Cronos: The New Dawn Nails The Most Crucial Aspect of Great…

Survival horror has come a long way since its rather humble beginnings. Remaining fairly niche throughout the earliest gaming generations, it then saw a big boost in popularity with the likes of Resident Evil and Silent Hill putting their respective stamps on the genre, bringing it more into the mainstream and solidifying many of the expectations and design elements that would come to be associated with it in the process. Others then took note, and the conventions of survival horror were subsequently perpetuated, experimented, and iterated on.

Cronos new dawn screenshot traveler by ruined car

But over time, even those heavyweights of the genre were not always immune to the influence and broader appeal of more action-oriented games, with RE and SH at points drifting further into this territory, to the dismay of portions of their fanbase. But now, Bloober Team's latest title, Cronos: The New Dawn, plants itself firmly in old-school sensibilities while taking the lessons learned since into account to great effect. Cronos: The New Dawn contains all the ingredients that constitute a great survival horror experience, and adds to the thriving scene that the genre has been enjoying in recent times.

Cronos: The New Dawn is Peak Survival Horror Design In the Most Important Way

Cronos The New Dawn screenshot shattered steel mill

Survival Horror Games Live or Die On Their Balance of Three Major Elements

As established by the forebears of the genre, there are a trio of interrelated pillars of survival horror that are the most important for any title to nail down. Broadly, these are:

Resource/item amount/scarcity in the game world
Enemy design, behavior, and placement
Inventory management and upgrades

Each leg of this triangle of design elements needs to be strong on their own, but they also must all be in harmony with each other to produce an ecosystem that strikes the right balance between them to ensure a game is firing on all cylinders. It can be quite obvious when a title doesn't manage to do this, and the resulting experience can fall flat, either being too frustratingly difficult, too easy, or just oddly off, which can deflate the tension and detract from the overall intent. Thankfully, Bloober Team understood the assignment for Cronos: The New Dawn (at least in my view) and can count itself among the top of the class in this way.

Cronos: The New Dawn Understands How to Do Survival Horror Design Right

Cronos new dawn screenshot traveler holding rifle

Cronos: The New Dawn may not necessarily be rocking the boat or reinventing the wheel in this case, but that means it also absolutely gets all the fundamentals right. With traditionally strict inventory limits and resource management requiring careful decision-making and planning, along with its unique enemy merging mechanic, Cronos constantly keeps you on the back foot in a satisfying way. Every shot and healing patch used matters, and it maintains the feeling of barely scraping by the skin of your teeth for the entire time in my experience.

Cronos: The Dawn is inspired by Dead Space and Resident Evil 4, and while I feel it doesn't exactly reach the highs of those, it cannot be denied that Bloober Team is perfectly on point here for the all-important balance and feel for what matters most in survival horror. Cronos smartly scatters just enough supplies across each section, as well as optional areas to loot, in service of making sure that you're never truly in a bind. The upgrades also have weight, with none of them being superfluous, and allowing players to lean into their preferred approach and weapon type.

Cronos new dawn screenshot inventory screen

On top of ensuring that these aspects rest upon the sharpest razor's edge, Cronos: The New Dawn also hits many of the other elements that have come to be associated with survival horror. It has a well-realized haunting atmosphere and compelling story, along with inclusions like a calming yet simultaneously tense safe room music theme. These touches are all the icing on the cake, but without the rock-solid foundations of the above, their presence wouldn't be as impactful. Cronos: The New Dawn's core design structure, however, is composed of extremely sturdy stuff, resulting in a top-tier survival horror title that truly shines in this area.

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