Cronos: The New Dawn Review

bloober team, cronos: the new dawn

If you’ve been a fan of single-player survival horror, there has been no shortage of choices over the past decade. From remaking classics like Resident Evil, Silent Hill 2, and Dead Space, to indie titles like Karma: The Dark World and Dead Of Darkness, there’s plenty to enjoy in the genre.

Anyone who knows me knows I love Silent Hill and was basically in love with Silent Hill 2 Remake last year. With that said, when I was offered the chance to review the new game by Bloober Team, the devs responsible for that remake, I was in.

The media seems hell-bent on comparing it to Dead Space, and while I can see the vibes from the trailers out there, I was left wondering how it measured up to all those old horror game franchises. So the question is, does it?

What’s Going On?

Cronos: The New Dawn takes place after an event called “The Change” that more or less infected people and turned them into what are called Orphans, which are creepy-looking mutant creatures. You will take on your adventure as “The Traveler”, and as said “Traveler”, you work for an organization known as the Collective. As such, you will jump through time rifts that will transport you to the past of 1980s-era Poland to complete your “adventure”Vocation”.

You’ll use a device to harvest people’s “essence” to give yourself a leg up against your enemies, but you must keep in mind you’ll only be able to hold so many at a time, so choose wisely when it comes to the edge each essence will give you in combat.

Gameplay

If you’ve played any of the Resident Evil remakes or the Dead Space Remake, this game is more or less in the same vein as that. Over-the-shoulder 3rd person view. You upgrade your suit by collecting cores and using them at shops found at outposts. The weapons are upgraded by collecting energy and doing the same as with the Traveler’s shell, her suit.

The creature design is actually probably where the game is closest to Dead Space, in my opinion. Some of them do look pretty similar to Necromorphs. That said, the space suit is kinda where that starts and stops for me. While it plays similarly, so do many other games in the same genre, and there's no zero-G gameplay like in Dead Space. If you’re looking for something that feels like a Dead Space sequel, I don’t think you’ll find it here.

When it comes to the previously mentioned “Orphans” there’s enough variety when it comes to them that you won’t get bored with the gameplay, and there are definitely a few that are impactful enough to give you a jump scare or two.

The game does start out a little slow as the variety in combat isn’t quite there from the beginning, but as you collect new weapons, level them up and learn more, that does improve as the game ramps up.

I may get some pushback, but I believe Cronos is a throwback to the classics of the genre. In a lot of situations, particularly boss fights, there’s a good chance you're going to die, sometimes a lot, as you learn different enemies’ moves and abilities. Oh, and be warned, there is no easy mode (in fact, there’s no difficulty mode at all til you beat the game).

Also, for those who love cute things. The cat petting in the trailer isn’t just there for show. Petting them is in the game; Cronos will keep track of all the ones you’ve interacted with, and they will be kept in a room you can go back to later.

Performance (CPU: Intel i9900k GPU:AMD 7800xt)

I have to say I’m a bit shocked about what I’m going to put in this section. This game was built in Unreal Engine 5. Every engine has its issues. UE5, however, has a habit of having what I call getting on the “stutter struggle bus.” Basically, at random intervals, it will almost feel like the game skips. Many games do this, but games built in UE5 seem to have a bad case of it.

However, I’m happy to report I dealt with absolutely none of that with this game. The only bug I dealt with was in one section, I got stuck in a vehicle that had some ammo and the like in it. For some reason, when the notification saying I couldn’t pick them up came up, I couldn’t get out of the vehicle. Thankfully, this resolved itself when the notification went away.

That aside, performance was pretty great. For the most part, I got between 80-100fps at 1440p high settings while running Intel’s Xess upscaler. You can stay above 100fps using FSR3 and frame gen. However, some games can get slightly muddy-looking with FSR, and this game is guilty of it.

Conclusion:

Cronos: The New Dawn is born of the same vein as some of the more classic single player horror games, and while the game definitely plays like a lot of the more recent entries it’s still its own thing. It borrows from a lot of them for sure, but there is a really good story here. The gameplay is right in line with the most recent horror remakes we've been getting lately, all while being able to borrow from past versions of those games by being tough but fair. There was also enough weapon and enemy variety where I felt in suspense and at the ready to kill whatever and whoever I needed to.

I feel the need to point out that while I see why the Dead Space comparison is there gameplay-wise, I felt it had more in common with Resident Evil and Silent Hill, for what that’s worth.

The one thing that dragged this down a little bit is that while I loved the gameplay, the story was a bit slow to start, and it picked up in the latter half of the game. This is the one area I felt it could have used a little work, but it’s still good, especially as I am the type of player who values gameplay over story. All in all, I loved my time with the game and can’t wait to see what Bloober Team has up for us next.