Hi Fi Rush Review

I was planning to play this game for some time, I was originally going to play it on PC but I waited since there was going to be a PS5 version instead and I'm glad I did since I prefer to play on console than PC. Hi Fi Rush is now on a console I actually own. That said, I was also hesistant on playing the game since it was apparently a "rhythm game" of sorts and those aren't really my thing, I am willing to tolerate them in some random mini game to break up the pace or if a game feels like a loose inspiration of them like the free flow combat in the Arkham games or the platforming in Prince of Persia but generally speaking, I would never go out of my way for a genre like this.

With all that said, I enjoyed the game, but like many character action games, I only got a causal enjoyment from it. I like the combat in the moment but so much of the advanced combos and tactics I really don't care for.

The timing hits on the beat to get higher damage I am not sure is a gimmick or you actually need to do, it "felt" like I was timing my hits to the beat, but at the same time, for the timing rank I never scored very high, I was at the same time also getting an S rank during moment to moment combat and I was clearing combat encounters at a quick rate, I wanted to try on very hard on mode to see if it was just a fluke or I was actually that skilled but this leads to a big issue that prevented me from doing so despite very hard appearing to be forgiving, and that is the parry system.

I didn't even know the game had a heavy emphasis on parrying and my big issue is that the timing just feels way too strict and it almost feels like a rhythm game on hard mode where the circle to time the parry only pops up once and the rest of the parry prompts felt like I had to be very good at spotting the animation frame on when to parry. The Koriesca boss was a nightmare because of this or any enemy where parrying was a requirement to defeat them was. I just couldn't get the rhythm down and it felt like a completely different game every time it was there, the moment to moment fighting felt like I could just be decent at this style of game to succeed where anything with parrying felt like I had to be geniunely good.

I think there is a reason why I have seen a Reddit thread complaining about it and how the devs would later on patch in an accessiblity option where the parry window was super forgiving, unfortunately this option is only on normal so I just gave on very hard and played on normal. I did wish the game did a better job at being a more consistent, "rhythm games for people who don't play the genre" overall.

The style system apparently has your attacks be stronger and encounrages your meter to reach S at all times, but the only issue is that it's too easy to be at S rank at all times so it's hard to notice a geniune difference.

Other than that since I played on normal, the game is perfectly adequate for someone who gets casual enjoyment from the genre, I like how the support characters is something the game actually made me use like Peppermint for blue shields and Macaron for green armor, the game taught to me in a way where I started to use them actively and it felt like an extension of my moveset rather than never using them at all so good job to the game there.

I like how the game does a good job at almost never needing to use recovery items instead the game will reward you with health depending on how well you are doing which is something I like since it never feels like I need to look at my health and then retreat and look into a menu then activate the item, I like how it kept me in the action at all times.

The platforming at first felt a little obnoxious in how basic it was but later in the game, it did start to throw some more complex time challenges especially when Koresica joins your team where you have to use her special ability to activate a generator and then have a limited number of time to make to the end of a a platforming gaunlet. It does have the Platinum games problem of not doing much inbetween the major arena fights where it's just, "here's a platforming section, and here's arena combat" but it the platforming in this does have slightly more going on than in something like Bayonetta does especially later on.

The bosses are solid and enjoyable they aren't super great but they do a good enough job at filling in that larger than life action sequence in between group fights, the mid boss checkpoints did remove some frustration especially the fights later in the game.

The voice acting is pretty good and the story is serviceable, Chai is a little obnoxious at first but he gets slightly more tolerable as the game goes on. The character interactions overall are entertaining enough, nothing that is going revolutionize anything but it gets the job done.

Overall, I was expecting to get some casual enjoyment out of Hi Fi Rush and I got just that, I don't think it's a masterpiece but it's decent enough.