Check the Dust of Heaven
Capcom’s Resident Evil didn’t invent the survival-horror genre, but it did inspire a long line of imitators. Video games still emulate the Resident Evil formula to this day, though few are as blatant copycats as Heaven Dust. Originally released last year on PC and Switch, Heaven Dust has now made its way to the Xbox ecosystem, and while fans of Resident Evil might get some enjoyment out of it, the game is a pretty lackluster survival experience. -horror in general. The concept of Heaven Dust is essentially Resident Evil meets a chibi art style and isometric camera. The game is set in a mansion, not unlike the Spencer Estate from the original Resident Evil game, and as one might have guessed, it’s full of zombies. Players are completely defenseless at the beginning of Heaven Dust, but soon they will get their hands on a pistol and be able to take down zombies with ease. Combat in Heaven Dust is straight out of the old-school Resident Evil playbook, where players can’t move and shoot at the same time. All of the combat comes down to getting some distance from the zombies and spamming the fire button, though players should beware of the occasionally unresponsive controls when they aim their pistol.
Heaven Dust’s combat is unimaginative and painfully dull, with less depth than the 1996 game that inspired it. Whereas the original Resident Evil had a full arsenal for players to collect, Heaven Dust only has one pistol. While players can upgrade the pistol a bit, they will still be using one weapon throughout to kill the exact same enemies. Zombies are the only enemy type that Heaven Dust players have to worry about, and so combat becomes uninteresting quickly. Heaven Dust’s combat is as simple and underpowered as it gets. It can also be frustrating at times, as players may find themselves between two zombies whose attack animations are synched in a way that makes players stuck in place. no recourse but to die. Heaven Dust is small enough that dying isn’t a huge ordeal, but there are still some questionable checkpoints, sometimes the game doesn’t save properly and sends players back to a safe room other than their most recent one. visited. Aside from these failings, Heaven Dust’s gameplay has some redeeming qualities, especially when it comes to puzzle solving and exploring the Spencer Estate-esque mansion. It’s fun finding items and solving puzzles to progress through the game. While most of the puzzles are fairly easy to solve, there are a few that tend to confuse players, and figuring out what to do can be a rewarding experience.
Unfortunately, exploring Heaven Dust has some downsides as well, especially when it comes to inventory management. Managing Heaven Dust’s inventory is a bit of a chore, with unresponsive controls that make menu navigation a pain and a tight inventory size that limits experimentation. As a result, players will spend a lot of time backtracking through item boxes (found in Resident Evil-style safe rooms), which can get in the way during certain parts of the game. Subsequent playthroughs will make that particular aspect of the game less frustrating as players will know in advance how much space they need to get to the next section. And make no mistake, Heaven Dust was developed with multiple playthroughs in mind. Heaven Dust has multiple endings for players to discover, and there are several achievements built into the running of the game. It’s possible to complete the game in less than 30 minutes, though most initial playthroughs will likely take several hours, especially if players get confused by the puzzles.
It might be unfair to compare it to Resident Evil too much, but Heaven Dust doesn’t try to hide that it’s copying Capcom’s franchise. It goes beyond being an homage to a classic game and ventures into “clone” territory, where the player character looks like a chibi against Resident Evil hero Chris Redfield, solving puzzles in a mansion that also has a secret laboratory, killing zombies, using item boxes, mixing green herbs, and finally fighting a boss enemy that looks like the spitting image of Nemesis on the box art. In the game, Heaven Dust’s Nemesis looks more like the Tyrant from the first Resident Evil game or even William Birkin from Resident Evil 2, complete with what appears to be a large eyeball on its chest. Predictably, it all ends in a self-destructive sequence. Heaven Dust is an obvious Resident Evil clone, but since the game is essentially a bite-sized, downgraded version of Resident Evil, one has to wonder what the point of playing it is. After all, the classic Resident Evil games are readily available on modern consoles, and they do everything Heaven Dust does but better. Heaven Dust presents itself as a downgraded take on the Resident Evil franchise and that’s exactly what it is. There are some fun puzzles and old-school Resident Evil fans can start exploring the mansion and find all the similarities between it and the Capcom franchise, but otherwise it’s hard to have a reason to like of most survival-horror enthusiasts. to play it. Heaven Dust is out now for PC, Switch, and Xbox One. Today Technology reviewed the game on Xbox One.