Ghostrunner is a game about the joy of movement, and I love how it never loses sight of that. You’re a cyborg ninja and your weapons are speed and agility; everything you do, and everything the game throws at you, revolves around it. There are many enemies and boss encounters and special abilities, but they all centre on the fundamental idea of momentum.
Ghostrunner reviewDeveloper: One More Level (primarily), with help from Spligate and 3D Realms Publisher: All in! Games and 505 GamesPlatform: Played on PCAvailability: Out today (27th Oct) on PC (Steam, Epic, GOG) for £20 (temporarily), and Xbox One (X/S compatible) and PlayStation 4, via their online stores, for £25. A bargain!
It’s a relief. I worried Ghostrunner would do a Mirror’s Edge and get bogged down in combat, but it doesn’t. Polish developer One More Level understood why the Ghostrunner demo worked earlier this year, and stuck with it. Do one thing and do it well.
Ghostrunner is a game about acrobatic routines, about devising them and performing them. It’s what everything boils down to. You’re an incredibly agile character who can wall-run, slide around, swing around, dash around and even slow time. But you’re also an incredibly fragile character who will die in one blow from anything. The challenge of Ghostrunner, therefore, is a kind of elegance: not getting hit while simultaneously getting close enough to hit and slice apart others.
Repetition is key. Ghostrunner is a game of trial and error. Think of it like Trials or Hotline Miami. There’s an instant restart mechanic you will use a lot. Die and press R (on PC), and you’ll be back to the beginning of your current checkpoint, usually only a few seconds away. It’s fundamental to the loop of the game. You can’t hope to overcome a new area without dying a few times while you hone your plan. Try one way, die, then try another: that’s how it goes. You’ll come to accept it and, therefore, the sting of dying goes away.
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But not entirely. Ghostrunner is a hard game. It’s a game of dexterity and one you could probably look very impressive playing if a friend were to watch. But it takes practice. Playing it reminded me of learning a musical instrument, checkpointed areas like passages of music, the micro-moments of them like bars.