Freedom Wars Remastered PS5 Review

Gameplay

Graphics

Audio

Value

Summary: An solid post-apocalyptic monster-hunting action JRPG that would be criminal to miss

4

The Greater Good

Freedom Wars Remastered is a political JRPG that is as much a scathing indictment of our current capitalist society as it is a warning of the bleak future humanity could face if we don’t stop our constant conflicts over resources.

Imprisoned on the Vita for the best part of a decade Bandai Namco’s action-heavy post-apocalyptic monster hunter has been released on modern consoles via a new remaster that sands off the rough edges but keeps the core of this depressingly prescient action JRPG intact.

The game starts with our stylishly dressed teen protagonist waking with amnesia after taking a nasty dive on a previous mission out into the wastes of the far-flung future. The powers that be have decided that since you’ve forgotten who you are, it’s apt that you restart your million-year prison sentence simply for existing.

Depressed and alone he curls up into a ball on the bare concrete bunk in the tiny prison cell to try and get some rest. At least he tries to until an alarm sounds and he’s informed that his sentence has been extended by 100 years for simply trying to rest.

This is the authoritarian nightmare you’re tasked with navigating in Freedom Wars. A future where humanity has decided to incarcerate most of the population for the ‘greater good’, and keep them that way via a series of absolutely banal rules and regulations, like not running for too long, sitting funny, or talking to your fellow ‘Sinners’ for too long when you’re not out on the job.

It’s Sandford gone global. Where every crusty juggler is under the permanent thrall of the shadowy cabal that runs the panopticons. Warring City-States strewn across Japan vying for what limited resources are left in a world that’s been ravaged by climate change and war.

Thankfully there is a way to make your miserable life slightly more tolerable; If you take up arms to protect the Panopticon from its rivals and scavenge for resources. (Humans are considered resources by the way.) You will be able to reduce your sentence and earn social currency which lets you opt out of the endless petty authoritarian laws designed to keep you imprisoned and grinding away, forever tethered to your customizable robotic companion, for the rest of your life.

However, things are further complicated when you decide to sneak into a restricted area in the panopticon with one of your squadmates after you heard rumours there was a ghost there, only to find a girl imprisoned there. After breaking her out you find that she’s from the cities in the sky and traveled to the surface to look for her father who was working on a way to burn down the entire societal system the world has become trapped in.

Not that this changes the gameplay at all. The sky dweller joins your squad and you continue with your duties.

The main thrust of these is venturing out into a series of maps and either rescuing citizens that have been kidnapped by other panopticons, shooting up rival squads of sinners, or bringing down the legions of huge robotic death machines known as abductors that do their bidding.

Playing either online or off (the friendly AI is surprisingly smart and efficient) you get tooled up with a combination of machine guns, rocket launchers, and massive swords and polearms to tear these lumbering death dealers apart and break out the desperate office workers trapped inside.

There’s something about watching your team drag an abductor to the ground with grappling ropes (thorns) and then whale on it until its guns fall off that never fails to feel incredibly satisfying.

Especially since all of that pilfered firepower can then be used to power up your guns and abilities once you get back home in a fairly robust upgrade system that lets you take simple machine guns and add extra elemental effects, better knockback, or augment them with modules that increase their effectiveness in specific ways from increased damage to certain body parts to improvements in accuracy and range.

Anything left over can be donated to the panopticon ‘for the greater good’, more currency so you can buy the right to run in the halls and rest, and more time off your sentence.

Once you’ve done enough missions, and met the requirements, you’ll also be able to take a test to improve your social situation further. These are big missions that drive the story forward. It also allows you to unlock more missions that provide better rewards and access to more powerful firepower and upgrades.

It’s an incredibly addictive gameplay loop that managed to ensnare me for days. A quick session was impossible as I would be constantly hanging on to play just one more mission to get that next upgrade, or hit that next self-imposed milestone on reducing my sentence which is constantly above the heads of sinners as they make their way around the panopticon.

It also helps that the moment-to-moment action is a ton of fun. Combat is fast, furious, and crunchy; flying around the level using your grapple is exhilarating, and smashing up the huge variety of towering Abductors that stomp across the landscape is incredibly satisfying and requires a surprising level of tactical nouse.

The presentation is decent for what it is, but being a Vita game from 2014, I wasn’t expecting much. Still, care has certainly been taken to give the remaster a decent amount of spit and polish, with the resolution boosted to 4K, textures touched up, and running at a steady 60fps.

The biggest new addition to the remaster though is that it now includes a full English dub (the original Vita version only had Japanese). It’s a decent translation and the main cast put in solid performances that fit its anime aesthetics and more melodramatic moments perfectly.

This is why it’s a crying shame that the game has become increasingly unstable the longer I’ve been playing it. Not sure if it was a recent patch, or that there’s just something up with the game on PS5 Pro but it has got to the point where Freedom Wars Remastered freezing has stopped becoming a case of if, but when.

I hope that Bandai Namco comes out with a fix soon, although they are aware of it because it’s marred what otherwise would have been a glowing review and at the moment I’m not sure I can recommend at least PlayStation 5 Pro players from taking the plunge.

Final Thoughts

Freedom Wars Remastered is an engrossing Monster hunting action RPG with a seriously addictive main gameplay loop, likable characters, and a world that is as terrifying as it is fascinating.

Technical issues aside, it looks good, it plays even better than it did on the Vita and the new English voice acting makes the story even more engaging.

If you’re looking for a solid monster hunter not made by Capcom, Freedom Wars Remastered is easy to recommend. Just be aware that it’s not in the best state at the moment on the PS5.

About the Author

Gareth Newnham

Freedom Wars Remastered PS5 Review