Not only as a great game, but also as a sign that indie efforts deserve as much time in the spotlight as the bigger budget releases on the radar. Squeezing their latest effort into the same list as Demon’s Souls or Spider-Man: Miles Morales as a launch title may seem a bit foolhardy, but considering the quality on display here, I feel that The Pathless deserves the attention. Instead, The Pathless comes from Giant Squid, an indie developer previously famous for scuba-em-up Abzû, a rather tame and contemplative game by usual gamer standards. The thing about the previous three examples I provided is that they all come from the triple-A, the guys that act as the big-dogs of the gaming industry, the ones you expect to release an amazing experience with a bit of hardware mastery. So, while The Pathless makes for a great launch title for the PS5 (for reasons we will get into), it can also be considered one of the late shining examples of the PS4 generation. Only this time, the games are also readily playable on the new hardware, with a ton of visual and performances bells/whistles straight out of the box. This is when you would see late bloomer examples such as your God of War 2’s, your Resident Evil 4’s and Shadow of the Colussus(‘s). This is around the time in a console generation where the previous machine gives off that last hurrah.

We are also seeing just how much easier it is for developers to bring their titles to the new platform, without any of the proprietary nonsense that plagued gaming in the past.

This generation change has been smoother than most, with the PS5 being capable of playing/upgrading PS4 experiences as opposed to leaving the previous console and the wealth of experiences in the dark in favour of a clean slate. The current generation is in its handshake period, gracefully stepping aside as the newer, shinier thing comes forward to take both the contents of our wallets and time in equal measure. This is one of those times in the generation cycle where I absolutely love being a gamer.

Novemin PS4 / PS5 / Reviews tagged Abzu / annapurna / Giant Squid / The Pathless by Grizz

Ps4 the pathless download