South of Midnight: The First Preview

ign.com:

Whether you adored 2013 indie darling Contrast or were disappointed by 2016’s We Happy Few, it’s hard to argue that developer Compulsion Games doesn’t swing for the fences and try new things. After spending a day with the team taking a closer look at South of Midnight, it’s clear that innovation streak hasn’t slowed down one bit, and I went from mild curiosity to full-blown hype for this unique action-adventure game. Though I didn’t see anything that blew my socks off in terms of gameplay, it stood out in just about every other way, especially with its striking setting, curious stop motion animation, and stellar original soundtrack. That all left me eager to see more and play it for myself.

South of Midnight is set in a part of the world we don’t see too often in games: the American deep south. It isn’t just a backdrop for you to fight monsters, but rather the entire premise on which the adventure sits, with characters, folklore, and mythical creatures all drawn from real-world places and stories. During a hands-off demo, I saw flooded wetlands after a recent storm, mosquito-riddled swamps, and ostentatious Antebellum manors, each infused with elements of fantasy I’d not seen anywhere else.

These exotic places fit nicely with an equally unusual art style that emulates stop motion animation – yet another rarity in games, and one that would be sure to fog up Guillermo del Toro’s glasses. The whole thing looks like it was ripped from the pages of a children’s story book, which I really dug. It definitely took some getting used to at first, as the jerky movement might easily be mistaken for framerate wonkiness to the untrained eye, but it also adds to the otherworldly fantasy charm that South of Midnight oozes.

It can sometimes be pretty difficult to understand how exactly a game will feel to play during a hands-off demo, but in the case of South of Midnight touching a controller wasn’t necessary to recognize its best quality: its music. Each level has you facing off