Back in 1995 is a survival horror game with a nostalgic look and fill, with blocky retro graphics and CTR screen effects. Learn more in our Back in 1995 review!

 

The game tells the story of a guy named Kent who is trying to reach a radio tower, for reasons. To do this, he will explore the buildings to find the best route to get there, going high and low. As he does this, he will find some items to help him on his journey. There are also some weird-looking monsters that will need to be defeated as you help him from from location to location, trying to stay alive during every step of the way. It certainly nails the old-school and feel from classic survival horror games.

 

The puzzles are far from challenging. As you’d expect from a survival horror game, some of the doors will require keys to open them. Other puzzles will have digit codes that can easily be forced without the need of actually finding the clue for the code somewhere else. As for the enemies, they lack that extra something that makes the monsters on games such as Resident Evil or Silent Hill stand out. They are uninspiring, looking like backed potatoes with arms, which means they’re very forgettable.

 

Fighting against enemies is not going to be that easy, even if the combat elements are not as prominent as in other survival horror games that place a bit more extra emphasis on the action side of things. Your character is very slow, and this also translates to how fast he is when attacking any enemy. There’s also a lack of any feedback on how much damage you’re dealing to the monsters, which didn’t make the combat feel satisfying. At least there are different weapons to collect, which will also reward you with some trophies.

Speaking of trophies, you will need to play the game twice to get that shiny Platinum for your collection. The game is not that long, and you can probably finish it in a couple of hours at most without using a trophy guide. If you’re a trophy hunter using a guide, and make no mistakes during your run, you can probably beat it in less than an hour. The one thing that might get in your way are the tank controls for Back in 1995 which, if you never played a game like Resident Evil back in the day, will end up feeling weird.

 

Back in 1995 is a budget game on PlayStation that is a decent homage to the old-school survival horror games that some of you might have grown up playing, but it’s not one that stands out. The story has no feeling, combat feels slow and stiff, and your character is rather bland. There’s certainly room for improvement in case a sequel is in the works.

Disclaimer
This Back in 1995 review is based on a PlayStation 4 copy provided by Ratalaika Games.