Redfall
What to Know
Average Score
- April 28, 2023
- Arkane Austin
- Action, Shooter
Critics Consensus
- In-Game Purchases
- Users Interact
- April 28, 2023
- Action, Shooter
- In-Game Purchases
- Users Interact
Critics Consensus
# Reviews: 97
Redfall has a lot of charm, but rampant technical issues, uninspired combat, and dreadful AI make the game a huge disappointment and marked departure from Arkane's usual standards.
Rate and Review
Critic Reviews for Redfall
Critic Reviews
Score Distribution
97
Reviews
Ranges
Right now Redfall is not the game I’d expected, certainly not following the excellent Deathloop, but you can check back with us later this week for our final assessment.
Immersive sim meets four-player co-op in this vampire themed first person shooter that features competent gunplay but a lack of ingenuity in its challenges.
If this tone takes center stage in the back half of the story, combined with plot developments that add some momentum to the proceedings, it may be easier to overlook the game’s weaker aspects and appreciate it as a compelling narrative work. At this point, though, the town of Redfall is sucked too dry of liveliness for players to be invested in whether its vampires triumph or not.
Luke Reilly (IGN)
Not Recommended - (Read Review)
Right now Redfall is not the game I’d expected, certainly not following the excellent Deathloop, but you can check back with us later this week for our final assessment.
Nick Gillett (Metro GameCentral)
6/10 - (Read Review)
Immersive sim meets four-player co-op in this vampire themed first person shooter that features competent gunplay but a lack of ingenuity in its challenges.
Reid McCarter (Polygon)
Not Recommended - (Read Review)
If this tone takes center stage in the back half of the story, combined with plot developments that add some momentum to the proceedings, it may be easier to overlook the game’s weaker aspects and appreciate it as a compelling narrative work. At this point, though, the town of Redfall is sucked too dry of liveliness for players to be invested in whether its vampires triumph or not.
Outlet | Author | Score | Date | Quote | Read |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
33bits | Juanma F. Padilla | 75 / 100 | 05-02-2023 | Redfall will surely not go down in the annals of Arkane Studios great works, nor will it become a console seller. It seems, in fact, a video game typical of more modest companies with errors and lack of optimization more typical of small independent companies. Beyond this, Redfall can give us hours of fun. The setting is attractive and the game can shine at times, even if it doesn’t stand out in any particular way. | Read review |
3DNews | Алексей Лихачев | 3 / 10 | 05-13-2023 | When Arkane releases a new game, it’s always a celebration. But not this time. It’s rare to see a new game from a big publisher of which you can’t come up with anything good to say. | Read review |
ACG | Jeremy Penter | Not Recommended | 05-01-2023 | Redfall is uninspired, unpolished, and mostly unfun. A game that doesn’t merge two ideas but instead separates them so much they still feel like 2 different games | Read review |
Areajugones | Ramón Baylos | 7.4 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | Redfall is an open-world game that retains some of the greatest virtues of Arkane’s design, but is weighed down by certain issues related to the genre to which it belongs. Possibly it will be a game that becomes something much bigger in the future, but finishing it has left me with mixed feelings. Right now I feel that, despite its successes, what shines most about Redfall is the promise of what it could become… And I don’t know if this ends up speaking well or badly of the game. | Read review |
Atomix | Alexis Patiño | 69 / 100 | 05-04-2023 | Redfall was conceived with a bunch of promises around it, the real vampiric apocalypse is that it coulnd’t hold up to any of those. Looking as a last get game with loading textures and an incredibly dumb AI. This game looks more like a concept or an alpha version than a Microsoft Game Studios final product. | Read review |
Attack of the Fanboy | Christian Bognar | 3.5 / 5 stars | 05-02-2023 | In no way is Redfall groundbreaking | Read review |
AusGamers | Kosta Andreadis | 5 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | And so this once sleepy locale has been turned into a gothic hellscape, where citizens are hiding, and cultists are working with their vampire overlords to appease the more powerful vampire gods. | Read review |
BaziCenter | Farzan Mihanzadeh | 5 / 10 | 05-19-2023 | As much as we love Arkane Studios and their works, Redfall exceptionally disappoints in almost every aspect, and it seems that there is still a long way ahead for Arkane to polish all the issues up to the standards. | Read review |
But Why Tho? | Charles Hartford | 6 / 10 | 05-04-2023 | Redfall never manages to be anything more than fine. My time playing through its single-player campaign rarely wowed me once the skillful crafting of the world itself wore off. | Read review |
Cerealkillerz | Steve Brieller | 7.8 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | Storywise Arkane Austin nails their presentation about the vampire infested small village Redfall. Graphic and audio design are very fitting with B-Movie flair. Sadly the game doesn’t deliver that many highlights besides very basic open-world co-op shooter gameplay. Even though, four different classes, a small skilltree and several weaponoptions are provided the gameplay loop doesn’t get much more than shooting at everything that moves. Using gamepass or waiting for a sale is recommended. | Read review |
CGMagazine | Dayna Eileen | 7 / 10 | 05-05-2023 | Redfall is an entertaining, albeit shallow, romp in the FPS genre solo or with a team. Though PC seems to be performing less than favourably and next-gen consoles aren’t being pushed to their true capabilities, the game remains functional, fun and occasionally frightening. | Read review |
Checkpoint Gaming | Elliot Attard | 5 / 10 | 05-01-2023 | Redfall is an interesting concept with some valid ideas, some cool lore, and some great moments driven by solid visual design and a knack for leaning into the supernatural. But with a vapid and dull open world, bad mission design, constant backtracking, and a plethora of performance issues—this release ends up sucking the life out of you one glitch at a time. | Read review |
COGconnected | Mark Steighner | 78 / 100 | 05-01-2023 | I had fun playing Redfall, both solo and with friends. There’s a definite Salem’s Lot vibe to a New England town oppressed by a vampire apocalypse. All the characters are interesting to play and the monsters are varied. Still, Redfall does not revolutionize the open-world shooter, or even really evolve Arkane Austin’s by-now familiar formula. Redfall feels like the product of a reliable game plan that’s due for an update. | Read review |
Destructoid | Eric Van Allen | 5 / 10 | 05-08-2023 | I really spent most of my time playing Redfall thinking about what else Redfall could have been. I like that Arkane tried something new, and I’m bummed it came out like this. It’s a really unique premise and concept in its first bite, but its fangs don’t leave a lasting mark. | Read review |
Dexerto | Patrick Dane | 2 / 5 stars | 05-01-2023 | Redfall is one of the worst-performing games I’ve played in years, and even when it’s working, it’s undercooked and uninspired. It’s impossible to say if this is the case, but Refall ‘feels’ like a game that has succumbed to too much compromise. There’s a world where there’s a great version of this concept, complete with a much grander vision, however, we sadly don’t live in that timeline. | Read review |
Digital Chumps | Nathaniel Stevens | 5.5 / 10 | 05-08-2023 | To say that Redfall needs major work to fix some balancing issues would be a bit of an understatement. For a game that had so much hype during its development and was supposed to be the first big game of 2023 for the Xbox family that wasn’t called Halo or Forza, it has fallen short in its delivery. There are quite a few issues with Redfall, lots of unbalance in gameplay, and plenty to correct before it can be considered a permanent and worthwhile IP. | Read review |
Digital Spy | Jess Lee | 2 / 5 stars | 05-10-2023 | Redfall isn’t as unplayable as some of the most intense reaction might lead you to believe. That said, we found it to be a rather mindless experience, often finding ourselves going through the motions. And when considering how it falls short in ways we wouldn’t have expected from an Arkane title, the game is sadly a disappointment. | Read review |
Digital Trends | Tomas Franzese | 2 / 5 stars | 05-03-2023 | Redfall makes concessions to work as a middling multiplayer game at the expense of a promising single-player experience. | Read review |
DualShockers | Robert Zak | 8.5 / 10 | 05-01-2023 | Redfall is an open-world shooter where you can creep through a spooky mansion alone at night, then link up with some friends to take on a giga-vampire in another dimension. It’s weird, and it’s the right kind of weird. | Read review |
Easy Allies | Michael Huber | 2.5 / 5 stars | 05-07-2023 | Redfall misses the mark with nearly everything it does, while wasting a solid premise and setting. | Read review |
Eurogamer | Christian Donlan | Not Recommended | 05-05-2023 | Arkane’s vampire thriller is muddled and deeply compromised, but has moments of real charm. | Read review |
Everyeye.it | Giuseppe Carrabba | 6 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | Without mincing words, Redfall would have needed a more extensive development cycle, and a bit of courage in the realization of the structure. | Read review |
Game Informer | Alex Van Aken | 5 / 10 | 05-08-2023 | Looking at the world of Redfall, I become sad by its wasted potential. For every great location, there are a handful of forgettable ones. The result is an empty-feeling game with several puzzling problems, like a lack of proper stealth takedowns, a tedious quest and waypoint system, and the inability to pause gameplay in single-player mode. Rampant technical issues hinder brighter moments, including frequent server crashes during multiplayer, inputs failing to work, broken animations, and numerous other bugs that make playing Redfall a frustrating experience. For a game about fighting the undead, Redfall feels soulless in all the wrong ways. | Read review |
Game Rant | Joshua Duckworth | 3.5 / 5 stars | 05-01-2023 | Redfall is ultimately a fun experience thanks to the world, the enemies, and the gunplay itself, but as a whole, it’s an incredibly shallow one too. Because of this, some may question whether it’s worth the price tag, but it’s noteworthy that Redfall is launching on Xbox Game Pass. It feels like the game is designed for the service, with an experience that is easily digestible, is full of simple mindless fun, and is easy to move on from. | Read review |
Gameblog | Sélénos | 4 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | Between the failed infiltration and dreary fights, Redfall leaves us with a particularly bitter taste. | Read review |
GameCrate | Derek Swinhart | 3.5 / 10 | 05-10-2023 | There are so many things wrong with Redfall; every element feels plagued by poor decision-making. The visuals are dated and buggy, the story is paper-thin and filled with annoying archetypes, and the gameplay is floaty, unsatisfying, and generic. Don’t even get me started on the atrocious AI, which can’t even make its way around basic objects. If Redfall was truly developed by the Arkane Studios I love so much; it must have been under difficult circumstances. Rarely do games like this exist without low budgets, tons of studio interference, and short development cycles. I don’t blame Arkane, and nobody should, but Microsoft needs to rethink their entire strategy if this is what we can expect from their AAA exclusives going forward. Keep the casket closed for this one. | Read review |
Gamefa | Mohammad Reza Nowroozi | 5 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | The idea of fighting vampires in a world designed by arkane sounded exciting, but unfortunately, Redfall cannot meet the 2-year wait of fans and becomes a one-time and forgettable experience. Numerous technical problems, lack of innovation and outdated gameplay are some of the problems that ruin the experience. For now, maybe the existence of the game on Game Pass can be the only reason to justify playing this title and it might entertain you for a short period of time. | Read review |
GameGrin | Violet Plata | 7.5 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | Redfall’s a great title with lots to do throughout its world, but the lifelessness of the NPCs and story alongside the amounts of bugs and the steep entering fee, I can’t assume it’ll be for everyone. | Read review |
GameMAG | Unknown | 3 / 10 | 05-07-2023 | Redfall is a broken mess that serves as the worst kind of Xbox Series X|S representation and a huge stain on Microsoft, Bethesda and Arkane’s reputation going forward. | Read review |
GamePro | Kevin Itzinger | 56 / 100 | 05-03-2023 | Even apart from the technical problems, Redfall doesn’t manage to convince in any way or to reach the quality of other genre representatives. | Read review |
Gamerheadquarters | Jason Stettner | 2 / 10 | 05-09-2023 | Redfall is an empty mess, an embarrassment of the Xbox platform and a completely mundane exercise in insanity. | Read review |
Gamers Heroes | Johnny Hurricane | 5 / 10 | 05-03-2023 | Redfall is a fantastic idea that just doesn’t pan out. Clunky combat, horrible AI, and boring gameplay make this one an easy pass. | Read review |
Gamersky | 心灵奇兵 | 6 / 10 | 03-02-2023 | Redfall is a letdown. Arkane Studios’ signature immersive simulation and level design are nowhere to be found in the game. Instead, their typical poor shooting experience, lack of polish, and rough performance issues are present in the game, which is a little too rebellious. | Read review |
GAMES.CH | Joel Kogler | 60 / 100 | 05-05-2023 | Arkane Studio’s Redfall stretches the very definition of what a finished game should be. It’s unfinished, unpolished and uninspired in almost every regard. It feels like a dye prototype years from a full release. The few moments of Arkane’s magic, when visual design of the vampires, some fun weapons and frantic co-op gameplay come together are quickly overshadowed by catastrophic bugs, bad performance and an empty-lifeless shell of a game. | Read review |
GameSkinny | Thomas Wilde | 6 / 10 | 05-01-2023 | Redfall’s fun with friends, but there are a few problems with the formula. | Read review |
GameSpew | Richard Seagrave | 5 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | After some updates, Redfall may well become a Game Pass must-play, whether you like to play alone or with others. But right now, while you can have fun with it if you grit your teeth and give it some leeway, it’s very hard to wholeheartedly recommend. While some issues here are likely to persist even once the title has been polished up a little, such as the world feeling too empty at times and skill trees being underwhelming, it’s the technical problems that are the stake to Redfall‘s heart. | Read review |
GameSpot | Mark Delaney | 4 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | Arkane takes a stab at infusing the genre du jour with its signature style, but the end results are a bloody mess. | Read review |
GamesRadar+ | Sam Loveridge | 2.5 / 5 stars | 05-02-2023 | Redfall is ultimately not up to Arkane’s usual standards. It feels rushed, unfinished, and unsatisfying to play. | Read review |
Gaming Nexus | Eric Hauter | 7.4 / 10 | 05-01-2023 | Redfall is a bigger and much more deliberately paced game than I was expecting. Fun in multiplayer, I found that I enjoyed it even more solo. Creeping around with a sniper rifle, shooting vamps with stake launchers from afar, I was able to play Redfall as a stealth game, which was highly enjoyable. Some technical issues still need to be ironed out, but there is a lot of fun here for folks that vibe with the spooky open world. | Read review |
GamingBolt | Shubhankar Parijat | 5 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | Redfall is Arkane’s most underwhelming game to date. A fascinating setting and some remnants of the developer’s beloved gameplay formula aren’t enough to overcome the game’s numerous issues, from stiff controls and disappointingly rote design choices to lackluster storytelling and technical deficiencies. | Read review |
GamingTrend | David Burdette, Anthony Shelton | 35 / 100 | 05-01-2023 | Redfall resembles the vampires it’s based on. It lacks identity, and sucks the life out of you. Every time I see a spark of potential, it’s stomped out by bugs, braindead AI, and an empty world not worth exploring. I wish Arkane well in their next endeavor, because they need to let this one die. | Read review |
Geek Culture | Jake Su | 5.1 / 10 | 05-03-2023 | Ultimately, Redfall could have been a great way for Arkane to branch out in its development philosophies and strategies, but the final product leaves too much to be desired. Instead of turning players into willing thralls of exciting combat and teamwork, dropped into an engaging world full of treasures, what we have got is the opposite. Everything fans love about the studio’s work is sorely missing in this nightmare, and that is but a stake through the heart of a risk not worth taking. | Read review |
Generación Xbox | Pedro del Pozo | 7 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | The best word to describe it is that “it is a very simple game”. Redfall is fun, but not exciting. The formula is there, waiting to be polished, covered in a thick layer of dust full of bugs, poor animations and missing features. As a fan of Arkane, they’ll have me first in line when they buff it. A server is very given to getting hooked on products of this style, which I end up loving, but you also have to admit and explain where they have been wrong, because a good review is also an opportunity for improvement. My advice is the obvious: try it on Xbox Game Pass for yourself and judge. More than one of you will be surprised… for better or for worse. | Read review |
God is a Geek | Chris White | 6 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | Redfall is hampered by issues like poor AI, texture pop-ins, and bland missions, meaning its stronger moments are overshadowed. | Read review |
Guardian | Rick Lane | 2 / 5 stars | 05-04-2023 | Despite occasional flourishes, Arkane’s latest game feels fundamentally at odds with itself | Read review |
Hardcore Gamer | Jordan Helm | 2 / 5 stars | 05-02-2023 | From a studio having delivered far better and should in all likelihood have done so once more, Redfall is an uncharacteristically poor and cobbled-together brand of tedium. | Read review |
Hey Poor Player | Shane Boyle | 2 / 5 stars | 04-01-2023 | In all my years of gaming, I struggle to think of ever feeling a sense of disappointment as profound as I do when playing Redfall. Sure, you can increase the fun factor by adding a few buddies into the equation, the varied classes lending themselves well to group play, and there are glimpses of something great when you’re afforded the opportunity to slow down in one of the more tightly scripted missions, but these positives merely serve as momentary distractions from the multitude of issues that plague Arkane Austin’s latest effort. Between the half-baked gameplay loops, repetitive open-world busy work, and shockingly poor optimization, Redfall feels like a title that’s still in alpha, never mind a product that’s supposed to represent a flagship release for Microsoft’s premium subscription service. | Read review |
Hobby Consolas | David Rodriguez | 78 / 100 | 05-01-2023 | Redfall will be a good game for when all the technical problems that launch treasures are fixed. Arkane’s good hand in terms of setting and gameplay is moved to the background due to errors and failures and despite everything, this exclusive is very fun, despite innovating rather little. | Read review |
IGN | Luke Reilly | 4 / 10 | 05-01-2023 | Redfall is a bafflingly bad time across the board. Plagued with bland missions, boneheaded enemies, and repeated technical problems, Redfall simply wasn’t ready for daylight in this state. | Read review |
IGN Italy | Francesco Destri | 6.5 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | In Redfall, Arkane’s trademark can only be seen in places, and the end result, while not entirely awful, falls far short of what we expected from the return to the scenes of Prey’s creators. | Read review |
IGN Spain | Rafa Del Río | 8 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | Redfall becomes Arkane’s most fun game: no moral dilemmas, no existential doubts and totally enjoyable both with friends and alone. | Read review |
Impulsegamer | Stephen Heller | Not Recommended | 07-07-2023 | Because you shouldn’t play Redfall. It is a middling game at best, but at worst it will take precious time away from other games, hobbies, or conversations you could be having that will hold so much more meaning than this release. | Read review |
INDIANTVCZ | Jan Kalný | 4 / 10 | 05-06-2023 | Redfall, simply put, is a disappointment. What else can be said? In the end, uninteresting gameplay, untapped potential, boring or first-rate systems… We don’t know what went wrong in Arkane Austin. But this really isn’t the game we expected from them. Or anyone, for that matter. | Read review |
Jump Dash Roll | Derek Johnson | 5 / 10 | 05-09-2023 | Redfall, with its mediocre gameplay, forgettable story and generic visuals, comes closer to destroying Arkane’s legacy than it does to being a properly enjoyable video game. | Read review |
LevelUp | Luis Sánchez | 4 / 10 | 05-10-2023 | Redfall is an amalgamation of ideas from other more popular video games, however, lacking in its own originality and entertainment value. | Read review |
Merlin’in Kazanı | Samet Basri Taşlı | 55 / 100 | 05-05-2023 | Redfall is a game that has wasted its potential as a fun co-op game in an interesting world, with both technical problems and poor game design choices. | Read review |
Metro GameCentral | Nick Gillett | 6 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | Immersive sim meets four-player co-op in this vampire themed first person shooter that features competent gunplay but a lack of ingenuity in its challenges. | Read review |
Niche Gamer | Augusto A. | 8 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | It still feels a bit unfinished in some aspects, but it has a good amount of content that is bound to have you hooked for 20 hours or so, maybe longer considering how addicted you get to clearing the vampire nests like I did. | Read review |
NoesPaisparaFrikis | David Valero | 7 / 10 | 05-23-2023 | Redfall has been somewhat disappointing | Read review |
Oyungezer Online | Onur Kaya | 6 / 10 | 05-03-2023 | Redfall is proof that Arkane’s familiar design habits don’t fit well into the open-world formula, especially when there are raw online elements involved. That’s why it’s by far Arkane Studios’ worst game. | Read review |
PC Gamer | Tyler Colp | 44 / 100 | 05-04-2023 | Redfall’s empty open world, flimsy shooting, and siloed systems make for a flat, dull experience. | Read review |
PC Invasion | Sam Robins | 4 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | Redfall is an initially compelling game, but once it bears its teeth the sheer lack of quality propped up by unfinished ideas is abundantly clear. | Read review |
PCGamesN | Andrew Farrell | 7 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | As long as you don’t mind the truly daft AI making things a bit mindless, Redfall is a good-enough co-op action game, but it makes me sad for the vampire-hunting immersive sim Arkane could’ve delivered. | Read review |
Polygon | Reid McCarter | Not Recommended | 05-01-2023 | If this tone takes center stage in the back half of the story, combined with plot developments that add some momentum to the proceedings, it may be easier to overlook the game’s weaker aspects and appreciate it as a compelling narrative work. At this point, though, the town of Redfall is sucked too dry of liveliness for players to be invested in whether its vampires triumph or not. | Read review |
PowerUp! | Leo Stevenson | 6 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | Redfall is not the second coming of first-party AAA games on Xbox and it was never going to be. It’s an average co-op shooter with half-baked ideas that never fully come together. It’s fun for a few minutes but it wears thin very quickly. Give it a try on Game Pass but don’t expect too much. | Read review |
Press Start | Brodie Gibbons | 6.5 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | Redfall is a gold dust-rare miss for what has been a very consistent deliverer of quality video games. If you are able to look beyond the game’s several questionable design choices, Redfall can serve up just a small bite of mindless fun beneath the island’s black hole sun. | Read review |
Rock, Paper, Shotgun | Ed Thorn | Not Recommended | 05-05-2023 | A hollow open world FPS which feels more like you’re playing through an already abandoned live service, as opposed to a fully supported one. | Read review |
Saudi Gamer | خالد أحمد | 5 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | Redfall may be Arkane’s first disappointing game! This is not because the studio moved away from what distinguished it in its previous games, but rather through the game itself as an open-world game that did not offer anything special and did not try to move away from the issues of this type of game that has been criticized in many games since the beginning of the last generation. And on top of that the fact that the game is technically tragic, and it is preferable to wait for a lot of updates to fix its problems, whether from technical issues or wobbly performance. | Read review |
Saving Content | Scott Ellison II | 2 / 5 stars | 05-05-2023 | Redfall is a far cry from Arkane’s usual work, and it’s sad to see this is the final product from this team. The writing is the best part, but nothing about it can save this from being a mediocre game that can’t manage to do more than one thing at a time, whether it be an immersive sim, an open-world game, or even an RPG. Try as I might, I can’t find enjoyment in this, or even continue to play a game that looks and feels this incomplete for its $70 price tag. Redfall is playable, but in the most threadbare way, as it’s a shell of a game that will exhaust you long before the credits roll. And like vampires are wont to do, Redfall sucks. | Read review |
Screen Rant | Jason Hon | 3.5 / 5 stars | 05-01-2023 | There is a lot to enjoy with Arkane’s latest, even if some aspects don’t feel as fleshed out as they could be. The game looks and plays great on PC with several graphics options, including performance and ultra-performance modes. Although the gameplay could use more variation, the locations and enemies in Redfall are a lot of fun to experience with friends. Redfall does more right than wrong in a gaming genre filled with multiplayer shooters competing for limited screen time | Read review |
SECTOR.sk | Peter Dragula | 6.5 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | Arkane Studios brought co-op in the world of vampires, but the game does not reach the quality of the titles Dishonored, Deadhloop, Prey, for which autors became famous. | Read review |
Shacknews | Bill Lavoy | 5 / 10 | 05-31-2023 | I wanted desperately to find a good game underneath all the bugs in Redfall, and every now and then a tiny ray of light would shine through and give me hope. I took my time to give it a fair opportunity where others wrote it off only a few hours in. Unfortunately, they were right, and this will go down as one of the more disappointing games that I’ve played in recent years. All we can hope for now is that Redfall’s disastrous journey serves as a warning to Microsoft and its stable of development studios. Not because the world’s second-largest company can’t take the hits, but because players deserve better. | Read review |
Skill Up | Ralph Panebianco | Not Recommended | 05-03-2023 | Video Review | Read review |
Slant Magazine | Steven Scaife | 2 / 5 stars | 05-08-2023 | The more fantastical elements of Redfall fail to impress, but the everyday detail of its setting manages to shine through, surfacing little stories left in the wreckage. The problem is that, even if you’re willing to dig for those moments, they’re still overshadowed by the glimpses of another, larger story: the one that explains how Redfall came to be released in such a state as this. | Read review |
SomHráč.sk | Denis Burčík | 55 / 100 | 05-13-2023 | Redfall doesn’t offer much else than an empty world, a lot of bugs, high price point and terrible performance. | Read review |
SpazioGames | Gianluca Arena | 7 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | Redfall shows some good ideas (especially in its level design), but they are not enough to compete with the brilliant previous works that Arkane gave birth to. | Read review |
Stevivor | Steve Wright | 7.5 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | Redfall is a truly exciting experience. It’s great solo, has the potential to be great with friends — especially if someone has a save so I can access that last 17 Gamerscore I need, thanks. It’ll be perfect for anyone who’s loved an Arkane game — sci-fi, fantasy or otherwise — in the past. | Read review |
Telegraph | Tom Hoggins | 2 / 5 stars | 05-09-2023 | Arkane’s open-world vampire shooter has some of the developer’s trademark spark, but is let down by an identity crisis and technical woes | Read review |
The Angry Joe Show | Joe Vargas | 2 / 10 | 05-24-2023 | Video Review | Read review |
The Games Machine | Gabriele Barducci | 5.8 / 10 | 05-04-2023 | Redfall is an indecipherable mess. Many technical problems destroy its playability, making it still fun when played with friends, but otherwise it is clearly an incomplete game. | Read review |
The Outerhaven Productions | Keith Mitchell | 3 / 5 stars | 05-02-2023 | For all its shortcomings, Redfall isn’t a bad game, a bit dated but not bad. | Read review |
TheSixthAxis | Dominic Leighton | Not Recommended | 05-02-2023 | The combination of open-world and supernatural foes has become increasingly wearisome in the last few years, and immediately after playing through Dead Island 2 I wasn’t particularly looking forward to Redfall. However, Arkane Austin should never be underestimated for putting their own spin on a genre, with Redfall offering enough surprises and memorable moments so far to set it apart from the open-world crowd. | Read review |
TrueAchievements | Luke Albiges | 3 / 5 stars | 05-02-2023 | There’s definitely a decent time to be had with Redfall (especially in co-op) in spite of some baffling design decisions, but given Arkane’s track record, it’s hard not to be deflated by what Redfall could have been compared to what it actually is. | Read review |
Twinfinite | Chris Jecks | 3 / 5 stars | 05-01-2023 | Redfall feels like a victim of the great, Game Pass machine. A game with heaps of style and potential that ultimately falls short in core areas like story, mission variety and technical performance. I can’t help shake the feeling development may have been rushed in order to fill a gap in the subscription service’s exclusives release schedule. It’s fun in parts and its wider potential occasionally manages to shine through, but it ultimately serves as another reminder that Microsoft’s first-party offerings still lag behind the best the industry has to offer. | Read review |
Use a Potion | Unknown | 6 / 10 | 05-11-2023 | Redfall is a bit of a technical mess right now, but there’s no doubting that behind the issues there’s a satisfying vampire-slaying romp for players to embark on. It won’t win points for originality with its gunplay and the missions can get repetitive, but between uncovering the sinister sights of the town, working with friends in rewarding co-op action, and utilising the wonderful abilities of your character, there is a good time to be had. | Read review |
VG247 | Jeremy Peel | Not Recommended | 05-02-2023 | An echo of Arkane’s past glories | Read review |
VGC | Jordan Oloman | 4 / 5 stars | 05-02-2023 | Redfall is a compelling adventure with killer combat and an atmospheric setting in which you can easily lose a weekend. Even though it feels watered down by Arkane’s systemic standards, it’s an ambitious, primarily successful experiment full of narrative nuance and unique ideas. Hopefully, Redfall’s shakeup of the genre will pave the way for more inspired looter shooters in the future and, selfishly… another immersive simulator? | Read review |
VGChartz | Lee Mehr | 3 / 10 | 06-07-2023 | Redfall’s grocery list of problems, from storytelling to open world design, are so extensive that it seems more humane to drive a stake through this beating heart – if you can find it. | Read review |
VideoGamer | Josh Wise | 7 / 10 | 05-01-2023 | Frankly, it’s a relief to see real neck-biters treated with the proper pulp care. Arkane Austin gets right to it: teeth, claws, and clear agendas. | Read review |
WayTooManyGames | Leonardo Faria | 4.5 / 10 | 09-24-2023 | Redfall might not be the worst game released in 2023, but I don’t think I have played something more uninspired. It looks dated, its performance is disappointing, its plot is bland, the controls are glitchy, and the entire gameplay loop is the most generic and passion-devoid AAA schtick you could think of. If Arkane clearly wasn’t willing to make this game, then why would any of us should or want to care about it? Not even the fact it’s on Gamepass makes it being worth downloading it and playing for a day or two. | Read review |
Wccftech | Alessio Palumbo | 6.8 / 10 | 05-07-2023 | With Redfall, Arkane strayed a bit too far from its roots and couldn’t nail the landing. While the core gameplay is fun, and there are moments of brilliance that harken back to Arkane’s glorious portfolio, most of the studio’s strengths clearly do not mesh well with the open world genre, as exemplified by the disappointing safe house missions. Additionally, the writing is very uneven, never succeeding in making the player care about any of the characters, and the co-op mode adds little substance. | Read review |
We Got This Covered | Ash Martinez | 4.5 / 5 stars | 05-01-2023 | With rich, beautiful open worlds, a multitude of weapons, and a wide variety of enemies to square off against, Redfall amazes. Players won’t regret staking their claim on Arkane’s latest masterpiece. | Read review |
WellPlayed | James Wood | 4.5 / 10 | 05-02-2023 | A disappointing take on open-world first-person shooters, Redfall has none of the flavour or mechanical finesse that we’ve come to expect from Arkane Studios. | Read review |
Windows Central | Jez Corden | 3 / 5 stars | 05-01-2023 | Redfall is a serviceable first-person open-world shooter with perhaps the most needless “RPG layer” in the history of always-online games. Tools that might make the sandbox more fun are arbitrarily spread across four separate playable class characters. Weapons you enjoy using will lose effectiveness as you “level up” with the game’s pointless progression system, which only hinders the otherwise interesting campaign. There are far too many similar shooters out there that simply do almost everything Redfall is trying to do, only far better. Redfall struggles to grasp an identity of its own in a very noisy market. While embers of fun do exist in Redfall, it’s maddening that this is the product of the legendary studio that gave us Prey. Arkane is very clearly out of its depth with Redfall. | Read review |
Worth Playing | Cody Medellin | 7 / 10 | 05-01-2023 | It’s a bit difficult to parse out the overall quality of Redfall. If you’re talking about it from a technical perspective, it’s scattershot but comes out better than some games that look and sound pretty but have terrible performance. If you’re looking at it from a story perspective, it’s a slow burn that cranks up things once you get close to beating the first major vampire, and the same can be said for the gameplay. Solo play is also better than co-op, based solely on the issues we ran into with connectivity, but mileage can vary. Overall, Redfall asks quite a bit of time from players before getting really good, which makes it perfect for Game Pass but tougher for those who don’t have the patience to spend the time to wade through the jank to reach that point. | Read review |
Xbox Achievements | Dan Webb | 60 / 100 | 05-01-2023 | Redfall is perhaps one of Bethesda and Arkane Austin’s most ordinary titles. A perfectly competent first-person shooter that does little to raise itself above the competition. The perfect Game Pass game that’s not worth the money, but is worth a casual weekend of play. | Read review |
ZTGD | Terrence Johnson | 7 / 10 | 05-01-2023 | It just makes no sense that Microsoft promotes this game as this grand co-op experience but then put in place every system known to man to hinder that process or make it harder than necessary; no quick match in a multiplayer game in 2023 is ridiculous. Sadly, Redfall is a prime example of what current day Xbox has become, the potential for greatness is there but they can’t get out of their own way to reach it. | Read review |
About Redfall
Redfall is an open-world co-op FPS from Arkane Austin, the award-winning team behind Prey and Dishonored. Continuing Arkane’s legacy of carefully crafted worlds and love of creative game mechanics, Redfall brings the studio’s signature gameplay to the co-operative action and FPS genres. The quaint island town of Redfall, Massachusetts, is under siege by a legion of vampires who have blocked out the sun and cut the island off from the outside world. Trapped with a handful of survivors against diabolical enemies threatening to bleed the town dry, choose your hero from a diverse roster, grouping up with others to create the perfect team of vampire slayers.
RELEASE DATES:
DEVELOPER(S):
- Arkane Austin
PUBLISHER(S):
- Xbox Game Studios
- Bethesda Softworks
GENRES:
- Action, Shooter
SERIES/FRANCHISE:
- n/a
GAME MODES:
- Co-operative, Multiplayer, Single player
GAME ENGINE:
- Unreal Engine 4
DLC:
- -
BUNDLED IN:
- -
DIRECTOR(S):
- Harvey Smith, Ricardo Bare
PRODUCER(S):
- -
DESIGNER(S):
- -
PROGRAMMER(S):
- -
ARTIST(S):
- -
WRITER(S):
- -
COMPOSER(S):
- -
GAME MODES:
- Co-operative, Multiplayer, Single player
GAME ENGINE:
- Unreal Engine 4
DLC:
- n/a
BUNDLED IN:
- n/a
DIRECTOR(S):
- Harvey Smith, Ricardo Bare
PRODUCER(S):
- n/a
DESIGNER(S):
- n/a
PROGRAMMER(S):
- n/a
ARTIST(S):
- n/a
WRITER(S):
- n/a
COMPOSER(S):
- n/a