Kong Survivor Instinct – Review

Dang, this game is a weird one. Kong: Survivor Instinct, released on October 22, 2024, for the PS4, PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC, is a game that holds the Monsterverse canon together as an in-between tie-in game whose impact we can only look forward to seeing come the movies.

The story is set with the premise of several Titans on the loose in the city, and going on a rampage: Kong being one among the few that were present, taking over their own areas of the city and causing mass destruction that sets everything in motion. You play as David Martin, an emergency responder on the road to search for his daughter, Stacy Martin after a call that was cut due to the Titans’ appearance, and drives off to begin his search. What mysteries will he learn from all this? Where could Stacy be? Was she kidnapped? Is she safe, or has she fallen victim to the Titans’ rampage? It’s up to you to uncover that mystery by playing through to the very end.

The gameplay is, to put it simply, feels more like a beat-em-up mixed with elements from both the classic Prince of Persia games and SETA’s obscure game Nosferatu what with the backtracking whenever you get an upgrade or a key item which opens new paths for you to explore to find other things such as increased health pickups or the ever-needed first-aid kits and bullets plus overcoming puzzles in the area, some of which require a bit of thinking outside of the box to solve, requiring you to observe your surroundings keenly to find the solution to proceed.

On the plus side, the game is responsive when a controller is used and even optimal to use on a game as tight as this. Looking back on the Prince of Persia analogy, the second game in the series to be specific, it feels as fast and as fun/frustrating as the second entry. As for the Nosferatu feel, sometimes the combat feels a bit delayed or if you press too fast, it feels as if it doesn’t register. The Metroidvania feel for it is minimal, as you won’t be needing to go back too much to find progression items but rather to find anything you skipped over such as a missing upgrade or a file you were not able to locate earlier during your search to find solutions to your current problem. As for the later parts of the game, learning mechanics and how to properly execute them is a must, especially during tense avoiding runs against a Titan in which a single mistake has you rolling all the way back to a checkpoint or from the very start if you’re unlucky.

The combat of the game is as tight as SETA’s Nosferatu on the SNES, and every mistake you make is entirely on you, making sure you learn from it once enemy numbers start going up. Messing up feels unfair and would oftentimes kill you, but it’s part of the learning process of the game’s mechanics as it progresses, from the first weapon you get to learning how the enemy mechanics and thought processes work, using it against them whenever you get flanked on either side via using your surroundings or even using your enemies against each other, enemy patterns are worthwhile to be studied if you want to do a one-life or even a one-sitting run at a later point.

The starting enemies with crowbars and large knives actually pose a threat from start to finish, and things escalate soon as enemies start coming with riot shields, pistols and shotguns, which add more flavors and frantic moments to the combat. You can even outsmart them by using stage hazards such as ledges, gasoline tanks and even poison pools later on in the game to defeat enemies, and knowing how to fully turn the tables on squads of enemies is key to progressing past a rather tough battle before a major movement in the story.

The music of this game is just nice to listen to, framing the somber solo moments of exploration and puzzle-solving, or even when small fights break out. Too bad there’s no stage clear or fight end music like the aforementioned Prince of Persia II, since the areas aren’t supposed to feel like stages but rather just zones you traverse. The soundtrack is good, but not something I’d buy as a collection DLC, for sure.

To summarize everything, Kong: Survivor Instinct is quite good, enjoyable even. The gameplay is nice, the story is engaging enough that you are pulled in to see the very end, the combat might take you some time to learn as the battles keep ramping up and keep things fresh up to the last battle. The obstacles are clever enough to keep you on your toes, which is nice. In the immortal words of Joe Bob Briggs, “Three stars, so check it out!”.