Adventure Corner ~ Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy

Welcome to Adventure Corner, a column where members of the RPGamer staff can give their thoughts, impressions, and pseudo-reviews for various adventure titles that don’t fall under our usual coverage. Adventure Corner is aimed at delivering opinions on a wide range of titles, including visual novels, point-and-click adventures, investigative mysteries, and so forth.

In this edition of the column, we look at Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy on PlayStation 5, an action-adventure title centered on a 14th-century pirate’s expedition into the ruins of Minoan civilization.

Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy

In my early college years, I majored in archaeology for quite a while, and no civilization fascinated me more than the Minoans. As Europe’s first civilization and one of the world’s foremost, the Minoans are known for their labyrinthine monumental architecture, vibrant frescoes, and technological prescience. They’re also known for being quite mysterious; their early written language, Linear A, remains entirely undeciphered, and much of Minoan civilizational structure remains obscure. Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy takes advantage of that ambiguity, and crafts its own superbly interesting spin on Minoan mythos. Bolstered by astonishingly grandiose and authentic presentation and smart, tight character writing, Resonance firmly establishes itself as an outstanding action-adventure title and a smart prequel to the Plague Tale series.

Set in the early 14th century, Resonance follows Sophia, a young girl in a convent of Catholic nuns. At the convent, the nuns inject her with a mysterious substance, causing her to have strange visions, most of which center around a Greek warrior, a door, and a far-off island. The nuns force her to keep a book with drawings of her visions until, eventually, her father, Alec, and his gang of bandits come to rescue her. Adopting her into the tight-knit gang of smugglers and thieves, Alec promises to investigate the origins of Sophia’s visions, as does his trusty right-hand lieutenant, Faro, and their repeated expeditions gradually lead them closer to the island, though tragedy and loss follow with each journey.

Years later and having grown into a confident, capable fighter, Sophia is finally allowed to set off on an expedition with the gang – a mission in Venice to steal a key needed to traverse deep into the very island Sophia has been hallucinating about. However, the mission goes horribly awry due to a traitorous betrayal. After much chaos, but managing to secure the key, Sophia is left to escape with her closest gang friend, a redheaded thief named Leni, and together they set out to the isle of Crete to investigate the source of her visions and, while they’re at it, maybe plunder some treasure too. Together, they set off deep into the island’s labyrinth of the long-ruined Minoan civilization, uncovering otherworldly and often dark secrets.

Sophia and Leni overlook a ruined Minoan temple.

Resonance quickly and firmly establishes Sophia’s motivations and the emotional stakes of her journey. Her odyssey to Crete is a personal journey to quell and understand the visions that haunt her, but also to navigate the deep personal tragedy her gang’s expeditions have wrought. Much praise must be given to Anna Demetriou, Sophia’s voice actress and motion capture performer, as she navigates the role with aplomb, nuance, and a growing sense of exhaustion and genuine humanity as she’s pursued by the Venetian army, spurned members of the gang who think she’s the traitor, and more otherworldly threats below. Her interactions with Leni are entertaining and organic, and their dynamic truly feels like the concentrated epitome of the idiom “thick as thieves.”

Beyond its characters, Resonance’s setting is just jaw-dropping, both in its scope and detail. From the minute Sophia and Leni land on Crete, the island immediately entrances with its white-sand beaches, sun-bleached cliffs, and overgrown ruins. Long-abandoned, half-buried structures offer colorful glimpses of a once-vivacious civilization, with faded but still vibrant frescoes adorning the interior walls of crumbling buildings. As players delve deeper into the labyrinthine rubble of Minoa, Resonance occasionally flashes back to the very warrior of Sophia’s visions, with glimpses of a gladiatorial escapade and Minoan civilization at its peak, with some bombastic scope and magical visuals as the plot more frequently delves into the lore of King Minos and his mythical architect Daedalus.

Gameplay progression in Resonance is accomplished primarily through puzzle-solving. To aid in her tunneling down through the Minoan ruins, Sophia makes use of her childhood journal – which her father, Faro, and others have added to from previous expeditions – and the spherical key she and Leni managed to steal away in Venice. Most of the puzzles aren’t particularly difficult, but they are always engaging and thoughtful, with most centered around redirecting light with mirrors and deciphering associated Minoan symbols. If there’s one refreshing aspect of Resonance, it’s that it respects the player’s intelligence. Neither Sophia nor Leni will blurt out a puzzle’s solution or hints, leaving the player in quiet solitude and avoiding one of the more annoying tendencies in some modern games.

Sophia uses the Minoan sphere’s light to solve a puzzle.

The puzzles are particularly effective in two ways: first, in how well they flesh out the island’s mythos and culture. The symbols on the island are genuine Linear A symbols, and the puzzles often center on grandiose, impossible architectural contraptions that, while obviously embellishing the monumental and technological achievements of Minoan architecture, remain culturally authentic and awe-inspiring. In one memorable area, a behemoth golden bull and its gargantuan hands and horns rose from a cavernous abyss after solving a puzzle involving mirrors and Linear A glyphs, evoking the infamous story of the labyrinth used to trap the Minotaur.

Second, the puzzles gradually reveal the mystery behind Sophia’s visions and serve as an effective, steady mechanism for shifting the game’s narrative tone. While there’s always a looming threat behind Sophia and the game opens on a very ominous note regarding Sophia’s visions, the initial foray into Crete feels bright, sunny, and almost paradisaically adventurous; Sophia and Leni imagine naming their ship together once they cash in the looted island’s booty. But as players travel further into the abyss and solve more puzzles, Minoa’s dilapidated splendor gradually gives way to unease. Sophia’s visions become more frequent, menacing, and ill-timed. Eventually, the game descends into outright terror, and solving puzzles begins to feel more anxiety-inducing and survival-based, which does wonders at amplifying Resonance’s stakes.

Unlike its predecessors and sequels, Innocence and Requiem, Resonance is distinctly more action-focused. Combat sections do wonders for the game’s stakes, and fights feel fluid, fast, and fair. Wielding a sword, Sophia can block, dodge, parry, and execute critical strikes. She can also kick to break an enemy’s defensive stance, and has access to a grappling hook, which, aside from aiding in environmental exploration and traversal, allows her to pull enemies closer or break their stance. While most attacks can be blocked, enemies will occasionally mix it up with yellow-colored strikes, which must be parried, or red strikes, which must be dodged.

Resonance‘s skill tree.

Parrying is the most important aspect, as parrying regular attacks gradually fills a stagger bar (parrying a yellow strike does so instantly) that, once full, opens the enemy up for a critical strike. On the Normal difficulty, Sophia is only able to take three hits, although her life bar will refill by one segment for each enemy killed. For RPGamers who are wary of the increasing prevalence of parrying in action RPGs or action games generally, they need not worry – Resonance is not Sekiro, and the parries require nowhere near perfect timing, with enemy patterns being easy to read and react to. Overall, combat is simple but engaging; Sophia moves with blistering speed, and the game adequately encourages aggressiveness.

Along her journey, Sophia can find numerous charms and pieces of jewelry, along with Resonance Points, which allow her to upgrade her skills and combat proficiencies. Red attacks can eventually be parried, enemies can be grabbed and launched, and so on. This keeps combat from feeling stagnant, increasing its speed and fluidity, and giving players new abilities to try while also illustrating Sophia as a deadly, swashbuckling pirate. Resonance Points can be reallocated at any time, letting players adapt their playstyle and focus on the element of combat that works best for them, making the game feel very accessible.

Later in the game, the gameplay evolves and evokes its brethren a bit more, shifting focus to stealth rather than combat. Without spoiling a major twist, deep in the subterranean depths, Sophia must evade a truly menacing threat with mechanics centered on airflow and light, weaving in the game’s themes already established in the puzzles quite well. These sections are just as absorbing as they are tense, with the level design doing wonders, and when they break out into chase sequences, it’s absolutely exhilarating. These sequences are long enough to build tension, but short enough to keep the pacing brisk and satisfying, and all are punctuated by the game’s sound design.

A flashback shows Minoan civilization at its height, in all its colorful glory.

A full evaluation of Resonance would be incomplete without praising its striking score by Olivier Derivière, which elevates the entire experience through its cultural authenticity and sheer quality. The score centers on a distinct Mediterranean sound, punctuated by eclectic instrumental choices. The game’s combat sequences and gladiatorial flashbacks make imposing use of the carnyx, a Celtic war trumpet, and the traversal segments employ Mediterranean lutes like the yaylı tambur and bouzouki to great effect. The vocal performances utilize a Greek Cypriot dialect that also does wonders for immersing players in the setting and illustrating the game’s themes – hearing an ominous thanatos in the choral chant builds serious apprehension. As a final note, the ambient music during the game’s stealth chase sequences is thoroughly unsettling, with some impressive dynamic flourishes when enemies notice players.

All in all, this is a wonderful action-adventure game that deftly balances all the elements that make the genre great. It clearly has many influences, Uncharted and Tomb Raider among the most prominent, but it never feels derivative and stands on its own as one of the best and most exceptional that I’ve played in many, many years. Sophia is a nuanced, fascinating lead, and the game’s presentation of Crete is authentic, special, and remarkable, as is its tonal descent into unsettling terror. When paired with the game’s breakneck, forceful combat, thoughtful puzzle and level design, and very reasonable fifteen-to-twenty-hour length, Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy is a well-paced, infectiously endearing, and astonishingly crafted adventure that is sure to leave its mark on the genre.

Disclosure: This article is based on a free copy of the game provided by the publisher.