Trek to Yomi is a stylish samurai action online game from the developer Friv2Online Studio completely executed in black and white. Whether it was conceived as a tribute to the classics of Japanese cinema, or, conversely, was an attempt to "leave" on his merits, the result was sad - apart from an unusual video sequence, the game does not stand out with almost anything. A little more in our review.

The game is black and white from the very main menu - and already here the first problems become noticeable. Sections are drawn in large beautiful characters and signed in very small print in Russian or any other non-Japanese language that is supported by the game. It’s hard to see it from a normal distance even with perfect vision, and after a very short time, this typeface starts to hurt your eyes – especially since this size is everywhere here.

The plot is rather ordinary, but it is served epic and pompous, which the branded black and white design clearly contributes to, reminding the players of the films of Akira Kurosawa. At least those of them who watched them.

Built in the form of a story about the childhood of a samurai named Hiroki, a tutorial, an old story about an oath to his teacher who died in front of the hero at the hands of the enemy, the daughter of sensei Aiko, who grew up from a childhood friend to a comrade-in-arms and wife - if it were a film, everything would be fine, especially given the really beautiful panoramas, the quality soundtrack, and the mesmerizing combination of Japanese voice acting and Russian subtitles that I have loved since my youthful passion for anime. I wish their eyes didn't hurt so much.

But it seems that the developers of Trek to Yomi, as has repeatedly happened with other teams, fell into the old trap of not understanding the differences between the friv game and the film as art forms in general. A beautiful story and vivid shots are important, but you still want to play games, and Trek to Yomi has noticeable problems with this.

Already in the mentioned tutorial, it is clear that a completely banal slasher / beat'em up is hidden behind a stylish visual shell, and even connected with a bunch of restrictions. Health, stamina, tricks, blocks, combos, finishing moves, auxiliary use of long-range weapons - all this is done quite well and is quite well controlled, but it looks hackneyed and secondary, and after the first hour of the game it already becomes noticeably boring.

The transition to one-dimensional (!) movement during the battle is especially killing, when no matter how many enemies there are, only two can fight Hiroki at the same time, one in front and one behind, and the rest are waiting for their turn in the remaining three-dimensional space.

The enemies themselves are quite faceless and forgettable, even conditional bosses. Adrenaline and dynamics were also not reported - the battles are strictly dosed so that we have time to contemplate the magnificent landscapes between them. So magnificent that the developers decided to take away the player’s ability to somehow control the camera so that he admires them from a strictly conceived angle.

The semblance of pumping, which looks like new combos revealed in stages after killing some enemies (we are just shown button sequences) and the search for items that increase health and stamina, does not give a pleasant feeling of progression and looks made “for show”.

The same can be said about collectibles, and also about dialogues with NPCs, as a result of which you can sometimes also get something useful. The structure of locations is almost linear with small branches and "secret passages" where, again, you can find some kind of bonuses or sanctuaries - a local hybrid of points of preservation and restoration of health, and so quite generously scattered along the way.

Over time, it turns out that not everything is so beautiful and with the main trump card in the form of a visual component. No, she still remains just as stylish and pleases with the beautiful performance of lighting and small details - but here again the contradiction between the friv game and the movie arises in full growth, so against the background of all this beauty, Hiroki can simply get lost, once again forcing the player to strain vision to search for it, or hide behind a tree crown that has fallen into the frame - and, as we remember, it is impossible to rotate the camera here.

Summing up, one can only repeat once again the common truth: games are not movies. Despite all the good intentions and desire to stand out, Trek to Yomi turned out to be an average game - and clearly not in the sense of "strong average" (sorry for the hackneyed cliché). The gameplay component turned out to be much weaker than the cinematic one, but the latter fell short of a completely interactive movie, stopping somewhere in the middle.

The result is a visually noteworthy, but rather controversial work, which, of course, you can pass a few evenings with if you are a fan of the samurai theme - especially given the availability in Game Pass - but there are many much more interesting games in the subscription. And if you want to see interesting black and white stories about feudal Japan, it's better to just watch Kurosawa's films.