Crow Country Reviews
As a fan of the genre dating back to the 90s, even though I completely understand why titles such as Crow Country aren’t being made by the Capcoms of this world anymore, I do miss this style. While it has clearly been inspired by the early Resident Evil games, the modernisations and quality of life additions go a long way to ensure that this isn’t just a carbon copy of something that has gone before. If old-school survival horror is what you want in 2024, put Crow Country right at the top of your list.
A tight package of intriguing puzzle design and nail biting ambiance that is perfectly tuned in difficulty. There's even a hint system in place to ensure you don't get stuck too long on any single puzzle. I loved my time with Crow Country and it will definitely be making an appearance on my Game of the Year list.
Crow Country skillfully blends the nostalgic allure of classic survival horror with modern game design advancements. The game’s atmospheric environment, captivating puzzles, and user-friendly controls render it an essential experience for both long-time fans and new players. Still, given its challenging nature and fixed camera angle perspectives, it’s not something that may appeal to everyone.
Crow Country is a delight to experience. It leverages a unique style that has obvious inspirations and successfully pays homage to them while sporting its own fun story. The overall adventure is a little marred by sub-par combat controls but it has so much intrigue and so many cool puzzles that it’s still a blast. The journey of Mara as she explores a strange dilapidated theme park is something worth experiencing and the Switch is a fantastic platform to do it on!
Crow Country "caws" back to old-school horror games from the PS1-era, preserving what made them suspenseful and engaging while adding some updates. Not all of these work, but enough do, making a trip to Crow Country worth taking for fans of retro survival horror games.
A worthwhile retro survival horror experience that utilizes every inch of its three-to-four hour runtime while paying homage to the greats. Even though it's lacking in scares, it manages to enthrall with its excellent brain-scratchers and deft design decisions. A small and successful slice of survival horror.
Despite a few minor critiques, Crow Country is a fantastic game. I'm glad I gave Crow Country a try, as it has quickly become one of my favorite Halloween games because of its rich atmosphere and compelling narrative. The story is compelling, and though it’s set in a creepy, abandoned amusement park with Playstation One-style aesthetics, it leans more into the realm of a sci-fi thriller than pure horror. The twist takes me completely by surprise, and the ending leaves me wondering about Mara’s fate and the secret she uncovers. If you’re looking for the perfect spooky game to dive into this Halloween, Crow Country is definitely worth your time.
But even with a couple of missteps, I'm still scoring Crow Country highly. The story engrosses, and the puzzles challenge without being too ridiculous. The game is long enough to be rewarding but not so long as to make replay intimidating. And the retro horror may even make you jump a couple of times, in teen-rated fashion. The Snipperclips devs have done considerably good work here, and anyone who predicted otherwise can eat crow.
Crow Country shines on Switch as the delightful survival-horror gem we’ve come to love, offering engaging and satisfying gameplay that keeps players hooked. While the platform's excessive loading times may detract from the experience, the Switch version remains an excellent choice for fans seeking portability or an alternative to the PC version.
Review in Italian | Read full review
Crow Country is a love letter for fans of classic survival horror, an outstanding adventure that captures the essence of the genre perfectly. Despite the classic cut of the adventure, there is no lack of integration of more modern mechanics that favor playability, and its difficulty selector, despite being unpopular due to one of its levels without enemies, is a success for a larger audience. to the genre. Without being perfect, Crow Country will take us back to that 32-bit generation where the foundations of the genre were established, something that is definitely worth it.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
Crow Country is a great retro-flavoured survival horror that manages to pay homage to the '90s classics while providing a bunch of modern conveniences that make the game feel fresh and, more importantly, fun. Exploring the creepy yet charming titular amusement park is a joy thanks to its wealth of intriguing secrets and nasty creatures. There are a few annoyances that keep it from being a masterpiece, like the slightly delayed screen transitions and the infuriating traps, but like Signalis before it, Crow Country is well worth investigating if you're after a retro-style horror game that, miraculously, doesn't feel dated right out of the gate.
I appreciate what the developer was going for with this project and there are absolutely areas that nail the brief. The visuals are charming and the story was a campy laugh, it also built a decent atmosphere when there were no enemies. But there’s a nagging at the back of my mind that says I didn’t enjoy it overall. The combat didn’t gel with me, even though I have a love for the old tank style. It had zero fear factor, not even the odd jump scare. There was too much ammo and health so I never felt my survival was at risk. Enemies were poor… maybe it just wasn’t for me.
Overall, Crow Country is a title I can easily recommend. The interesting puzzles and captivating world-building kept me hooked throughout my playthrough. Each of these elements blended nicely too, and created a package that felt realistic, rewarding, and engaging. Though I found the combat to be tricky in the beginning, I have no issues recommending this game to people who are familiar with survival horror titles or even those who have not spent much time with the genre.
A throwback to survival horror with narrative depth
The aesthetics, densely packed environment and, at times, challenging combat go together to create a really enjoyable survival horror experience that results in Crow Country promising to be a sleeper candidate for my game of the year.
Crow Country is clearly influenced by some of the scariest games of the ‘90s, but it’s good enough that it can be enjoyed today even if you never played those games the first time around (or even if you’re generally too much of a scaredy cat to play them).
Crow Country can be classified as a good game, as it presented an excellently written mysterious story, with excellent Level design and a good variety of enemies, accompanied by an extremely wonderful artistic direction and music. The game’s drawbacks may be the extreme ease of playing, the weapon arsenal’s lack of diversity, and its weak shooting mechanics.
Review in Arabic | Read full review
Between atmosphere, mechanics, and storytelling, Crow Country gets caw-fully close to bonafide classic status in the survival-horror pantheon.
Crow Country is a well written story survival-horror adventure that keeps you dig through the abandoned theme park for clues and missing objects while unravelling the story of Mr. Crow. It feels like a labor of love for old school genre classics and horror tropes. The PS1-era graphics add a lot of flavor to the mix as well.