Hunt the Night (PC) Review

Hunt the Night from Moonlight Games and Dangen Entertainment is a throwback to the original Legend of Zelda titles. Being a top-down action-adventure title with a steep learning curve. It can be tough-as-nails and fits right in with games like Dark Souls and Bloodborne in terms of difficulty. 

Players take on the role of a slayer and set forth on a dark adventure through some incredibly unnerving locales, teeming with dark forces and sinister foes. The theme of light versus dark features heavily throughout Hunt the Night and it makes for a quite mysterious experience.

Hunting the Night?

Hunt the Night kicks off players tossed right into the deep end. Players will take on the role of Vesper, a female Stalker who has to fight for her survival against the minions of the night in this dark fantasy adventure. It wastes no time and upon loading it up, you encounter a frightful beast who inflicts massive damage upon you.

She awakens in a strange location in the world of Medhram and sets out on a journey that’ll slowly teach you the game’s mechanics. Before you know it, you’ll be able to dash, fire bullets, attack with your sword, and cast dark magic.

As you progress throughout the game you’ll unlock new weapons and abilities and you’ll also be able to lob grenades. It is formulaic and easy to understand, but the game doesn’t hold your hand. On the contrary, it will mercilessly let you die repeatedly in the very first sections if you slip up.

Hunt the Night has quite an extensive arsenal of weapons to use. Players will probably find a favourite and stick to it for a while, before finding something better or more well-suited for their own particular play style. For example, the spear has a satisfying range to it if you prefer being cautious, but using the sword for quick jabs in hit-and-run style attacks might be more your forte. 

The same goes for projectile weaponry, with the default pistol consuming less ammo per shot than the more powerful yet severely range-limited shotgun-esque gun. Players will therefore be able to mix and match their weapons and dark powers and play the game in a variety of different ways with the core gameplay aspects of survival kept at the forefront. 

Hunt the Night can feel absolutely brutal. You will die a lot in this game and unfortunately for less skilled players, there’s no way to change or lower the difficulty. If you’re easily frustrated by tough games, you might want to look elsewhere it involves a lot of trial and error as well as backtracking through locations due to the checkpoints scattered throughout levels.

If you’re familiar with Bloodborne, Sekiro, or games with a focus on dodging, Hunt the Night will feel right at home to you. You will need to dodge, and dodge often, because enemies can overwhelm you quite quickly.

Dying can be frustrating but getting through particular tough sections of gameplay feels incredibly rewarding. If you’re a sucker for punishment and enjoy games that require skill and provide a level of challenge that most modern games don’t offer, Hunt the Night will appeal to you.

It’s also quite easy to get lost in the game but for the most part, you are funneled towards the right path if you explore enough.

Graphically, Hunt the Night looks fantastic with the pixel art style being incredibly detailed and filled with numerous eye-catching elements. Environments in particular are teeming with detail and enemies look great too. Boss enemies in particular are extremely well done and their attacks are pure eye candy.

The animations in the game are also great and the same applies to your own attacks and abilities. Some of the character portraits however do look a bit rough around the edges.

The soundtrack of Hunt the Night is fairly standard though so don’t expect anything particularly standout or catchy here. It has a very creepy vibe to it and it fits the game perfectly given the dark nature of its content.

There’s no voice acting here but the game doesn’t need it to succeed. The story of the game is explained in-game via “Feathers” which have tidbits of lore attached to them as well as via character conversations with the few NPCs that you will encounter.

Environmental storytelling is another key aspect of Hunt the Night with the environments themselves conveying a lot of what’s going on in the game world to the player. Set pieces that play out at key points in the game are also well done.

Final Verdict

Overall, Hunt the Night is a fantastic top-down pixel action-adventure game with an incredibly challenging difficulty associated with it. There are some aspects of the game that are a bit unrefined – such as the ranged weaponry being a bit unbalanced compared to the melee options – but this may be addressed in a future patch or update.

This is a game that fans of the top-down adventure genre of games will enjoy, while seasoned veterans who are used to ‘Souls games will tear apart in no time. Once you get over the steep learning curve, and actually sink your teeth into the game, it does become a lot easier to manage. You will, however, need the patience and skill to manipulate your character in such a way that you’re able to dodge repeatedly to survive an onslaught of enemies spawning in waves, all in a very hostile environment.

Hunt the Night gets a recommendation from us if you’re a fan of games that are challenging while featuring a myriad of combat options catering to varied playstyles. Moonlight Games have done a great job here and we can’t wait to see what else they put out in the future.

A review code for Hunt the Night was provided to gameblur by the publisher