Game Review: Reanimal

Reanimal is the next major horror platforming game from Swedish video game developer Tarsier Studios. If you’re not familiar with their name, they worked primarily on spin-offs and additional content for Sony’s LittleBigPlanet games.  They cemented a major reputation after they developed and released the first and second entry in the Little Nightmares games.  Leaving the IP behind with the publisher Bandai Namco, Tarsier got straight to work on a new IP which would serve as a spiritual successor to their prior games but with the intent of pushing the boundaries when it came to delivering something even more terrifying.  Reanimal was the end result of that new ambition and it was released on February 13th 2026 to generally favourable critical reception.  Sadly I couldn’t find anything online about sales numbers which is typically a negative sign if the publisher isn’t too keen to publicise the games total sales metrics.

The narrative of Renimal is set in a dark and mysterious world in which you play a young boy who wakes up adrift at sea. Finding his sister nearby, the duo dock on dry land and begin to explore the local terrain with the intent of finding their lost friends.  Their journey will be anything but easy however as they will come face to face with all manor of horrific perils that have laid claim to their friends and trapped them in their own deadly nightmares.  As you progress through the game, you’ll soon learn of the darker manifestations that cling to this group as they are plagued with reminders of the accursed doom that seeks to consume them all.

Like Little Nightmares before it, the narrative component of Reanimal isn’t directly explained to the player.  A lot of the storytelling is done through visual cues as well as the environmental design.  It’s vague by intent and depending on your tolerance for this kind format you’ll probably love or hate this games approach.  I personally found it to be too vague to fully appreciate what it was trying to do in all honesty.  I think the vague approach can be a lazy crutch at times because it allows the game to put most of the interpretation on the player and I don’t think the game offers nearly enough to work with.  This makes it all the more frustrating when the end of the game tries to pull off this big supposedly shocking reveal that doesn’t really feel earned.  I just didn’t find the world or it’s story all that interesting which is not something I expected to complain about when you consider how compelling Little Nightmares world was in comparison. 

On the gameplay end, Reanimal doesn’t really shift the core formula up from what you’re used to with the Little Nightmare games. You’ll be presented with these open 3D environments with the camera framed from a zoomed-out perspective.  Exploration is key and each area has their own puzzles and obstacles you need to figure your way around. Each section of the game offers its own distinct threats in line with the themes of the respective area and there’s a decent sense of variation with the gameplay for the most part. Just because there’s a constant variation behind the gameplay doesn’t mean what’s all there is of a decent quality however. I felt ultimately the ideas at play lacked proper definition areas which is only exasperated by the short length of the game itself.

Where the game excels for the most part though is the presentation. Tarsier Studios know how to realize a truly horrific world and that’s a point easily reinforced with Reanimal. Each explorable area in the game is vividly designed to reflect the cruel and brutal dread that seeps into the world. There’s a cold and unwelcoming aura the permeates from each area and it goes such a long way to imbue the game with this unrelenting sense of unease.  Along with the environments there’s also a unhinged design to the enemies you’ll encounter throughout the course of the game. To say the monsters you need to escape come from the deepest corners of your nightmares would be an understatement.  Christian Vasselbring, Jacob Carlsson, and Stefan Almqvist all contribute towards the core presentation of the game with their haunting soundtrack too. 

Tarsier Studios are one of the more unique studios in the industry and their video game output is a clear representation of their talent for original horror experiences. Reanimal is a testament to the studio’s ambition, although that ambition sadly isn’t enough to position this game as a superior successor to their prior horror experiences.  While the core gameplay and design are competently designed, the narrative aspect is notably lacking in memorability and the ideas at play just don’t feel well realized. As an experience it isn’t devoid of value but it’s sadly not something I came out off with as strong an impression as their prior titles.