For first person shooters, the Nintendo Switch isn’t always my first choice. But after playing more of them recently, I was excited to see what RICO London had in store. Developed by Ground Shatter and published by Numskull Games and Aksys Games, this title is actually a sequel to 2019’s RICO. This is the first I heard of the franchise so I’m sorry to say I have not played the original.
RICO London takes place in 1999 and on the eve of the new millennium. You play as detective Redfern, who finds herself at the belly of the beast. A huge high-rise tower filled with criminals on every floor. Like some crazy action hero from the 90s, she takes it upon herself to take down every single one of them. While this is can be played co-op, I went through the game all on my own. Your objective is to make your way to the top of the tower and clearing each floor along the way.
You have the option of a small handful of weapons; guns, rifles, and even some throwable objects like knives. I particularly enjoyed the throwable knives since they were almost a guaranteed 1-hit kill. When breaching doors, you’re given a brief moment of a slo-mo effect to help you get the drop on your enemies and maybe perfect your headshots. The art style is very basic and kind of plain, but it also fits in a comic book style esthetic I think they were going for. There is even fun comic book writing popping up in front of your enemies as you kill them. Similar to comic book sound effects or when Adam West’s Batman fought bad guys.
From looking into the previous game, it seems like a lot of features are unfortunately removed, a lot of which is what made the first RICO so special and unique. There are many that say this sequel is way more basic and streamlined, having not played the first myself, I cannot confirm, but it seemed worth noting. While the overall concept and idea of the game all seem like a great recipe for a good time, I’m sorry to say by the end of playing the campaign (which will only take you a few hours) I was left very underwhelmed by my experience.
Finding med kits to replenish health, or even using a syringe when you are shot down is cool, but it really seemed like the ratio of med kits spread throughout each floor was very inconsistent. There would be floors where I couldn’t find any and others where there’s way more than I needed. Another inconsistency I noticed was when enemies attacked me with melee weapons. There were several times where I felt like I lost health before the enemy even finished their swing at me. This can be a serious issue when you are running really low on health. I felt cheated getting killed when I felt I had the upper hand on my enemy.
The difficulties ranges and it’s cool that they have a permadeath option for the highly skilled gamers, but when replaying stages there isn’t any variation. Apparently, in the first game when playing stages enemy encounters are more random. With this one, they are pretty much the same. For me, this kind of kills any excitement one would have for replay ability. With a short and not a very enjoyable campaign and a lack of any incentives to keep the player engaged to keep playing afterword, RICO London is a tough game to recommend. Especially after finding out this title has a $50-dollar price tag! This would be slightly easier to recommend if the price equaled to the experience. I wouldn’t go near it until it’s under $15.
5/10
For more information on the North American edition, visit www.aksysgames.com/ricolondon.
Gaming since I was given an original Nintendo as a kid. I love great storytelling and unique ingenuity. When both collide in a single game, I'm a happy gamer. Twitter/IG @NickNavarro87
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