Kong: Survivor Instinct (Xbox Series) Review

Let’s be honest, videogame tie-ins have a pretty woeful track record. Whether its games based on movies or movies based on games, the amount of quality adaptations is limited. A fact that made jumping into Kong: Survivor Instinct – the latest game based on Legendary Entertainments Monsterverse saga – a leap of trepidation, especially when the previous Monsterverse game, Skull Island: Rise of Kong, continued the curse of bad adaptations.

Set after the events of Kong Vs. Godzilla, Survivor Instinct throws you into the shoes of panicking father David. After a period of peace following the last Titan outbreak, Kong has made a disastrously violent return from Hollow Earth, weaving a path of destruction across a city. Kong’s return has also brought other Titans out of the woodwork, raising the dramatic stakes for humanity. To make matters worse, David’s daughter works in the city Kong is currently using as an angry child’s playground. Wasting no time after he can’t get hold of his daughter, David does what any movie father would do and drives recklessly into a monster-filled warzone to find his daughter. Unfortunately for him, some broken pipes and shattered buildings prove the least of his worries…

Played from a side-scrolling perspective, Kong: Survivor Instinct is a fully 3D game presented as a 3D survival/action platformer. It’s not a Metroidvania, despite what the slowly expanding maps and locked locations may suggest at first glance, and more a straightforward platformer with very light environmental puzzles and combat. Your main goals are to navigate the ruined environments and stay alive whilst doing so.

There’s a notable division between the games action moments and it’s platforming, with David possessing just the right number of skills – and spectacular quads – to make it through! One kick from this guy can send even the heaviest looking safe sliding across the floor with ease! David’s limited skillset doesn’t expand as there are no experience points earned or other skills to buy. Beyond finding water bottles that increase your overall health, and magazine clips to increase the number of bullets in your gun, that core move-set is all you have.

David can run, jump, climb, slide when running, and move large obstacles around to create makeshift platforms or break through other obstacles. His overall speed feels rather slow, more in lines with golden age platformers like the original Prince of Persia or Flashback than more recent platformers.

The developers do a decent job breaking up the flow between platforming, fights, and survival chases ensuring the core gameplay loop never feels stale. Between moments of platforming, you’ll be dealing with other people hunting you down, and icky creatures looking to make a meal of you. Considering that Titans play a major role, there are some spectacular sequences in which you enlist Kong’s aid, via a doohickey from the movie, to bash through otherwise unmovable obstacles in your path or experience tense moments of platforming, running, and hiding while a Titan trashes its way through a building to get to you.

Combat is a more on the slower-paced, tactical side. You’ve got a series of melee attacks, charged attacks, and a quickstep that closes the gap between you and opponents while doubling up as a dodge. There’s also a parry attack that will become your most used move, a block, a grab that lets you push enemies around for some cheap hits, and your firearm which makes short work of everyone – especially if you land headshots.

Like the level design, which slowly grows with each new area, combat starts of simple before complicating things with multiple attackers at a time who might have body armour, shields, and shotguns. It almost feels like a rock/paper/scissors set of battle conditions, as you parry and counterattack, dodge shots from armed enemies, and then continue the pattern until you’re the last one standing. Enemies can be on either side of you and grab you as well, getting in their own cheap hits, before throwing you into the way of projectile attacks. Slow and steady is the name of the game. Dealing with creatures is generally easier so long as you time your attacks to interrupt their lunges or just shoot them. Ammo is a limited currency though, so you’re going to have to choose your battles wisely.

Combat is easily the games weakest and most frustrating mechanic. Partly because of its slow-paced nature, it just never clicked with me or felt satisfying.

Conversely, the platforming and exploration are the strongest and most enjoyable elements. Working your way through a devastated city, across halls that you would have once taken a simple stroll down, is extremely engaging. As is looking for health upgrades and unlocking paths between area. When you’re not being attacked, it’s an eerie affair. Even with slow movement, the constant flow feels extremely fun and haunting and does a really good job of grounding you in the centre of an apocalyptic disaster.

It helps that the visuals were an unexpected highlight. Sure, it’s not in the same league as AAA titles, but the map design is fantastic and the set design is really stunning, specifically the backdrops to the 2D plane you’re on. As the city segues from an evacuated residential zone to the crumbling city centre, the city backdrops are sprawling yet chock full of little details. From a set of neighbourhood corner shops to towering cranes in the distance, the environment artists have done a fantastic job. Another nice touch, and one that you rarely get to see in the movies, are the bodies trapped beneath cars or webbed up for somethings supper. The one downside is that while the game is also fully voiced, it’s not good. It fluctuates between acceptable and cringeworthy, but it gets the job done.

Wrapping up, Kong: Survivor Instinct was a game that I approached with hesitation but one that really surprised me with just how much fun it was despite a few flaws. Yes, the voice acting isn’t great and the combat grows unappealing, but the platforming and visual flair more than make up for it in spades.

Kong: Survivor Instinct was reviewed on Xbox Series S|X using a code provided to gameblur by the publisher. It is also available on PC and PS5.