Abigail "Fetch" Walker's tumultuous life takes center stage in Infamous: First Light, a standalone companion to Second Son and a game that has divided reviewers.
First Light widens the story of the Infamous series without spoiling the contents of Second Son or requiring a play-through of the base game to understand the standalone. As a standalone spin-off of Infamous: Second Son, First Light returns to the streets of Seattle for more open-world adventure.
Fetch's morally ambiguous tale is fleshed out in First Light as she uses her neon abilities to neutralize bad guys and traverse streets, walls and roof tops as swirls of light. However, First Light conventional game play mechanics and its absence of the series' morality system combine for an experience that rang hollow for at least one reviewer.
"You occasionally have the option to enchain guards and gangsters that try to flee the scene after you've wreaked havoc, but there is no reason to choose peace over murder: First Light is typically concerned only with its own neon fireworks," the reviewer states. "Given the way Delsin fully embraced his living power fantasy, it's ironic that his story would allow a (sort of) noble path, when the more conscientious Fetch is allowed no such redemption. First Light also displays the symptoms of retroactive continuity: several specifics of this story deviate from the details described in Second Son."
A round up of First Light's review scores follows: Destructoid 8.5/10; Eurogamer 6/10; Game Informer 8/10; GameSpot 6/10; IGN 7.5/10; and ShackNews 7/10.
As more gamers call for better diversity in video games and reports show more women are engaging in the entertainment medium, First Light's decision to star a female character is falling under the microscope.
But Chris Zimmerman, Sucker Punch cofounder, says the developer's decision to star Fetch in the standalone was a logical progression of the series and gender played no role in the decision to place her at the center of First Light.
"The fact that Sucker Punch, like all video game companies unfortunately, has a relatively male-skewed gender balance probably does influence our outlook on things, but we don't make an explicit point of that," Zimmerman says. "When we started work on First Light, we didn't think of it in terms of a male or female lead. When we were deciding whether the protagonist should be Fetch or not; gender didn't even come into the conversation."
First Light released for the PlayStation 4 on Aug. 26. As a legitimate standalone, an install of Second Son isn't required to play First Light.
First Light brings with it 25 new trophies, four of which are hidden.
