I rarely stumble upon praising reviews for a niche game I’ve never heard before, play it and end up liking it a lot. Usually the game turns out to be not some amazing surprise like Sylvio, but rather just a nice but forgettable experience. I am not forgetting Mundaun.
At its core, Mundaun is a first person action adventure with a somewhat open-ended level design. You can explore a lot of optional areas, unlock small locations, get additional rewards, do additional tasks. And as the game goes on and new locations become available, you can backtrack and explore more of the game’s world. Interestingly, the rewards consist not just of minor story bits, but include upgrades to your character, additional resources and early unlocks for some gear that you can find elsewhere. Because yes – this game does have action elements in it. You can fight back, even if you can also run away, melee weapons break and the ranged weapon, when you unlock it, has limited ammo. Oh, and you get a car to drive around as well. …and this is reminding me of Sylvio…
But the story and the mood couldn’t be farther from the ghostly Sylvio. Mundaun is rooted in folklore and religious beliefs, being a simple tale of dealing with the devil. It’s set in a mountainous region of Switzerland and all of the characters are dubbed in Romansh language (subtitled). The game looks hand drawn and incredibly surreal in style, with many memorable visuals and concepts, while the soundtrack is perfect at creating and complimenting the look of the game. The tale won’t blow you away with characters and twists, but it’s really well put together and evokes the feeling of a classic horror tale, with some allegoric content, a sense of dread and wonderfully dark mood.
There are occasional moments where the title isn’t as clear as it could be about what it expects. For one, there was a sequence that lead to my only death in the game, because it was set up as if it was a scripted event and no buttons seemed to do anything. Additionally, I feel that those who don’t like to explore might find the game boring, where I found it exciting. Also don’t expect this to be a “proper” survival horror – it’s a story driven adventure first, while action and stealth are there to complement that. Which they do well, but without much of a challenge for those who wish for it.
I loved almost everything about Mundaun. It has that pure ambition of the games from the 90s, that wanted to do everything, paired with the more pragmatic modern approach. Making the game feel ambitious, but unlike many of those titles from the 90s, complete and polished. It’s a rare title that got me genuinely excited and surprised. And I think that Mundaun is absolutely worth checking out.