When Compulsion Games, creators of Contrast and We Happy Few, were purchased by Microsoft they went quiet for a long time with many rumours circulating about their next project. When it was finally announced that their next game was South of Midnight, the striking presentation grabbed player’s attention and I’m happy to say the final product continues to do so.

The game puts you into the shoes of Hazel, who at the beginning of the game is helping her mother Lacey pack a few items before they escape a storm about to hit their home. Before they leave though, the storm sweeps everything away and takes Lacey with it, forcing Hazel to track her down. Soon after the story takes a supernatural twist and the real stories begin as Hazel is tasked in her new role as a Weaver to resolve the traumas of a number of people she finds in her travels while finding her mother.

Visually, the combination of painterly visuals and stop motion animation really stands out and gives the game a quality that at times makes you think they could make a movie from it. It’s a very pretty game. The audio tops it though with some fantastic voice acting and a soundtrack that not only ties in deeply with the game itself (listen to the lyrics) but timed impeccably to help enhance the impact it makes to the story. It really felt like one of the best implementations I’ve played in a while.

Gameplay consists of a combination of platform traversal broken up with enemy encounters and boss fights. While the traversal is mostly intuitive, I found the combat segments could be frustrating as Hazel didn’t always feel as nimble or responsive as she could be when it was needed. While checkpoints are generous and never leave you at a disadvantage after a failure and restart, it does often feel it is more the game letting you down than your own lack of skill in combat. Upgrades to Hazel’s skills do counter those issues over time though and you can reach a point where you’re fully upgraded and can smash your way through most obstacles.

From start to finish the game had taken me fifteen hours to complete on the default difficulty but I could imagine some players may even be able to do it in twelve and still get the majority of achievements too. The story South of Midnight tells kept me wanting to play through to the end and I really enjoyed it. Combat frustrations aside, travelling through the world was a memorable experience with some of the best presentation seen so far this year. Looking forward, I’m excited to see what Compulsion can do in the future as this is definitely their best game yet.

South of Midnight is out now for Xbox and PC. played on an Xbox Series X via Game Pass. Images via the IGDB.com press kit.