The character we play is a solitary diver who seems to be quietly going about his business at the start of the game. Who is he ? Where is he ? What is he doing ? Why are there car wrecks underwater? And first of all, why is the game named after a working-class neighborhood in Osaka? We advise you to calm your ardor and temper your curiosity, because Shinsekai starts bluntly and without text explanation. The title of Capcom makes the choice of a silent narration, no dialogue nor any message (with the exception of those concerning the tutorials) coming to enlighten the player. This process has the advantage of bringing us immediately into the action and establishing a certain mystery. But honestly, we would not have been against a minimum of screenplay exposure, just to better understand the universe and the potential issues at hand. The game goes so far as to never name the various interactive elements.
Whether it's the resources to collect or the tools to use, the didactic messages are content to evoke them through icons. This gives us explanations of the type: the "small drawing A" increases your capacity in "small drawing B". Even certain elements of the decor display pictograms that could almost be described as cryptograms at times. As for the sketches that can be unlocked and which seem to tell a story, the subject is still not always very clear. Over the hours and events we still end up understanding a little better what is happening, but this feeling of swimming in the blur is not necessarily very pleasant. What we immediately grasp, however, is that the main danger comes from ice formations that invade our living space, and push us to sink deeper into the ocean. But watch out for the waters colored red, which indicate too much pressure for our diving suit! Fortunately, it is possible to improve the latter in order to dive ever lower.
DEEP THROATS
To do this, you will have to collect resources from the scenery. Some are obtained by digging in the rock, others by collecting plants, and still others by killing the local fauna. Movement on the seabed is free, a Breath of the Wild endurance gauge limits climbing on sometimes steep slopes, while the suit's thrusters allow free swimming in the water, at the cost of a drink of oxygen. It is possible to equip additional bottles, but these can break if you land a little too hard on the ground, or during fights with sea creatures. This is where the crafting system comes into play, since it allows you to make additional oxygen reserves, harpoons, hammers for repairing bottles, or even larger bags to be able to carry more objects and resources. Your headlamp is another very important gameplay element, since it reveals the presence of buried objects. On the other hand, the creatures may spot you more easily and attack you more often. We advise you all the same to keep it on as much as possible, since this will multiply your harvest of resources (those hidden in the rock, and those recovered from the corpses of the unfortunate animals who will have come to mess with you).
Metroidvania obliges, Shinsekai offers its share of bosses, secret areas to unearth, and round trips with the aim of unlocking, thanks to new abilities, previously impassable paths.
Weapons (gaff, harpoon, grappling hook, electric arc, etc.) can also be improved. Moreover, if the adventure is lived alone, you will still quite quickly cross paths with a small robotic companion who will help you recover objects and resources. Later, you will actually get your hands on a real submarine, which will allow you to evolve in larger settings, to unlock certain passages using a drill, to kill certain creatures more easily, and even to unlock a fast travel system between different areas of the map. It is possible to leave the ship at any time, by remaining attached to it using a cord which provides us with continuous oxygen but limits our movements, or by regaining all our freedom if we wish. Metroidvania obliges, Shinsekai offers its share of bosses, secret areas to unearth, and round trips with the aim of unlocking, thanks to new abilities, previously impassable paths. The pleasant feeling of progression associated with the genre of Metroidvania is here reinforced by the possibility (and the necessity) of sinking ever deeper into the ocean, over the improvements of the suit. The atmosphere is both relaxing and scary, especially if you tend to be claustrophobic. Not perfect, however, the game suffers from small animation problems. From time to time, we can see the characters "sliding" to reach a predefined position, certain fights offer too many frames of invincibility to the monsters which pass from the foreground to the hero's plane, and the swing at the end of the rope of the grapple clearly lacks flexibility. Another defect of this Shinsekai: the menus giving access to the map, the craft and various information lack shortcuts and are not always arranged in a logical way. No reason to refuse this very pleasant underwater adventure!
