E3 2017 Impressions — A Plague Tale: Innocence

A Plague Tale: Innocence

While at E3 I was able to see A Plague Tale: Innocence in a more intimate setting than just a trailer. Here’s my take on A Plague Tale: Innocence

When you hear something like A Plague Tale: Innocence you instantly think of just an illness and maybe some innocent seeming people being affected by said illness. I know that is what I thought when I first heard about Asobo Studio‘s new title coming to the PS4, Xbox One, and PC. I won’t lie, originally this wasn’t much on my radar but Focus Home Interactive had me on over to have a look at a bit of the game here at E3 and it is a bit more that what I mentioned before. Okay, it is a lot more than just a sickness and some people who are the poor souls being afflicted by it.

In A Plague Tale: Innocence you take on the role of Amicia as she helps her brother Hugo survive through 1349 France after a massive plague of rats have swarmed and are doing all kinds of horrible rat things. Mainly just devouring humans who happen to be caught outside in the dark. To top it all off, there is an un-named Inquisition hunting them down or trying to impede their movements for some reason. It wasn’t very clear on why they were trying to stop the kids outside of needing a game mechanic and antagonist for A Plague Tale outside of the rats that swarm the streets.

A Plague Tale: Innocence is a stealth puzzle game at its core from what I was shown here at E3. It is still early in development so things were spare to see, but it was apparent that Amica needed to hide and sneak. She also needed to stay near light as that is the only thing that will keep the rats away. This is something that is also used to navigate other hazards out there as she has a sling and can shatter the lanterns of the Inquisition to force the rats to take them out, or she can set other fires to keep them at bay and walk through the danger zone that is created by the rats.

Of course, none of the light lasts long in A Plague Tale: Innocence and you need to keep moving and searching for the next objective. In the demo here it was the kids trying to find their mother who apparently wasn’t their mother. Asobo Studio said they weren’t going with any super natural elements in A Plague Tale: Innocence so there is some explaining as to why they heard the siren’s call of their mother’s voice, but I’m guessing the full game will explain all of that. It would have to I’d think as it is also linked to why there are millions of rats in this one location of France.

I will say that A Plague Tale: Innocence visually looked amazing. There was a great level of detail and the lighting was done very well. It would have to be given the focus of it all, but it was a great site to see. The level and puzzle design also looked to make sense in the parts that were shown and not something overly convoluted just because the game needed it. Like the one where you need Hugo, who is much smaller, to crawl through a fence to get a candle while Amica knocks down a lantern to get light to keep the swarm at bay. A Plague Tale: Innocence is off to a great start and I am interested to see how it all plays out.