Topic: What PS5 Games Are You Currently Playing?

Made it to antiquity in ‘Nioh 3’ and the basement in ‘Resident Evil Requiem.’ Off the back of the excellent ‘Reanimal’, I’m in gaming bliss at the moment.

@GirlVersusGame ‘Neva’ is outstanding, one of my favourites from last year. The surprise DLC that just dropped is a worthy addition to the experience as well. Have you played ‘Gris’?

@Metonymy I haven't but if it's anything like 'have you tried grits? I have and they are horrible, like eating tarmac from a race track. If it's the same developers then I'll probably try it. I think I'm near the end. I'm in a kind of red purgatory and it feels very final. This might be my first pure platformer, I tried DeadCells and Requiem of the Night but the pace was non-stop. Other than Spiritfarer I can't think of any side scrollers that are this relaxed, until things get spooky.

I noticed some things about the game that might be complete misses but I found them interesting so I'll share. The first is that the name Neva sounds like Never. As in the Neverending Story which also incorporated a blight or corruption infesting the lands. The second is a lot more 'out there' and a little spooky. Those things with the white faces look like a spirit in the vodou tradition, it has no name. Practitioners call it a nameless one, and there's a reason for that. Names in Magik, Witchcraft and the Occult hold power, for example your name (I'm just going with Steve, random guess) I just spelled your name out and the original meaning of 'to spell' goes back to holding power over someone. I.E. I put a spell on you (but not really)

That thing in Vodou can't be controlled, therefore it can't be named nor have I ever found it's name mentioned even once in well over one hundred books on the subject. I know of no other being or spirit to not be named, the Dictionnaire Infernal and Keys of Solomon all name those demons/spirits but that one thing never is. It's by definition a corruptive force, it doesn't possess the living. Rather it infests the dead, animals, and corrupts the land/environment. Just like those creatures in the game, I seriously doubt the developers ever heard of that thing but it's an interesting similarity. I've seen certain Native American tribes react the same way to Skinwalkers and Heyókȟa, I asked a medicine man about both and he refused to even say their names, it was bad medicine just to name them. He wouldn't talk about what they call Watchers either, certain beings never make it to paper. Only passed through word of mouth but again words are power. All I've ever seen are pictures of that other thing and it looked just like those creatures in the game. Which added to the spooky factor because I'll read or study any kind of book on any kind of Witchcraft/Occult but that thing makes a lot of people wary.

• I'm probably way off and it's just a reference to humanity destroying the environment like Endling which used a similar aesthetic and had animals.

You are making progress too if you can juggle Resident Evil, Nioh and Reanimal like that. If you've played most of the other Resident Evil games would you say they are heavy on jumpscares? I've only played the first two, those dogs and that window even in those graphics were enough. I can't begin to imagine how that would look/feel and work on PS5. I'll watch horror all day long, but being in it myself is very different. Even this level in Neva is a bit freaky and I have daylight streaming in through many windows. The Village is one I'd like to try, mostly because it doesn't look as modern as all of the other trailers/games. It looks more like back home or Romania, minus the monsters.

@GirlVersusGame Inspiration can come from anywhere so I wouldn’t be surprised either way. Sometimes I think there might be some credence to the concept of the collective consciousness. Regardless, the designs in ‘Neva’ are striking and evocative. ‘Gris’ was made by the same developer, and shares some similarities but has more of a focus on puzzle solving.

I wonder, what authority must one possess to give something a name? Perhaps I should carry a label maker in my pocket, in case I encounter such an entity 😬 I have often thought about the effect that a person’s name - tone, inflection and the like - has on how they see themselves.

I’ve played most ‘Resident Evils’ but not all. They are definitely full of jumpscares and are very effective at building an unrelenting tension. They are also extremely campy and hilariously over the top, so despite delivering the scares, they generally strike a pretty good balance between horror gore fest and campy action.