Jusant Review - A Breathtaking Journey to the Pinnacle of Adventure!

Jusant Review by StormieDae

XBox/PC/PS

10/31/23

DON'T NOD

Do you wish you had a game like Only Up that actually has a story and isn’t absolutely infuriating? Then you are in luck with Jusant. Scale immeasurably tall towers and ascend to new heights alongside your watery companion. Master your climbing tools, find your way up through diverse biomes and piece together the tower’s strange past.

Jusant is a brand-new action-puzzle climbing game and a meditative journey to the top of a tall tower. Challenge yourself at your own pace, explore different paths and unravel the secrets from a bygone civilization. Developed by DON'T NOD, this game takes place in a world where there is no more water. Which will explain why the game is called Jusant, which is the French word for low tide.

You begin your adventure with your critter friend that you don't really know anything about, and the only thing you are meant to do is start climbing this gigantic tower in front of you. There is no dialog in this game, not even one line but that does not stop it from being incredibly moving. You learn about the story of how the world got this way and the people who once roamed this abandoned civilization through documents that you find throughout the game.

Your mysterious companion in Jusant

I cannot stress enough how important it is to say that while from the outside this game looks extremely similar to the recently popular Only Up, it could not be further from it in reality. The overall concept is similar mechanically in the sense that you are constantly climbing. This game is impactful, moving, and absolutely gorgeous.

I have to give part of the credit to this game's sound design. The music is unbelievable, and the sound effects are fantastic. This game actually brought me to tears without one single word spoken and that tells you how touching, and effective the sound design is.

While talking about design, I could not go on further without mentioning how stunning this game is graphically. It also ran perfect for me, I never experienced any bugs, crashing or lagging which I was really impressed with.

Moving into the controls, it's very unique and actually took me a bit to get used to. When you climb, you move each arm independently reaching for the closest thing you can grab on to whether it's a rock, a branch, a piece of wood whatever you can to continue your journey up. You need to master your climbing tools and watch your stamina meter to successfully navigate this ever-changing tower. As you go higher and hone your skills, you have to figure out how best to use the tools at your disposal to get to where you want to go.

Climbing is the name of the game in Jusant, but you'll go at your own pace

I played this on PC and, upon starting, you are shown a message that its best to play this game on controller so that's what I did, but while writing this review I did decide to go back into the game and try it on mouse and keyboard too and to my surprise, it's just as smooth on mouse and keyboard in fact to me, it was easier for me. So however you prefer to play will be smooth here.

This game is all about strategy, there are going to be moments where you might get a little bit frustrated, but it is always so rewarding once you get past your challenge and on to the next piece of stable ground. Something I loved about this game, unlike Only Up, you cannot fall off of cliffs.

Gorgeous visuals compliment the touching narrative

You can't die so you won't lose hours of progress by taking a misstep. There are instances where maybe you have to start at the bottom of a base, but this game gives you everything you need to be successful. Backtracking can sometimes really ruin an experience for some gamers and luckily in this game, you don't need to worry about that.

Jusant is also amazing at guiding the player, I had full ability to explore as much I wanted to and even with going into different caves or taking other paths, I was always able to easily find my way back around to where I was meant to be going and never felt punished for exploring and taking my time.

I very easily get lost in video games and I never found myself running around unsure of where to go.

Your little critic friend also helps you reach your destinations by using some magic. The animals and plants around you will transform in an effort to help you climb up to the top. And as you proceed forward you come across seashells and old relics that will help you piece this story together. It took me 12 hours to get to credit roll with this game and I did get stuck a couple times so you could maybe finish this a little faster, but you can also finish it much slower. After my credit roll, I went to my collectibles and noticed I missed a lot of stuff so there is also replay value here for my completionists and you for sure get plenty of bang for your buck as far as content goes.

DON'T NOT certainly didn't disappoint with Jusant

Without going into spoiler territory, this story is just stunning and its ability to convey emotion through just reading some documents and climbing is so wildly impressive. The ending scene in this game left me in a little Stormie puddle of tears and I was left thinking about this story for days following.

I haven't felt so moved by a game in a long time and as expected DON'T NOD did not disappoint me with Jusant. I am absolutely honored to grant this game the Golden Genie Lamp of Approval. It's one of a kind and an absolute masterpiece. Anybody who even slightly feels compelled to play this- do it. Do it. Go do it. You won't regret it.

Pros:

+ Amazing visuals and audio

+ Powerful narration

+ Unique and compelling gameplay

+ Great PC performance on the right rig

Cons:

- Certain climbs can be a bit frustrating

Golden Genie Lamp