Overall, Crow Country has to be one of the most atmospheric, well written, and intentionally designed games I've ever had the pleasure of playing. Just absolutely incredible. Most of the game mechanics are probably things you've probably seen before in similar games, but that is by no means a bad thing. When this game does something, it does with purpose, and it does so WELL. It doesn't try to freak you out by being meta like other modern horror games do either- it just focuses on crafting an overall unsettling atmosphere exclusively through in-game world building and scenery. Yes, it's basically just zombies in a creepy abandoned theme park, which sounds fairly generic, BUT they have so much world building, twists, and creative ideas for both story and game play that make this experience as a whole feel very unique. As always, the first half of this blog will be largely spoiler-free, but I'd still recommend picking up the game and playing it blind anyways. It's available for just $20 on most platforms (including Steam).
As with their other games, SFB Games' writing remains very strong, generally being gloomy but also having some lighter moments and even realistically embedding game mechanics into areas where they make sense. So many of the staff memos are written to give you a good idea of how the staff interacted and felt about the park while simultaneously giving very believable reasons for puzzles to exist, something which can be very difficult to do. And even though I've seen endless zombie and monster stories, the gradual reveal of the park's history had a far more powerful and sickening impact than I was expecting. In general, I don't think I've ever seen any story combine so many specific concepts so well in quite this way. Again, nothing was exactly a totally new idea, but that did not matter in the slightest with how precisely every idea and theme was utilized. Even the time period had so much thought put into it, with there even being a trivia puzzle referencing outdated facts. I'm also biased towards liking stories without cell phones. Just a little. The game had a handful of lighter moments as well, but they're dialed back enough to not feel out of place. The jokes are mostly things like "realizing this isn't a real treasure chest makes you feel cheated" instead of the same level of hilarity they've proven they could do in Tangle Tower-- but this is exclusively a good thing. There was never too much exposition, and when you go a while without any dialogue or flavor text it feels very intentional. And adding to all of this story was the music, which perfectly suits every area. A lot of it gets intermixed with ambience to indicate danger, but listening back to the soundtrack after beating it made me realize just how distinct every song is. Although I still can't hum most of the melodies on my own, hearing each track brings up such a specific memory of where it plays, especially as you approach the ending. The save room theme in particular is very memorable for just how calm it is, really letting you know that it's ok to let your guard down just for a moment.
Speaking of letting your guard down- this was some extremely effective use of using enemies to control tension. (Minor spoilers for the first 10 minutes of gameplay ahead). The buildup to the first encounter takes so long that you think there's only going to be a few scripted events, and then the second after you save you can get jumped by NEW enemies which spawned in the corridor you just cleared. I was so unprepared for this, but it was such a perfect way of communicating there's literally always going to be some kind of danger. Then, wandering back out into the main area, you find that it's now densely packed. There is no real story reason for this sudden population boom, but it works so well from every other standpoint that I can't really complain. This game then introduces a very good and unique balance of persistent enemy deaths and having reinforcements trickle in. You can easily dodge a majority of the monsters, but letting them live means they will gradually pile up or become stronger, a great tradeoff because you're can still dodge the stronger monsters with the risks of taking more damage and new attack patterns. Ultimately, this incentivizes you to clear areas without ever actually forcing you to use ammo. That's something else this game does well- resource management. You very rarely will be full on ammo or items, but you also will never really run out either- something which is especially difficult to do in a game like this where it's a finite resource. Certainly, there are a few points like vending machines and the trunk where you can resupply yourself, but only if you're almost entirely out. And I almost never needed to use either, which is the mark of good balancing. To compare this to another survival horror game, in Half Life Alyx you can really only use guns as weapons and can very easily run out, causing you to die and restart to find a more efficient way to clear enemies. That's a very different approach that can work well, but it also further proves how thoughtful everything in Crow Country is. There are still these more efficient combat paths, but you don't need them, and you shouldn't be completely out of supplies by the end of a brute force method either.
Touching on the combat a bit more, my only real issue with this game is just that enemies can get stuck on obstacles somewhat often, diminishing their threat level and slightly breaking immersion. They don't stumble or anything, they just keep walking like the game doesn't know there's a wall there, and once or twice I had one clip through a table or even through me just to get closer. It's not a deal breaker by any means, but does feel very video-gamey in a bad way.
Backing up to good game design- aside from one secret area, these are some of the best puzzles I've ever seen in pretty much any video game. So many weird set pieces stick out in your mind and several memos allude to something hours before you have access to it, creating this incredible feeling the second you find something new where you just KNOW exactly what it is and where it goes and how it works and why it exists in-universe and it really speaks to the talent of the developers and shows how much they must have play tested and refined the experience. There's even a button prompt which tells you to hold a button instead of tapping it like other interactions, which is such a tiny unnecessary thing because you would be able to figure it out after failing once, but just because they'd already anticipated that failure, it made me appreciate those segments just that little bit more. There's also this very welcome quality of life feature where all enemies will freeze when you interact with anything or open your inventory, making combat avoidance much easier. The exploration mode is also an option for just avoiding combat entirely, and though I didn't mess with it at all I'm glad they added it regardless because it reinforces that the puzzles and story are the main focus.
Really, SFB's whole catalogue just showcases how amazing these developers are at puzzle design between Snipperclips and Tangle Tower, but Crow Country's are definitely my favorites because of how things are linked together. Even though Tangle Tower had similarly non-linear hints that made things click, you still had to backtrack. Here though, the theme park is entirely interconnected. The instant you get something or realize what to do, you also open up a new short cut just 1-2 rooms from where you want to go. The layout of this feels so genuinely real barring witchwood that I can't imagine how many iterations of maps and puzzle orders they had to go through. Finding the staff hallway that opened the secret passage I spotted earlier was one of the coolest feelings ever and I had to do several double takes on the map to make sure that the two attractions actually connected like that- and they did. In this regard, it's more of a metroidvania just from how much you're able to return to areas from a new direction, and I almost never got lost or stuck trying to find out what to do next. I was also impressed by the sheer variety on display- there's a lot of unique enemies and puzzle mechanics that work just as unique thematic set pieces and then never reappear. At all.
The art is also very good. It's very simple, but well stylized and effectively communicates what everything is at a glance. There's also a lot of little details that went into it, like having the arm pivot towards the keyhole (which I realized after it went through Mara's body, oops). She even ducks when entering a low doorway, which I think only happens... once in the entire game? The theming of the park is also fun because everything makes sense as something you'd see in a real theme park, like cute animal mascots, a fairy tale area, giant fairies/mermaids/fish, then realistically double as creepy things where they cast moving shadows, hold eerily still as they're powered off, and appear far too large when you get closer than a typical theme park visitor would be able to. Especially in the realm of mascot horror, designs tend to lean towards either too cute to be scary or too scary to make sense to have been for kids in-universe, but here it just works. It helps that the mascot of this park is a crow- it's a cute bird, but it's also heavily associated with death and scavenging. I also am just now realizing Mara might be shorter than every other character which is funny because in relation to other props and monsters, she's roughly an average height so other people are just strangely tall.
Here's a few cool screenshots I took:
