Severed Steel | PS4 Review

Fast, frantic, and flashy is this futuristic parkour focused FPS known as "Severed Steel". A fight full of female empowerment shown through a handicapped protagonist who awakes in a secret facility with one arm severed. Hurt, and hot tempered this leading lady aims for all out revenge as she takes on a whole army of soldiers that are hellbent on stopping her from sabotaging company efforts, and killing those that wronged her. While her story is minimalist in nature, and shown only through brief and periodic story panels the objective is clear. Destroy targets, clean house, and make your anger known. Using one hand for guns, and the other for a prototype arm cannon you set out to hand out a dish that's best served cold, vengeance.

Revenge in "Severed Steel" is dished out in two modes of play. Campaign, and Firefight. In campaign our vindictive heroine without a name, and one arm lame goes through the infrastructure of a secretive compound. It is here that you complete objectives that range from destroying mechanical targets, to exiting as fast as you can against a timer countdown, or clearing the room of soldiers of varying types. At your disposal is whatever guns you can get your hands on, and a set of basic parkour skills. Skills that include wall climbing, sliding, wall running, and diving. That and a slowdown mechanic that is handy in a multiple gunman firefight. Assessing the room, and taking out threats before moving on is the key to success as your life will end in a fair few shots if not careful. In accordance to challenge the difficulty levels are several in number, and appropriately named after steel themes. Difficulties that include severed steel, molten steel, etc., ... Each with their own handicaps, and buffs dependent on how high the difficult is set. Effectively changing gun play, life longevity, and the damage from enemies. Action, as it were, plays out by chapters wherein once the goal is met, and the exit entered you move forward.

As a tacked on side mode "Firefight" aims to up the ante with score based, and timer based chapter playthroughs. Single episode firefights where the weapon, arm cannon, and mutators are set to the players liking. The endgame being static for each chapter, and including such tasks as getting so many headshots, or clearing the chapter within set parameters, among other things. With the mutators you'll get game changing effects like a monk's rage mode where all you can do is throw guns at enemies. That or the meme-like mutator, "The floor is lava" wherein the floor will kill you as if it were lava. Needless to say there are a lot of really cool mutators that both effect gameplay, and change the effects or looks of it all. All in all it's a fun filled after campaign challenge for bragging rights. 

When it comes to settings you can adjust so many different toggles for accessibility allowing you to tailor the experience just for you. Some of these settings allow for advantageous gaming cheats that will help with the somewhat difficult difficulty spike. Making the parkour elements, and gunplay flow more naturally, and unhindered by normal play settings where things are a lot more manual in nature. You can set the platforming to auto-stop you before a pitfall, and even alter visual effects such as screen shaking, and flash to make it less abusive on the eyes. Things like colors for enemies will also aid in helping you better spot targets. It's the kind of quality of life tweaks that really cater to the individual.

The Verdict ...

Starting this game in campaign I was immediately taken aback by how the hands-on tutorial was handled. It kind of gave me an initial bad impression of gameplay, but once I got in and actually started playing I found the game was a lot more lenient when it came to how you approached chapter completion. Finding out that it wasn't a set in stone linear kind of ordeal where it's the developer's way or the highway made the experience more enjoyable. I particularly liked how badass the parkour, and gunplay elements made me feel. It was like a proper power trip, especially in instances where I kicked in slow-mo mode to hit multiple targets. 

Between the campaign and firefight I found plenty of experiences heightened by decently applied mechanics. Though I honestly had trouble with the parkour at times the game still drew me in with the satisfactory carnage dealt by precision gunplay. The enemy soldiers screaming out expletives in agony as I blasted them six ways from Sunday really sealed the deal quite nicely. It really delivered on the revenge plot, and made me feel like I was exacting vengeance on a whole army of people. It was a delectable power trip at it's most satisfying. I do realize not everyone is gonna catch on right off the bat, but once it clicks it's fun. As such it does earn a recommendation from yours truly!