Synapse Review - A Mind Game Is Brewing

It's a challenging space to stand out among VR one-person shooters, but Synapse makes an impression right away. The game features visuals primarily in a black and white and neon aesthetic, and your mission is to break into the mind of Colonel Peter Conrad (Davey Hayter), a former dark ops leader who now threatens to cause the apocalypse. As a nameless soldier sent to this unhinged frontline, you'll be aided by Clara Sorenson (Jennifer Hale).

After a brief introduction, a short tutorial launches each new save, and Synapse's operation feels easy to master. With artificial positioning movement, two hands can grab onto environmental objects to climb or use as cover. You can swap your primary hand, but by default, shoot with the right-hand controller, and when the clip is empty, push it back with your left hand to reload.

Ammo is obtained by walking over it, and you can switch weapons by pressing the X key. There's no manual reloading option, but this streamlined setup benefits Synapse's faster-paced combat. Turn your left hand, palm up, to get a small mini-map that plots nearby enemies and your health.

Synapse uses eye-tracking technology to create easy-to-operate telekinesis (TK) abilities that are the highlight of the game. Select objects by looking at them, press the left trigger to grab them, and use motion controls to throw. Holding explosives requires a slightly harder press, pressing harder will detonate them, so be careful, and the Sense controller provides decent resistance.

It's a very intuitive system and TK Power quickly becomes second nature. I used to think thrown objects felt soft sometimes, but I didn't know about the Open Mind upgrade back then. It solves this problem by moving objects closer or farther via the face buttons and adding noticeable power to your throws.

When you're ready to begin, Synapse takes you gradually deeper into Conrad's mind. The game is divided into nine levels between his preconscious, conscious and subconscious minds, and he will not let you go easily. "I can feel you... crawling over like a worm," he tells us with such venom in his tone, before beginning to summon enemies known as the Fallen.

However, that doesn’t mean you’re completely without support. Most levels have hidden fountains of life, altars to improve weapons and enhance your TK, or "challenge" journeys that serve as your currency. Challenges don't persist across new playthroughs, they buy temporary upgrades or refill health/ammo, so there's no point in hoarding. After defeating each Fallen, Synapse ranks your completion time and appears as a gateway to the next level, but not before offering an upgrade, such as increased blast damage or health regeneration with a challenge.

All of these are useful aids, but even so, don't expect to beat Synapse in one sitting; this is a game that values replayability. Only after completing three playthroughs and increasing the difficulty with each playthrough do you reach the true ending. However, you can unlock permanent upgrades through Revelation, which reward you with points based on hitting set goals (like killing 30 Fallen or beating two levels).

These points can then be spent across three skill trees. "Tactician" focuses on TK, providing abilities like grabbing enemies or crushing grenades. "Assassin" focuses on gunplay, where you can unlock larger ammo reserves, higher-caliber weapons like grenade launchers and submachine guns, or a more powerful starting pistol. Finally, Survivor focuses on vitality, allowing you to increase your maximum health, receive more healing from the Fountain of Life, and even resurrect after a death or two.

This is a great way to customize your play, and with these new abilities, Synapse becomes even more broadly open to play. My personal favorite is the "Power Grab" skill, which allows you to use TK to pull enemies out of cover, pull them towards you and defeat them easily. Or throw them into the sea or lava, the latter being an instant kill. Judge me all you want, but combat feels undeniably satisfying.

Each playthrough usually takes 40-80 minutes, which isn't fast, but if you need to stop, the auto-save feature means you can quit halfway through and finish the playthrough later. That being said, I think Synapse is better experienced on shorter playthroughs. While it's fun to play, longer playthroughs highlight the lack of variety in levels and enemies, which can make it feel repetitive.

Each level uses the same stages in the same order. What changes are your starting position, available paths, enemy spawn points, and where gates appear, and none of these changes feel huge. The stage feels familiar quickly, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but I also wish there was more variation between Synapse's enemies.

There are four types of Fallen, starting with regular ground soldiers, then moving on to more explosive variants intent on charging at you. Huge armored behemoths and flying units eventually join the fray, but I also wished the game's ending had offered more. I was hoping for a big boss fight, but Synapse's final challenge involves throwing bigger enemies at you, which is certainly challenging but not particularly creative.

These issues didn't stop me from having a great time, and after reaching the true ending after eight hours of playing with my teammates, I found myself wizened and wanting more. I wouldn't say it's a particularly story-focused game, but the stellar performances from David Hayter and Jennifer Hale kept me interested, and the stylish presentation gave Synapse its unique character.

Synapse Review – Final Words

Synapse is a strong addition to the PlayStation VR2 game library and should be purchased by any fan of first-person shooters. While the game's gameplay would benefit from more variety, I was impressed with the combination of eye tracking and combat to make telekinesis feel very satisfying. Reaching the end goal feels extremely rewarding, and when the visuals look this good, early PSVR 2 adopters won't want to miss out.

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