Metroidvanias have slowly become my favourite genre of late. Since starting my journey with Hollow Knight a couple of years ago, I’ve dived headfirst into several other Metroidvania titles. These include Celeste, Ori and the Blind Forest, and most recently Biomorph. Each has their own distinct style and has worked on varying degrees of success with their stories. After all, at least in my opinion, all Metroidvanias are basically the same. The difference is usually the narrative and how deep each game gets. What themes will they tackle within their worlds? This brings me to today’s review, Possessor(s).
Possessor(s) follows Luca, a young girl who lives in Sanzu City, a seemingly idyllic city. One day, the city is besieged by demons, and she loses everything. Her family, her best friend, and almost her life. Lucky for her, a dying demon decides to save her life (and his) by merging together. After taking 3 years to rebuild Luca Rhem the demon and her decide to try and get Rhem home so she can try and find her family. Along the way, Luca and Rhem will take on hard enemies and even harder truths about themselves and those they love.
Possessing spirit
As I said before, like most Metroidvanias, Possessor(s) sees you traverse a massive map defeating enemies, as well as finding items to further your progress in the story. The enemies are brilliantly designed. The idea is simple: demons can possess anything, so enemies can be anything, so enemies range from harmless foxes (unless you annoy them) to killer filing cabinets and so much more. The best designs are left to the bosses (obviously), and they are brilliant to fight. Dodging, parrying and countering is the name of the game, and if you don’t master those fundamentals, you will suffer.
Luca gets a multitude of weapons, and they range from knives to bowling balls and a semi-sentient skull. You can upgrade them to give them passive abilities, which will help you in your travels across Sanzu. I did find a problem with the fact that the game doesn’t push you hard enough to experiment, so for the entirety of the game, I had the knives (which you get at the start of the game)as my primary weapons. There are other skills to utilise and, as I said, many other weapons, but none of them gave me the sense of control the knives did, which is a shame when you have close to a dozen weapons at your disposal.
Also, the game isn’t clear about how to fully upgrade Luca and utilise the items you are given to help with that. I was at the final checkpoint before the final boss, and I kept looking at the upgrade items. I was constantly wondering do I just have them in my inventory and they automatically upgrade my health, or do I need to find myself a merchant? Turns out it was the latter, so I hightailed it to the merchant and doubled both my health and my healing items. Which means for 99% of the game, I had handicapped myself due to the lack of information the game offered. It also meant that the final boss was far easier than I was expecting.
Possessing your heart
The best part of Possessor(s), though, is its story and the characters within it. Like all Metroidvanias, it’s all about the themes and the discussion the game is having with its audience. Possessor(s) is telling a story of those toxic relationships that we really should move on from. The two characters, Luca and Rhem, realise what they are a part of, and throughout the game, they heal each other. It’s a touching narrative and shows how Metroidvanias have some of the deepest narratives within them.
Overall, if you’re looking for something fun, intense, and visually memorable, I highly recommend Possessor(s).
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