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First impression

Kona (whatever that means) was in my have-to-play list but I never bought it until now when the VR —version came out. First impression was little below decent since the game look very harsh. First thing I had to do was to drive a car and having a collision with another car. When I came to I found myself in a ghost village and I needed to start investigating.

 

Story

I, literally, just finished Kona and I’m not even sure what the story was? What the meaning was? I played this through in one day (approx. 10h) and it felt painful sometimes since I didn’t quite get the story. It’s something about people dissapearing from the village and then I found some frozen people and following footprints of a wolf and taking pictures and then there is something about a monster and… ugh. I know if I would’ve really concentrated I would’ve understood it all, but I think plot is to be told in a sensible way and with Kona the story is told mostly of how player collect things, meaning, a lot of it is left out. Whatever the reason was—in the end I didn’t understand Kona at all.

Gameplay & Controls

First thing that struck me was the controls. Most of the PSVR —games comes with this setup; moving forward happends by teleporting freely and looking around by turning certain angle at time. Other setup is teleporting, but not freely; the points have been made for you and also turning by certain angle at time, and Kona (of course) had this one. Seriously, I would’ve liked to walk freely and search places in my own pace. I watched some gameplay footage of the ‘original’ Kona and the player walks around normally. Why this wasn’t in this PSVR —version? Time, money, lack of money, lazyness, greedyness, comes first to my mind but then I thought the game itself. I think it was OK–ish in the end since playing by teleporting to certain distances made the gameplay easier and I never got ‘lost’.

 

I needed to start investigating

 

Since moving around is decided for you and what is left is your job to collect items and read letters and collect some more items and putting the right item to right place. It almost felt like point–and–click game. I searched as much as possible and collected things that I didn’t ever even need. Not even once. I had weapons that I have no idea where to use since there aren’t any enemies around? I put together a snow mobile but never used it? I had firearm but couldn’t use them either? It was bizarre.

Graphics

Kona looks horrible. The graphics reminded me of PS2/PS3 —early era at its best. Some parts looked nice and some items seemed to be detailed but with PSVR bad image quality I couldn’t make out the details. I didn’t run up to any bugs but what I saw was all the weird stuff that has to do with the game engine. For example if I pointed a flaslight to a sign/wall/etc. it didn’t reflect the light correctly or lighting up a stove the room gets darker? It’s just odd in every aspect since Kona was full of these kind of weird visual things.

 

felt like point–and–click game

Sound

I don’t think Kona (PSVR) has 3D–audio at all, since the sound was always off. Like the car (what player needs to use a lot) engine sound was so loud that I needed to adjust SFX volume down heavily. The background music, though, was scary and intimitading; eventhough nothing ever happened.

[Trees were 2D pixelart]

Difficulty

Kona (PSVR) is not difficult but it’s oddly put together and heavily unfinished. This would’ve needed at least another year to be released. The difficulty lies in little details that mostly annoys the hell out of you when you finally find it. To be honest the end part of the game I just wandered around and end up situations and then another things happened and then the game ended. So maybe I was lucky, or the game is even worse than I thought.

[No shit Sherlock]

Last impression

Everything about Kona is odd; plot, controls, gameplay… (I could go on all day what needs to be fixed) sometimes it’s good to think out of the box but this is a bit too much. I know the original Kona might be million times better of what I said about this PSVR —version. But with this setup Kona (PSVR) is not presentable.

If I may say; I would like my money (19,95€) back. I hate games nowdays because they put out things like this. It’s OK to do that, but at least put a warning sign to the description.

 

I searched as much as possible and collected things that I didn’t ever even need

 

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[Right click images to full size. Note that I played PSVR and saw everything up close.]

 

RELEASE DATE: Jun 19, 2018
GENRE: Adventure
PUBLISHER: Ravenscourt
DEVELOPER: Parabole
PLATFORMS: PlayStation 4

 

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