Returnal PC review. Representing an astounding evolution of developer Housemarque’s signature arcade action into the third-person action adventure genre and with some natty takes on the roguelike formula to boot, when Returnal released on PS5 back in April 2021 it’s certainly reasonable to say that we were more than a little bowled over by it.
The long-awaited release of Returnal on PC then is a cause for celebration. Not only does it bring across the PS5 Game of the Year candidate in all its glory, but it also adds the usual bevy of PC exclusive technical features that have been a reliable hallmark of PlayStation Studios efforts to bring PS4 and PS5 titles to the PC platform. To put it plainly, Returnal on PC continues PlayStation Studios grand tradition of going to the extra mile with its PC ports and I couldn’t be happier.
Returnal PC Review
Housemarque’s Unique Magnum Opus Leaps To PC With Impressive Results
First things first, Returnal is still an essential slice of third-person shooter shenanigans that everybody should play. Cast as Selene, a rugged space explorer that finds herself shipwrecked on the alien world of Atropos, Returnal puts players in her shoes, thrusts a firearm into their hands and sends them out into the wilderness in search of a mysterious signal that has been broadcasting non-stop since her arrival.
Far from some straight-laced science-fiction tale about a shipwrecked protagonist, Selene actually finds herself locked in a time loop whereupon every time she dies, she awakes at the wreckage of her ship but armed with the knowledge of the life before. As it turns out, the planet of Atropos feeds directly into this dynamic too, shifting and changing its layout every time Selene starts her life anew while obviously playing directly into the roguelike design that underpins Returnal’s snappily responsive third-person arcade shooter action. In short, Returnal is a bespoke experience and thankfully I can confirm that the same uniqueness has survived wholesale in its leap from PS5 to PC. You can catch the full lowdown on Returnal’s deeper gameplay and systems in our original PS5 review, here.
If you’re familiar with any of PlayStation Studios previous output on PC then you’ll also be familiar with the raft of exclusive technical features that are embedded into the PC version of Returnal. The first of these that you’ll notice is support for Ultrawide (16:10) and Super Ultrawide (32:9) display aspect ratios, both of which allow players to experience a massively expanded field of view as you explore and blast your way through the enigmatic alien environments of Atropos.
The next key technical benefit that Returnal on PC brings to the table (in addition to super sharp 4K resolution), is a range of higher quality ray-tracing visual presets that provide a frankly stunning standard of lighting, shadows and reflections that just weren’t present in the PS5 version of the game. The icing on technical cake for PC users ends up being support for performance enhancing technologies AMD FSR 2.0, NVIDIA NIS and NVIDIA DLSS – not least because playing a fast and furious blaster like Returnal at framerates in excess of 60 FPS enhances the experience duly, making Returnal feel more responsive to play than the OG PS5 version that came before it.
In addition to the aforementioned visual improvements and no less than the five visual presets that Returnal on PC brings to the table, Housemarque have also implemented a number of neat technical features including including an FPS counter, a gauge for GPU and CPU usage and a latency tracker. Basically, it’s clear that Returnal has not only been made with the same love, care and attention that defined the PlayStation to PC ports that preceded it, but that the team behind it have that same compassion for their player base too, issuing a patch so very quickly after release day which resolves a number of visual, performance and crashing issues.
Being a PlayStation Studios joint, Returnal also boasts full 3D audio support as well as full-bodied support for Sony’s excellent DualSense controller, allowing PC players to enjoy the same haptic feedback and implementation of adaptive trigger functionality that PS5 owners do. Put simply, Returnal not only continues Sony’s streak of providing PC gamers with excellent ports, but also in engineering a roundly impressive swathe of technical improvements that make the most of the additional potential technical headroom offered by the PC platform at large.
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In terms of its overall content offering, Returnal on PC thankfully includes all of the post-release that enhanced the PS5 version for the many weeks and months after its release back in April 2021. This means that not only does Returnal on PC enable players to tackle the mysteries of Atropos with a fellow explorer, but so too is the Tower of Sisyphus additional content also present alongside the super useful Suspend Cycle function which allows you to replay from a save state (I still find it somewhat baffling that this wasn’t part of the game on day one when it launched for PS5) and of course the now obligatory Photo Mode.
Though the five rendering presets and substantial number of visual sliders and tweakables all combine to let players tailor Returnal to run on a variety of PC rigs, it’s also true that Returnal really does require a substantially setup to match the PS5 version of the game – let alone get the most from all of the super impressive visual enhancements that have been thoughtfully plumbed into the PC version of Housemarque’s arguably finest hour.
As much as Returnal carved a niche of its own on PS5 as a stunning third-person shooter that had been masterfully blended with roguelike design, so too does it manage to inhabit a similarly unique place for PC gamers in 2023. One of the best PlayStation exclusives of 2021 has ended up being one of the best and most glossy PC shooters of 2023. Long may PlayStation Studios incredible run of PC ports continue.
Returnal is out now on PC and PS5.
Review code kindly provided by Sony PR.