Neon White Reviews
Part visual novel, part lightning-fast FPS platformer, Neon White's angst-ridden assassins are unbearable but its airtight level design and fantastic sense of momentum ensure its gameplay is something to celebrate.
You might love or loathe Neon White's willfully cringe anime storytelling, but these blistering platforming time trials are a heavenly delight.
Neon White achieves everything it sets out to with remarkable success. Not only is it one of the most entertaining experiences I've played in years, but it also speaks to a highly specific audience many just don't anymore. It's for weirdos, misfits, and dorks. Neon White is one of the best games of the year, and it'd be a colossal mistake not to check it out.
A stylish and brilliantly designed blend of first person shooter and platformer, which nails the compelling and addictive chase for the perfect run.
Neon White achieves everything it sets out to with remarkable success. Not only is it one of the most entertaining experiences I've played in years, but it also speaks to a highly specific audience many just don't anymore. It's for weirdos, misfits, and dorks. Neon White is one of the best games of the year, and it'd be a colossal mistake not to check it out.
Neon White's story stumbles at times, but its slick, breakneck action is flawless and elevates it to be one of the year's best games.
Game lead Ben Esposito has described Neon White as “for freaks, by freaks.” And yet, identifying as a freak isn’t a prerequisite for enjoying Neon White. The game’s greatest strength may, in fact, be how welcoming it is. Its difficulty is perfectly curved, its story is disarmingly charming. But after an hour of restarting the same level, ignoring all my other responsibilities to cross the finish line just a little faster, I realized that Neon White may have turned me into a freak so gently that I didn’t even notice.
Neon White gets its hooks in deep and fast. I knew within 10 minutes that I loved it, but I appreciated and enjoyed it more as I spent more time with it. My first playthrough was a blast as I discovered new weapons, explored levels, and experimented with shortcuts. But the “real game” felt like it started after I saw the credits. That’s when I started going back to each level, playing them over and over until I achieved the Ace rank, and then played them more just to shave hundredths of a second off so I could climb my friends leaderboard. It feels amazing to see “New Best!” on your time after dozens of attempts, and failing never gets frustrating considering how short the levels are and how quickly you can restart them. Whether you’re looking to best your own runs, compete with your friends, or attempt to make a splash on the global leaderboard, Neon White presents a welcoming on-ramp to the world of speedrunning, offers compelling challenges to overcome for those that want to pick up the pace, and delivers a satisfying gameplay loop regardless of the speed you want to tackle it at.
Impressive efforts with a few noticeable problems holding them back. Won't astound everyone, but is worth your time and cash.
Neon White is a love letter to turn-of-the-decade internet weirdos. It's full of rule-of-cool anime nostalgia, ear-shredding electronic music, and dialogue ripped straight out of my group chats. It's a genuine game made for an audience rarely prioritised, but even if you don't fit the archetypical person this game was made for, you're still in for the most stylish and satisfying action-platformer I've ever experienced.
If I had to sum it all up into a single sentence, I'd simply say that Neon White is truly one of the most enjoyable and original feeling platformers that I've seen in a while, and one that's well worth checking out.
Neon White is everything you want from a speedrunning game: fast, super precise, well structured and built around short and various levels. This alone would be enough to recommend it, but the package is completed with a unique artistic style, a valuable writing and a clearly original and strange game design that mixes together visual novel, dating sim, first person shooter and platformer. Some very small technical uncertainty in the repetition of the attempts does not affect the overall quality.
Review in Italian | Read full review
This is a video game about flying around heaven, shooting and dashing through demons, flirting with your other neons, gathering cards that happen to double as weapons, and talking to angels that just so happen to be cats with comically large sunglasses. If any of that sounds even slightly interesting to you, you may have found your new obsession.
Neon White is as addictive as it is challenging, with plenty of replayability and varied gameplay, looking gorgeous at every step. It's a magnificent take on the FPS-genre, building complex and thrilling levels where simply pulling the trigger isn't enough.
A speedrunning fps with tight level design and satisfying movement.
Neon White is a ballet of bullets and death that always leaves you wanting just one more run. There are a ton of levels and powers to master, along with a witty and sincere story at the center. One of 2022's best games.
Neon White, behind the sexy suitors and anime villains, underneath the storyline and relationship building, is a game about speedrunning. It’s about learning and replaying, and it’s about beating your friends. It’s a modern iteration of a classic, simple premise, but without perfect execution, a simple premise can easily flop. Thankfully, Neon White delivers nearly flawlessly. Just make sure to take your time with this whirlwind ride, you’ll thank me for it.
Timing is all as you wake from the dead and race towards a heavenly finish line, slaying demons en route, in this chaotic yet ingenious anime-inspired game
Neon White is overall a very good, even exceptional game, with addicting, thrilling, and wonderfully crafted gameplay. The characters are all incredibly endearing in their own way, even if the overall narrative doesn't break any molds. It's easily one of the best 3D platformers today, and one game from 2022 that is not to be missed.
The only major gripe we have is the severe screen-tearing. It's present throughout, and an unfortunate blemish on an otherwise very sleek game. VRR or a 120Hz-compatible display may solve this, but without those options, it's a slightly distracting technical hiccup. However, you're unlikely to notice in the midst of things, and Neon White is otherwise a highly entertaining, stylishly presented adventure.