Hell is Us – Demons of Boredom [Early (Final) Thoughts]

This is not a full review of Hell is Us, since I haven’t completed the game, but I felt I had to give my opinion on what I have played so far. Now, when I tried the demo, I got impressed, despite the large sword-anime antics, which is something I’m allergic to for the most part. Even so, the story felt mysterious, and the world, while being fairly large with plenty of areas to seek out, still felt tightly designed with an enjoyable dungeon to tackle at your own pace. I thought the full game would follow this premise, but so far, that’s not so.

Open fields of boredom
Instead, we get what we see at the end of the demo, a swampy field, with endless samey creatures to kill. Demons that you can see a mile away. This kills any tension of wandering about, which quickly turns into a “must I”, in contrast to actually wanting to take part of it. The creatures you fight also repeat a lot, despite having different abilities from each other. There are no tactics required here, especially when you get to upgrade your sword with special features. One of the things I got was healing, that had me healing myself after every fight, as long as I got “sword-energy”. Any fear of the battles: right out the window it goes.

So, we have a flat boring semi open-world, with almost identical monsters that become very easy to dispatch, but hold on, that’s not all. It’s also incredibly static. NPCs don’t move around, and in general there is no life to the areas you explore. The only thing moving out there are the creatures, and a world that honestly felt a little too gamey and overly designed to feel “real”, immersion wise. You know the deal, waist-high rocks that our protagonist with a hidden hip-issue can’t climb, or a small river that instantly drowns you. Or why not a flimsy door that a child could easily break through, but just must be unlocked with a key that you will probably find in some obscure well surrounded by demons.

The end (for me)
What sent me over the edge was when I finished the main narrative quest in the second location, which had me unlocking access to a new area with the APC. So, I jumped into the armored vehicle, and “drove” to the new place. And I was met with… another area of rolling hills and a dead landscape dotted with white demons just roaming about, like they were trapped inside a MMO.

Oh lord, I just couldn’t take it. I don’t mind the occasional grind, but the genre must fit the game, and at this point Hell is Us already feels a bit schizophrenic. Is it a Dark Souls copy? An action adventure game? A deep thematic story based on humans causing atrocities to each other in the name of some cause? I don’t know, like nothing fits and feels tonally off, with nothing coming off as truly immersive. Even when the devs went all out on that aspect, by cutting mini-maps, and quest markers. I give them probs for that, at least!

Potential
There was potential, as the demo, which is the introductory part of the game, was great, and truly set the atmosphere. It’s just a shame Hell is Us couldn’t keep this up, having it stumble out into a swamp dying to infinite demons spawned out of a yawn. The narrative becomes a tad predictable as well, and this is something you might sense in the introduction as well—and well, your intuition is probably correct if you feel it. It leads to what you think, which to me consists of the typical nihilistic stuff: humanity = bad. 

That’s my take on what I have played. It’s far from something that will entice me to play again, so I will leave it at that. I was hoping for more, or at least something cohesive, mysterious and fun that didn’t feel like an empty sermon about the morals of humanity. Yes, war is bad (in general). 

Thanks for reading.

– Thomas