I really didn’t expect much from Ghostrunner. Sure, I loved Mirror’s Edge when it released back in 2008, but nothing in the past twelve years has even come close. Dying Light was alright, but even the sequel to Mirror's Edge was a mess. If a huge dev team with an even bigger budget could mess that up, how could a small team, with only a few indie titles to their name finally surpass the game that set the bar for this genre? After playing through this game, and loving every minute of it, I can say that they definitely did.

Taking place in a cyberpunk-themed post-apocalypse, Ghostrunner tells the story of a cybernetically enhanced swordsman who awakens after getting thrown out of a tower with little memory of what happened to him, who he is, or why he feels compelled to immediately plunge a sword into the poor soul waiting below him. You are instantly contacted by The Architect, an AI held prisoner in the Tower, and you’re tasked with climbing the many floors of the tower to kill Mara, the person who killed you and imprisoned The Architect.

While the concept sounds interesting, that’s about as deep as it gets, There’s nothing in this game storywise that hasn’t been done tons of times in games and other forms of media. The story really takes a backseat to the gameplay here, and that’s just fine. I never really got invested in it as I do with most games. It definitely feels like an afterthought, but now that they have the gameplay down, maybe they could tell a better story in a sequel. Where this game really shines is the combat. You die on one hit, and so do all enemies. Because of this, you have to rely heavily on dashing mid-air, which brings the game into slo-mo, to dodge enemy lasers. The sword feels extremely satisfying to use, and pulling off kills gave me rushes of dopamine all the way through. I was way more tense and on edge throughout this game than any other game has made me feel. When you’re in the action, it’s non-stop. You’ll be running on walls with tons of laser fire coming your way, to going into slo-mo and dodging as you jump to another area, and then grappling around and slowly taking enemies out one-by-one. You have to adapt and try out new strategies to make it through, and each arena is a distinct and fun scenario. New enemy types and mechanics are thrown in almost non-stop until the end. Combat definitely never gets repetitive. The game feels amazing whether you’re using a keyboard and mouse or a controller.

What I think this game gets best though, is the difficulty. Throughout, I couldn’t stop thinking about how perfect it is. It’s very brutal, but very fair. There are no difficulty options, so don’t come into this game looking for an easy experience. This game definitely doesn’t hold your hand. Luckily, if you die, you’re right back at the last checkpoint with a tap of the R key. I’d compare the difficulty to coming close to FromSoftware games, but it is presented in a way where It feels less annoying, and even more rewarding. The only time I really got angry or frustrated was after taking a break from the game for a week due to moving, which screwed up the system of natural progression. I wholeheartedly think this game has the best difficulty curve I’ve experienced.

The boss battles, while few and far between, are finely tuned tests of skill and awareness. I'm generally not a big fan of boss battles, especially in a parkour game, but there are a couple of great ones here, and while there aren’t many, when they are used, they are used in ways that really change up the gameplay and keep the game from getting stale.

You’re also given a vast variety of abilities, either being powerups scattered across levels, or the permanent abilities you gain throughout the story. They are all very unique and fun to use. When you can use your permanent abilities relies on the power gauge, a meter that is filled up from each enemy you kill, and other factors. They are never required to use, but they are a really great tool to use when you’re overwhelmed by enemies. The traversal system is amazing. Nothing has really come close to Mirror’s Edge’s parkour system, but this really knocks it out of the park and finally tops it. It controls great, is easy to understand from the very start, but is also quite complex. It flows extremely smoothly, and everything just feels exactly right. Sometimes parkour in games can either make you feel too floaty or heavy, but the weight feels perfect. Throughout the game, you travel through tons of environments with unique ideas and traversal mechanics showing up throughout the story, and it makes sure to always stay fresh.

This game looks stunning. After switching from console to PC a bit ago, pretty much every recent game looks much better than anything on console, but this is the first game that looks truly next-gen. The textures and lighting are incredible. The art style and direction is really great, and delivers some beautiful stages, but they did start to feel similar throughout the game. Ray tracing is an option for Nvidia RTX Series owners, but honestly, like most non open-world games the baked lighting is extremely close, if not a bit better than the global illumination. So, really the only gain are reflections, but it’s not worth the huge performance drop from turning on ray tracing. DLSS is included here, but it’s definitely the worst implementation I have tried. The performance gain was extremely small, only giving me a couple more frames. It could just be a local issue, so definitely give it a try, especially if you are using ray tracing.

The soundtrack is definitely one of the best I’ve heard in a game. Daniel Deluxe sticks to a Techno/Cyberpunk aesthetic, and absolutely nails it. It matches perfectly with the gameplay, and definitely elevates some moments. The sound design on the other hand is mediocre, nothing really stands out. You’ll hear the same ten or so phrases repeated when you kill enemies, which got a bit annoying after a bit. The main voice actors are also pretty bland and lifeless.

I was really surprised how well the game was optimized. On my RTX 2060+i7 build, at 1080p with all settings cranked up to max, I held 240fps most of the time, with some small dips. The game is also pretty stable, but I did have two crashes both near the end of the game. However, I was luckily able to jump right back to my last checkpoint, so it wasn’t a big deal for me.

Morally, this game is tough. It’s quite gory, but that can be easily disabled, making the game pretty mild in my opinion. If you do keep the blood and gore on, you will be slashing enemies to bits with chunks of flesh and blood flying everywhere. The language is pretty bad. When attacking enemies, they will cycle through about 10 different lines that they will say. A couple of them say either s--t, f--k, or h--l. This could be disabled by turning off the dialogue volume. Luckily, there’s not really any occult or spiritual elements. Ethically, it tells a story of rebellion against a dictator who experimented and controlled random people, but you are constantly murdering those innocent people.

Ghostrunner will probably go down as the most overlooked game of this year. It completely blew my expectations away. There is so much more to this game than any of the promotional material has shown. If you liked Mirror’s Edge, Dying Light, or want a cyberpunk game to hold you over until Cyberpunk 2077, check out Ghostrunner