Severed Reviews
This is a perfect off-TV experience. While the gameplay premise wears thin over the short adventure, when the slashing combat works and the exploration feels organic, it’s incredible. Just be prepared for a bit of repetition as the story reaches its conclusion.
While most people have given up on this lovely handheld, I’m glad there are still some studios who are willing to take a chance on the Vita. Severed is a great game with a lot of depth that will have you thinking about it for a long time to come. On a console that is absolutely loaded with the dungeon crawler genre, it's no mean feat that this one manages to stand out.
A cut, thrust and parry above
Utilizing the Wii U gamepad's touchscreen controls, Severed serves up a fantastic adventure with plenty of engaging swordplay and a healthy dose of monstrous bodily dismemberment. The beautiful art style and a subtly-told melancholy story keeps players absorbed in the bizarre world in between bloody battles and the clever, Zelda-style dungeon puzzles.
It’s a shame that Severed came so late in the Vita’s life cycle, because it had me wondering whether or not more games like it could have saved the system. That’s just wishful thinking, of course, so it’ll just have to remain what it is: an incredible eleventh-hour treat for fans who have invested their time and money into the handheld. If you enjoyed Guacamelee!, you’ll find a lot of what you loved in that game has returned. Vibrant colors with a unique “diorama” artstyle really pop off the screen, and its inventive gameplay successfully combines touch-twitch antics and old-fashioned role playing. There may not be enough reasons to shell out for a Vita now, but if there had been more content like this arriving alongside the system back in 2012, we might have seen a very different fate for Sony’s second portable.
While a touch-focused first person dungeon crawler might sound crazy on paper, Severed's unique brand of combat is as deep as it is engaging. Oh, and the visuals and soundtrack are bonkers to boot.
Drinkbox Studios' Severed is a touch-based action RPG with an interesting premise, incredible visuals, and fun gameplay that simply overstays its welcome a little.
Severed takes a gimmick in touch-based combat and actually manages to successfully wrap an entertaining game around it. The eerie, ambiguous, yet beautiful, world helps but I found that enough new aspects were added to the combat to keep it interesting until the very end. If this is the Vita’s swansong then it’s going out on a wonderful note.
Across Severed’s seven or so hours, you get to experience some of the best touch screen gaming around. DrinkBox Studios have created a great game here with an engaging battle system and art style. It can feel a bit too minimalist in its design, and there’s much repetition in the environments, but DrinkBox Studios have created a great game with an engaging battle system and art style. If you own a Vita, Severed is worth getting.
Overall, Severed does a lot of good with its excellent and challenging combat, intricate dungeon maps full of collectibles, unique and visceral upgrade system, and a fantastic presentation. Its biggest shortcoming is its lack of opportunities to engage with its world and Sasha’s history, but with everything that works so well about the game, I can mostly forgive this slight. My roughly nine-hour experience was a great joy, filled with memorable sights, sounds, and (physical) touches. Maybe, like Okami for Playstation 2, it will be the console’s swan song, but it is hard to discredit a unique experience like this one purely for coming to the party so late.
Top marks to Drinkbox for daring to be different, and using the PS Vita's touch screen to create a unique gestural combat system. The action can be somewhat repetitive at times, but Severed's story is compelling enough to keep driving you on. That, combined with the beautiful-looking graphics deliver a dungeon crawler that's well worth experiencing.
Severed's distinct look and touchscreen controls make it more than your average dungeon crawler.
A fantastically strange and unique first person adventure that manages to make touchscreen controls seem fresh and interesting again.
Severed is a short adventure that has a lot of major gameplay elements packed into it. Its unique art style will keep your eyes engaged, while your brain will be firmly occupied with the puzzles and sword play. There’s not a lot more you could ask for from a $14.99 game.
If a colorful, morbid, corporeal, dungeon-crawling Punch-Out!! isn't sweet enough to sell Severed, consider it a vision of a world where the PlayStation Vita remained a stronghold of original and endearing creation.
DrinkBox Studios is one of my favorite smaller development teams. They have a knack for merging cool gameplay mechanics with bright, colorful visuals that I happily spend hours with at a time. Severed is no different - in fact it may be their best overall effort yet. While it is true that this title has seen some prior releases, it plays better on the Switch than any of its prior platforms.
To summarize the Severed was a little tricky, we have a great project, with wonderful realization of the unusual controls and an amazing story, but at the same time, a little tight through backtracking gameplay, beautiful in its own way of living the other world and not expressive main character, everyone decides that important to him, we can only suggest.
Review in Russian | Read full review
First Person, Dungeon, RPGs, Touch controls, a weird mix, that makes Severed another reason to own a PS Vita, which is nowadays a very rare feat since the portable console has been completely outcast by Sony, yet kept afloat by developers such as Drinkbox Studios. There is no doubt this is a game that needs to be in your library, so go dust off that Vita and play this game.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
Severed is a great experience that comes perilously close to overstaying its welcome. The combat is fast and intense, the dungeon exploration is enjoyable, and the visuals are enticing. The combat can become repetitive and is completely dependent on your touch-screen, but by and large, it's a fun and well-made game. As you slash your way through the bizarre monstrosities that populate the land, Severed manages to be engaging without feeling like a roadblock. It won't change the mind of anyone who hates touch-screen gaming, but it's a great example of how it can work, and it's one of the best indie games on the Vita.
Between the puzzles that need to be solved throughout this world (enough to fill up a few hours’ worth of gameplay), enthralling battles and a superb presentation, Severed gives you another good reason to cherish your Vita.