Highwater Review – The World Has Gone Crazy in a Little Different Way

A simple premise: an environmental disaster has caused the world to flood. Its inhabitants survive in makeshift settlements outside the city of Alphaville, where things are still more or less in order. The inhabitants of Alphaville send a rocket to Mars, where humanity must find a new beginning. And the main character Nikos and his friends decide to take this opportunity and leave planet Earth. But the path to Alphaville is not easy for them, they are relatively safe on the ship, but as soon as they reach land, battles await them like from XCOM, but a little different.

• Platform: PC, Switch, PS5, XSX (tested version) and S, Android, iOS
• Publication date: 14/03/2024
• Developer: Demagogic studio
• Publisher: Rogue Games, Inc.
• Genre: tactical turn-based strategy adventure game
• Czech localization: No
• Multiplayer: No
• Download data: 2 GB
• Game time: 4-7 hours
• Price: 570 CZK (Xbox)

Highwater came to mobile devices last year with a Netflix subscription. But this is definitely not a mobile game, there’s no way to be more precise. You won’t have to worry about controls, bland noise, or lackluster graphics. While it’s typical low poly, it doesn’t detract from the experience in any way, and especially in the second half of the game, the style stands out due to the visually evocative locations, such as when it comes to their colors.

If there was one place where the developers might have had greater ambitions, it would be the size of the game’s “map”. No one accuses Highwater of being linear, but the width of the corridors through which the player moves on his boat is indeed very limited and there is no question of any exploration of the environment. The same thing happens with the islands that Nikos and his friends visit on their own. There are some things to be found here, but the locations are mostly tiny and only serve as temporary battlefields.

This doesn’t mean that traveling the world isn’t fun. Even with the aforementioned visual aspect, there’s a lot to see and listen to here. On your travels you will be accompanied by a radio station that not only slightly expands your knowledge of the world, but, above all, plays very interesting music. Unconventional tunes are a nice addition to the cruise. It’s just a shame that they are interrupted during cut scenes or ascents to land. This happens a lot, in fact I’ve never floated long enough to listen to an entire song without the rap.

Highwater’s only real gameplay is combat. A turn-based tactics game that will remind many of XCOM and similar games. General rules of the game. The characters move along a chess map and in a certain number of actions they must defeat enemies. The variable is the lives of both parties.

But that’s where the similarities end. Not only is Highwater’s combat more intimate, it’s also more of a puzzle game, making frequent use of the environment. Encounters are predetermined rather than generated, and the developers often want you to take advantage of specific situations and locations. Therefore, it is necessary to throw enemies into the water with a fishing rod, overturn trees or poles on them, lure angry bears into the path, or let them scald in a field of electricity. This is not always the case, but in most cases, brute force alone will not achieve success.

This approach has its pros and cons. First of all, it doesn’t add any replay value, but that’s more of a simple fact than a complaint. In addition, it must be said that the game does not explain much, and finding the right key to success can sometimes be quite a chore. On the other hand, once you get the hang of it, the fights won’t be too difficult. The variety of enemies and, ultimately, friends deserves special attention. You will not only meet three different human factions, but also robots and many animals. Nikos’ group will also undergo changes during the game, which will also add tactical options.

I’ve mostly praised Highwater so far, but it’s time for me to move on to the parts I didn’t really enjoy. The world itself is interesting. It doesn’t offer a very deep dive into its laws and history, but you’ll get a basic overview. The people here literally splash around in the lighthouse, and you’ll meet a lot of characters you’d rather see locked up somewhere so they don’t get hurt outside. The game doesn’t shy away from plenty of clever cultural references and humor, which also hints at things like the growing use of artificial intelligence in the arts.

I was expecting maybe a bit more of a serious vibe, but I can’t fault the title for that. However, I found the story and its storytelling a bit flat. All problems that arise for the heroes are immediately resolved, all moral questions plaguing the main character are swept off the table. If Highwater were 100% “fairytale” then so be it, but it remains halfway that way and in my opinion that doesn’t bode well for the outcome.

The dialogue that appears in the speech bubbles is very simple and seems to shorten everything that is said. Maybe then it would be too much to read, maybe it would be tedious and annoying, but in this form the characters’ speeches seem extremely truncated. In the end, I fought the urge to skip the dialogue because I didn’t learn much from it anyway and even got a little lost in the action.

The journey of a group of friends in search of a new life will entertain. The combat may not be for everyone, especially if you’re looking for more chess-based gameplay than the logic puzzles featured here, but it’s good in the end. The same applies to the atmosphere, in which imaginative musical accompaniment predominates. History and storytelling no longer have the same power that sometimes seems almost overwhelming, which is a shame because the world is a good place. The technically trouble-free Highwater is worth it in one pass and at an affordable price.