Sayonara Wild Hearts Review (PC Game, 2019)

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Sayonara Wild Hearts is an action game with rhythm elements. A heartbroken woman is chosen to be the hero who saves the world. The High Priestess, the Hierophant, and The Empress have been overthrown by Death. They send a butterfly to transform the woman into The Fool, a hero capable of defeating The Devils, The Moons, The Lovers, the Hermit, and Death herself.

The story of Sayonara Wild Hearts is inspired by the major arcana. Each of the characters and levels is adapted from the Tarot deck. The Fool is forced to travel through the rest of the major arcana to find resolution to her own story. The ever-changing rules of the game reflect the different focuses, positive and negative, of each card. It’s a great conceit for a story that allows for a wide variety of gameplay modes.

Developers Simogo have a clear design philosophy that carries through all of their games. They want anyone to be able to pick up and play the games they create. They aim for simple controls and stories open to various interpretations. Sayonara Wild Hearts requires your choice of WASD or the directional arrows and the space bar. The game introduces new mechanics level by level, slowly building up complexity until your running on a mix of instinct and adrenaline to grab hearts, jump obstacles, fire arrows, and punch to the beat.

For me, the only downside to Sayonara Wild Hearts is that it isn’t a full-on rhythm game. The game is driven by music, even labeled a “pop album video game,” but it isn’t a rhythm game. There is little correlation between your actions in the game and the actual musical elements of the soundtrack. You will occasionally reach a combat point where you aim to hit the space bar in perfect time to the beat, but even that has no method of distinguishing between a downbeat or an upbeat. It took longer to get used to the flow of the game because its presentation really made it seem like it should be a more direct rhythm game than it is.

Once I got past that, I fell hard for Sayonara Wild Hearts. The gameplay is as fun as it is challenging. The visual style of the characters and the worlds constantly create new sensations. I can honestly say I’ve never played a game that successfully does so many gameplay styles without feeling completely disjointed.

In one level, you’ll ride your skateboard through an open world, switching through different paths to grab hearts while chasing down a butterfly. In another level, you’ll take control of a convertible car and drift your way through turns and obstacles, arcade-racing style. When you complete one level, the next level is teased with the arrival of one of the villains. The 80s racing level leads to the Hermit, who turns you into a Gameboy cartridge and forces you to play an Atari-style bullet hell game to defeat her. The skateboard leads you to your motorcycle and the gang of The Devils, who race you through the traffic-filled streets.

Best of all is the final sequence of levels where every gameplay style is mashed into one challenge. I cackled out of a mix of excitement and awe when I realized what was happening. It’s a musical theatre-style megamix as a video game finale and I’m here for it. It’s the perfect culmination of all your training.

When I say Simogo wants their games to be pick up and play for anyone, I mean it. You can fail at a stage, but you’re never stopped. You reset to the nearest checkpoint. Mess up enough times and the game will give you the option to skip past the section that’s tripping you up. Yes or no, you face no consequences to the overall gameplay experience. That element of forgiveness is a major theme in the story, reflected in the design of the game itself. Sayonara Wild Hearts is a highly nuanced text about grief, self-confidence, and finding something you’ve lost within yourself.

Sayonara Wild Hearts is available on iOS, PS4, Nintendo Switch, PC, Mac, and Xbox One. You can pick up the Nintendo Switch at Humble Bundle using my affiliate code.

My book #31Days A Collection of Horror Essays, Vol. 1 is available on Ko-fi.