When I first started reviewing games I was focused on trying to distill objective quality. That meant focusing on quantifiable things like visuals, gameplay mechanics, bugs/glitches/game breaking interactions and all those other things which would make my view of the game feel defensible. Long time readers will know that my rigid views have softened exponentially over the years with the rules I set myself being relaxed left right and centre. Now I’m very much of the mind that who you are, where you are in life and what themes resonate with you are going to be a much bigger factor on how you view a game than any objective quality measure would be. The beginnings of this idea can be traced all the way back to the original Death Stranding which, as a newly minted father, hit home so incredibly hard that even thinking about it’s ending today still punches me right in the gut.
So here I am, now a dad of 2 young kids, playing a game where you’re put in charge of one and god damn did I not just want to spoil the absolute shit out of Diana from the second I brought her home.
It’s another day on the job for Hugh, his restraints pulling him tightly back into the seat as he’s launched moonward bound. Why the hell the Cradle stopped communicating with Earth is information that’s beyond his pay grade but it’s still up to him to fix whatever nonsense the scientists up there have gotten themselves into. Arrival on Luna is anything but standard however with the docking bays devoid of any life and, weirdly any of the standard automatons that’d be roaming the facility. Before Hugh has time to think though he and his team are struck by a moonquake and the facility begins to fall apart around him. It’s then he’s revived by the only other human face he’s seen other than his team: that of a young girl wearing and oversized jacket. You give her the name Diana.
Pragmata has that trademark “eastern” aesthetic to it with the environments, UI and animations all feeling similar to other games from other Asia-based developers like SHIFT UP’s Stellar Blade or Black Myth: Wukong. Interestingly this comes to us via Capcom’s in house RE Engine which, whilst having been around for a good while now, still managed to surprise me with its level of graphical fidelity and performance. Indeed Pragmata is at it’s best in the game’s numerous wide open environments where the level of detail in the characters and environments can honestly be pretty overwhelming when you first find yourself in a new area. Thankfully though they’re designed well enough that you won’t be finding yourself stuck in dead end areas or attempting to explore places that the devs have no intention of you going in.
Going through the Steam tags on this game the most apt one, I feel anyway, is probably souls-like as much of the core gameplay, progression and minute-to-minute action mirrors much of what makes that genre great. To be sure it also fits well into the action-RPG genre in many respects as well given the levels of customisation you have over your character and the overall experience itself. You’ll be doing the usual walking through areas, unlocking shortcuts, returning to base, upgrading and going back loop that the Soulsborne series made popular all those years ago. Progression comes to you via collecting an array of different currencies all of which unlock a specific set of upgrades, new abilities and story related items. There’s also a smattering of optional puzzles and challenges which, if completed, help to accelerate your progression substantially. All of this is introduced gradually making it approachable without being overwhelming. Overall it’s got a lot going on, especially with it’s main combat loop being as unique as it is.
Combat, whilst theoretically having all the trappings of a third person shooter, is closer to something like an action-puzzle-solver with a bit of shooting thrown in. You see every enemy you encounter is shielded when you first see them, requiring you to make use of Diana’s hacking abilities to break them open to make your weapons effective against them. This puzzle takes the form of a connect the dots style puzzle which you have to solve rapidly before the enemy manages to get its hands on you. This makes every encounter a much more strategic affair where you have to manage your distance to the enemies, the puzzle that you’re solving and trying to keep your aim on point so you don’t also shoot the floor while you’re doing so.
It makes for some incredibly tense moments which in any other third person shooter would just be another run and gun section. The game is pretty forgiving in terms of solving those puzzles, dashing or losing your aim won’t reset puzzle progress for instance, and there’s a number of enhancements, skills and even weapons that making that hacking mini-game much easier than it otherwise would be. I didn’t manage to get my build to the point where I could continuously run auto-hacking to overheat stun enemies infinitely although looking through some of the post-game mods you can get I think it’s mostly doable but not to the point where you never have to hack an enemy again. All that being said though once you get into the flow of positioning, hacking then unloading round after round into enemies the auto-hack becomes more of a quality of life improvement more than a crutch to be relied on.
Progression comes in a steady pace that can be rapidly accelerated if you’re so inclined. The base currency is lunafilament which unlocks new mods as well as upgrades to them. The second is upgrade components which allow you to boost your HP/damage reduction, main weapon damage and Diana’s hacking ability. The last is pure lunum which is effectively a gating mechanism for the late stage upgrades, preventing you from grinding a section endlessly to make yourself truly overpowered for future sections. Not that there’s much of a need to do that though as the organic progression mechanics seem to get you most of the way there without too much hassle. Should you want to though there’s a training simulator that gives you a number of short challenges to complete which, if done in the specified way, give you access to a number of additional upgrade materials whenever you want them.
There’s a bit of Metroidvania spliced in here as well with the game’s levels being designed to be revisited once you unlock some of the later game abilities that prevented you from accessing certain places on your first pass through. Thankfully the save points/return to base areas are pretty plentiful meaning that you’re usually not too far away from revisiting an area once you’ve gone through them the first time. Whilst I don’t think it’s 100% mandatory to do so there’s a number of reasons, both gameplay and story wise, for doing so and I personally found it pretty rewarding to go back to those areas to mop up the few upgrades and other items that I’d missed on the first go around.
Pragmata is also very well optimised as I only noticed the smallest amount of slowdown in some of the larger areas which is very impressive given I’m running this game on 7 year old hardware. Like many similar games I did find the control scheme took some getting used to (and it definitely needs a controller) but I also feel that that awkwardness is part of a deliberate game design decision to introduce tension into what could otherwise be a slow, plodding affair. I did have some weird audio issues initially but I traced that back to my headphone software resetting itself to default for some unknown reason. Thankfully it wasn’t like Marathon which still has a weird persistent clicking issue that I haven’t been able to fix.
PLOT SPOILERS BELOW
Where Pragmata really won my heart though was with the story. My daughter is just a bit older than Diana is modelled to be and so a lot of the mannerisms, behaviours and moments that the game created between Hugh and her just hit home. There was honestly nothing more fun than collecting all of the Real Earth Memories and seeing her play with them, leave her stuff all over the shelter or just generally being a kid who also just happens to be a sophisticated android capable of hacking anything that she can see. They also did a great job with Hugh being the unwitting father role although, I will admit, he probably took to it a bit too quickly (even though I loved that about the game).
I’m in two minds about the ending though. Whilst the noble sacrifice to ensure your children survive and you don’t is something I think all parents can relate too I didn’t get the same tragic hero vibes from Hugh like I did with other similar stories like say Joel in Last of Us. The question I’m still reckoning with is: Would the story benefit or suffer if they didn’t have Hugh sacrifice himself at the end? I don’t have an answer to this yet and maybe it’s just me wanting to huff some copium, but the fact that I can’t definitely get to answer even after a month past finishing the game has me tending towards the game actually being all the weaker for it.
PLOT SPOILERS OVER
For a game I had once relegated to the the development hell section of my review queue (due to CAPCOM indefinitely delaying it in 2023) Pragmata has released to be one of this year’s surprise gems. The novel combat mechanics, steady progression systems and overall vibe just resonated with me on so many levels. To be sure there are parts that could be improved but that’d just be window dressing on an already spectacular game. The only thing that has me hesitating is how it all ended and the cognitive dissonance I feel about whether or not the change I want would actually improve how I feel about it overall. All that being said though Pragmata managed to capture the heart of this old gamer and father, and I’m sure it can capture yours too.
Rating: 9.0/10
Pragmata is available on PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X and Nintendo Switch 2 right now for $92.95. Game was played on the PC with a total of 15.4 hours playtime and 77% of the achievements unlocked.
