Bringing out cultures legends of horror into a playable experience that can be enjoyed and frightened by many around the world is always something that is interesting to check out. Not only do you get to experience another culture’s style of storytelling and adventure, but you also get to go through a legend that has been passed down through generations. In the case of Padendon’s latest action horror game Pagui, we are given an experience straight out of the Taiwanese horror culture.
Story
As a curious young boy, traveling around a town on your own doesn’t seem like something strange to do. Little do you know just how strange things become as you quickly learn of the spirits that wander the streets. After letting your ambitions get the better of you and the small clues are given by those you encounter, your determination to know what happened to your parents becomes a priority. Lucky for you, you are also a special child who is able to use the religious gifts of the gods to defend yourself against evil during your search for answers in this haunted town.
Gameplay
Most of the game is action-based, but when you first start off you are rather defenseless. This gives off a nice horror vibe and really shows how dangerous the town really is. Here is where you learn to sneak around the ghosts, avoid getting caught thanks to visual and auditory hints given before you are officially detected, and start your first series of quests. Other than avoiding ghosts, this is when you first get a look around the little village, get used to the controls, and an overall taste of the game’s atmosphere.
Eventually, you will be given some tools to fight with and that is when the game goes from horror to action-horror. Now you can fight off against the various ghosts that attack you, but there will be some that are more powerful than your basic attacks. Eventually, you will find relics that you can use to temporarily increase your attack, defense, or even as an elemental power of its own - namely the lightning power which becomes a very handy weapon when fighting against the red ghosts. Other than basic attacks and the relic ones, you do end up with a fireball-style attack that lets you keep your distance while slamming some serious damage.
There are plenty of puzzles in the game that range from shape fighting, design matching and search for the goal pieces. These can prove to be difficult sometimes, but the answer is always close by yet easy to over look. My hint for you here is, don’t overthink it. I lost a lot of time looking way harder for clues than I needed to.
If you ever get lost on what to do next, the mission is always shown on screen so you know what the goal itself it. The handier tool is the compass on the top of your screen as a red icon is left up there so you know which direction to head. This is helpful as more and more of the village is opened up as you continue to clear out the evil that keeps you confined within the small regions of the map at the beginning of the game.
Be ready for some platforming as well when completing quests. There are small moments where the platforming doesn’t seem too bad, but it can get intense to where you will have to really find your footing before taking the actions to progress further.
Graphics and Sounds
While I am not fond of the music itself, it was fitting for the type of game it is. Given the culture it is based on and the atmosphere of the game, I would say the music and voice work is properly set to what the game provides.
Visually the game isn’t all that impressive. It does a great job of presenting each enemy as its own and the atmosphere is spooky, even when you start feeling like you can take on any of the enemies. They do a strangely good job of making you uncomfortable shortly after you start feeling confident.
Replayability
There are a few collectibles and plenty of side missions in the game, but other than completing the game 100%, the experience and storyline will remain the same each time.
What Could Be Better
It felt like they were making up things for the player to do as they were developing the game. Rather than the storyline having an actual flow, it seemed like the developers were making up what quest the player should do next after finishing the set up for the last one that was just completed. The ending of the game supports this idea as well, so I hope this isn’t what they did and if it is, I hope they don’t do that again. It made me feel a bit detached from the overall arch of the game.
There was no explanation as to why the town was full of spirits and we are simply meant to accept that it is that way. I would have enjoyed some back story to the village that we are exploring in a direct way, be it a cutscene or conversation option with the granny.
Conclusion
Pagui is a great culture-based action-horror game! I enjoyed playing through it and like that it wasn’t too intense while also not being easy. The balance was there, the gameplay is solid, but unfortunately, the storytelling could have used some work. Overall, a very enjoyable experience that brought me into the legends of Taiwanese horror.
