide what you are! Are you fast paced and strategic? Or are you slow and frustrating? I hope that the sequel is able to understand what it truly is and deliver something much more polished. (I know I just yelled at the game for a while, but I enjoyed my overall time with this game. The core gameplay is fun, it just has a lot of downtime. Don’t let this review discourage you from purchasing the game.) 6/10 Thank you for reading.