Game Review--The Persistence (Switch)

"Nothing prepares you for deep space . . . the vastness of it all.  Some say it makes them feel small, insignificant.  I can't say I share that feeling.  I helped make this ship, The Persistence.  She feels like mine . . . all that power.  How could anyone feel insignificant next to all that possibility?  I have one hope to save her, to save myself . . ."

--Serena, The Persistence

Full of challenge, The Persistence lives up to its name: you will likely die again and again and need plenty of persistence to reach the end of the campaign.  It first debuted on the PlayStation VR as a game that can be played with or without the PS4's virtual reality add-on.  Last year, it came to the Switch, complete with VR-like controls that complete tasks by just looking at items.  This horror shooter boasts some of the most clever in-game justifications possible for its respawn mechanic and procedurally generated rooms even as it does very little to vary up the gameplay grind as the campaign goes on.

Production Values

The Switch is not as powerful as the PS4 and does not have a VR component for major game releases, so the experience of playing The Persistence is different on the Switch than it would be on the PS4.  Colorful enemies and futuristic rooms (that are shifting around due to a "macrostructure" design glitch, hence the procedurally generated main floors of the ship) still are right at home on the hybrid handheld-docked console, even though the game is far less immersive without VR.  The VR origins can still be seen in the simplicity of the controls.  As mentioned above, looking at something can trigger an activity, like opening a door, obtaining health, or using a computer terminal.  A teleportation feature also seems like it was originally conceived of as a way to provide more mobility despite the very unconventional nature of virtual reality games.  Both of these simplify the gameplay, which leads right into the next section of this review.

Gameplay

Regular gun use might be a more plausible approach later on, but stealth is vital early in the game for those who want to avoid death while gathering the resources needed to repeatedly upgrade.  Once they can be more consistently purchased, the weapons are very useful and diverse, ranging from a teleportation device with a buzz saw that cuts through enemies as you teleport to a rage serum that temporarily provides immense physical strength to a revolver that can kill some enemies in one shot.  Then there are more stealth-friendly options like a knife that quietly and instantly kills any living enemy, as well as a device that slows perceptions of time so that you can run past enemies or fight them while they can scarcely move.

New weapons can be created using Fabricators, machines that require Fabrication Chips found throughout the starship.  Stem cells can also be amassed and must be used if the player wants to switch to alternate characters upon respawning once their DNA is recovered or if upgrades are to be purchased improving Zimri's health, melee damage, stealth aptitude, and dark matter meter.  Both kinds of pickups can be found very easily.  Stem cells can be extracted from living enemies with stealth kills from behind--or even by teleporting around attacking foes or pushing them back with the shield and taking them during combat.  The less damage has been done to an enemy, the more stem cells can be harvested.

Two short challenge modes are also available.  The first lets you choose a firearm type, all of which have unlimited ammunition, and has you clear 24 rooms with only a single unit of health and no shield.  If the slightest damage is incurred, you die!  The second has you sneak from room to room to reach an end point armed only with a knife.  Upon completing the campaign for the first time, extra campaign modes unlock that have a fixed number of lives or additional upgrades--but with a particularly dangerous enemy type constantly following you in the case of the latter.  The new game plus mode is the ideal path for players who crave even greater difficulty and more powerful weapons.

Story

Some spoilers are below.

A woman named Serena uses a cloning DNA printer on a stranded starcraft called The Persistence to bring a copy of fellow crew member Zimri to life after an accident.  The ship is printing modified humanoid beings, some with special abilities like energy blasts, threatening Serena's chances of setting the course for home.  Zimri can see a gravitational singularity outside of the ship upon being "printed," and Serena gives her five objectives necessary for escaping the singularity's pull and getting the duo back to Earth.  The pair communicates as Zimri moves from one deck to the next completing tasks, but the strange creatures on The Persistence attack her at every opportunity they have.

Intellectual Content

Puzzles are rare and the minimal dialogue hardly tackles the philosophical issues of cloning, leaving the strategic side of the gameplay and basic premise of the scientific kind of "resurrection" Zimri experiences as the most explicitly intellectual parts of The Persistence.  Of course, creating a clone with the same memories as the former Zimri is not true resurrection, as the clone is a separate being that happens to share memories with a now-dead woman.  A physical and phenomenological duplicate of a living thing cannot truly be the same being.  After all, the former person has died and is not the one experiencing life as the clone.  The cloning in the story's setup is still one of the most intelligent ways of acknowledging a respawn mechanic in a video game that I have ever seen.  It makes respawning a core part of the plot itself with a genuine narrative reason beyond just letting players retry an area by resuming from a previous save.

Conclusion

The Persistence brings some very unique twists on familiar video game elements that make the title stand out quite a bit for its sheer cleverness.  Its repetition, minimal story, and great difficulty also stand out.  The difficulty is not a drawback, just an aspect that some people will not be subjectively pleased by; the other two do hold it back overall.  Despite the very limited story, alternate campaign modes and separate challenge modes could extend the replay time significantly for those who enjoy it with particular fondness, and each of these modes is different enough that even non-completionists might want to try them out.  The Persistence, with its obvious successes and problems, still gives the Switch another port that shows how Nintendo's system can handle plenty of games from the more traditional consoles it came out around.

Content:

 1.  Violence:  Bodies can be found with blood nearby, and attacking enemies also results in blood appearing.

 2.  Profanity:  "Fuck," "bastard," "damn," and "shit" are used, mostly when Zimri becomes conscious after dying and being cloned again.