South of Midnight Review: best music score of the year

Although prophets have been predicting the doom of medium-budget games for a good decade, they have survived the worst. As the industry appeared to split into two extremes - massive blockbusters and indie games made with modest budgets. Titles like the first Hellblade, A Plague Tale: Requiem, Life is Strange, Kena: Bridge of Spirits, and Sifu proved that there is still space for something in between.

Today the situation has reversed. Pumping up the costs of the biggest titles all the time has led to the biggest crisis in the industry in years. It's also becoming increasingly difficult for independent game devs to attract attention on crowded shelves, which are sagging under the weight of daily releases. In these challenging times, it is the mid-budget games - not overly costly to make, yet with enough funding to gain attention - that appear to be the solution to the current problems in gaming.

That's exactly what South of Midnight is - a pure mid-budget game that doesn't even try to challenge the biggest launches of the first half of the year, but has enough character and charm to provide about ten hours of decent fun.

Deep south after midnight

In the newest game from Compulsion Games studio (creators of We Happy Few and Contrast), we are taken to the deep south of the United States. Here we meet Hazel - a teenager whose home, along with her mother inside, is swept away by a raging, stormy river. In an attempt to save her mother, Hazel unlocks the Weaver's powers, allowing her to repair the world where it's flawed and heal human souls. Equipped with newly discovered abilities, a teenager embarks on an extraordinary journey during which she uncovers the secrets of her family and her own destiny.

If the description above struck you as a cliché from yet another young adult fantasy novel, then your association is quite accurate. The plot of South of Midnight sticks to safe genre frames and flows in a predictable direction. At the beginning, Hazel is a bit unpleasant—not to the extent that we wouldn't like her, but enough for her to recognize her mistakes and experience an internal transformation as the story progresses. As a Weaver, she encounters characters with deep problems, which she heals with her magical powers, and no long-term trauma scares her off. We are accompanied by a magical companion, who is a bit funny, a bit cheeky, but always ready to give good advice. Everything is executed good, but we've encountered this story a million times before - most recently in Kena: Bridge of Spirits, which was quite similar in scale and concept to South of Midnight.

The game's setting helps lift it out of the cliché trap. The devs took inspiration from the myths and legends of the Deep South, designing a variety of extraordinary creatures and setting the framework of the game's world. This is interesting, because while the Louisiana swamps often appear in pop culture, they rarely are something more than just a background. In South of Midnight, we have the opportunity to learn about the beliefs of the Cajuns and other locals. The problem is that all this extremely interesting lore is strongly pushed aside. As I played, it seemed to me that the developers were somewhat afraid of their own setting, choosing to hide it in an optional codex accessed from the main menu, while focusing on Hazel's family issues and the journey of becoming the chosen one.

The details in the codex are rather poor, typically confined to just one or two sentences per topic, and they didn't completely meet my expectations. I really felt the absence of at least a highlight on which aspects of this world's cosmology are truly derived from myths and legends, and which parts were created by the developers. The game piques interest in the topic but doesn't fulfill it, so if we want to learn more, we must look up information online.

Life is a fight to be won

Regarding the gameplay, South of Midnight brings to mind the simpler PS2 era, when action-adventure games focused more on providing players with engaging adventures and dynamic action rather than extending playtime to absurd lengths with countless collectibles and open worlds filled with unnecessary content. The game's chapters are completed quickly, regularly mixing fairly linear exploration, combat, and platform escape sequences.

All of these elements were made in line with genre standards, without big deviations towards something that either failed or exceeded expectations. What I liked most was the exploration, as it was nicely compressed - the levels are linear, and when we get more freedom, it's controlled and boils down to deciding the sequence of a few objectives before going forward. There are no side quests, mini-games, or other nonsense that don't respect the player's time. When exploring less obvious paths, we can at most gather extra Floofs for skill upgrades - but since they are not that useful, there is absolutely no need to lick the walls to constantly develop Hazel.

Hazel is equipped with an extensive set of movements inspired by other games to aid in navigation - from wall running and double jumping to levitation and temporarily recreating past objects (such as using a collapsed bridge). A genre standard, but well done - the character responds very smoothly to our actions, jumps where we want, and generally moving around the game world is usually a pleasure. Sometimes, some bugs stop certain sequences from triggering, requiring a game reset to fix the issue - luckily, this wasn't a frequent problem in the pre-release version, so I hope a few patches will resolve this inconvenience.

Refined controls are especially important in escape sequences, where players must use all their skills to swiftly move around the obstacle course. In many games, these sections become a nightmare due to control issues, but here, they are quite enjoyable.

The weakest element of the gameplay is the combat, which fortunately doesn't mean that it is very bad. No, it just sticks to one pattern all the time and because of that it quickly becomes dull. Each time, we go through the same scenario - we step into a flat, closed arena, defeat a few different enemies, and... that's all. The types of opponents change from time to time, but the general rules remain exactly the same. It doesn't help that even though we have access to what seems like a wide variety of special attacks (which can be further upgraded with the mentioned Floofs), only a small portion of them is actually useful. Most of the time, we just hammer away with standard attacks and dodge, over and over, until we get bored. And this happens quite quickly.

Boss fights offer a break from this pattern, requiring us to understand opponent behavior and tailor our strategy accordingly. They are also often divided into phases, between which we have short platform sequences. It's a nice change, although, as with other aspects of the game, there's nothing here that we haven't seen before. I should also note that in the review version, the first fight was bugged; I had to restart it twice to complete it.

Best swamp on this side of Louisiana

A clichéd storyline, well-executed but lackluster gameplay - I likely haven't portrayed South of Midnight in a particularly positive light so far. Fortunately, there is one aspect in which Compulsion Games' title absolutely delights - the audiovisual setting.

In no other game have I seen such beautiful, colorful, diverse, and lively swamps. Each level shows the various ways a seemingly uniform biome can appear. The story begins in regions typical of Louisiana's pop culture depiction, and as it unfolds, we also explore dark forests, flooded fields, scenic passes, and the wreck of a large cruise ship. Regardless of where we are, we are always accompanied by a rich fauna. At every step, we can feel that we are in the heart of a living ecosystem, filled with birds, crocodiles, foxes, chickens, pigs, or even cows on the roofs. Against the backdrop of how much life there is in South of Midnight, other games seem downright sterile.

This whole remarkable world features a distinctive, cartoon-like visual style, further enhanced by stop-motion animation. It adds a unique flair to the game, though I must complain a bit that the developers likely got spooked by the first reactions to this idea, resulting in it being toned down compared to the early pre-release materials. While the magical creatures still clearly exhibit "tearing" in their animation, the movements of Hazel and ordinary animals are nearly natural. It's a pity, I wish there was more of this effect, a lot more.

However, the soundtrack is PHE-NO-ME-NAL. During the key plot moments, songs accompany us, with lyrics that directly relate to the events on screen, the characters we encounter, their traumas, and emotions. Most of these tunes are absolute bangers that will probably be your companions long after the fun is over. The background music works perfectly, never allowing itself to be relegated to the role of an unnoticed addition.

Somewhere in between the south and midnight

The aesthetics strongly elevate South of Midnight, which, if not for the phenomenal musical layer and impressive graphics, would probably get lost in the crowd of "just OK" games. However, it's worth giving Hazel's adventures a chance, especially if you liked Kena and miss simpler action-adventure titles from the old days. Fortunately, you're not risking much - the game comes at a reasonable price, and you can also find it in Game Pass. For the sake of the setting - give it a go.