REANIMAL

REANIMAL on Nintendo Switch 2 marks a striking reinvention for Tarsier Studios, taking the studio’s talent for intimate horror and expanding it into a richer, more confident adventure. Tight controls, a smartly reactive camera and impressive AI make every escape and puzzle feel fair, while the island’s layered design blends openness with subtle guidance to create a world that rewards curiosity without losing momentum. It’s a bold step beyond the Little Nightmares formula and a clear statement of what Tarsier can achieve on its own terms.

Reanimal is an excellent multiplayer experience that takes place in a world full of dread, with a tense and creepy atmosphere that follows you everywhere you go, and enjoyable puzzles that are fun to overcome.

With Reanimal, Tarsier Studios delivers its darkest, boldest work yet. Expanding on the Little Nightmares formula with non-linear exploration, striking audiovisual design, and bombastic set pieces, this is an imaginative horror experience that confidently delivers its vision while offering accessible co-op play that fans of the developer have long clamoured for.

A skillfully crafted story that never tries to reveal too much and leaves room for interpretation. The escaping from adversaries and the sound are excellent. It lacks more puzzles and platforming elements, and the emphasis on combat can be too much at times.

The formula known from Little Nightmares has undergone a subtle evolution, and you can feel that Reanimal is a different brand, sharing only similar DNA. On paper, the changes might sound slightly off-putting, but in practice everything works exactly as it should, and it’s hard to tear yourself away from the screen. It’s a strong title that avoids excessive grotesque elements, bluntness, and violence; instead, Reanimal resonates on a different, much deeper level - somewhat like This War of Mine. It’s an experience worth going through.

Reanimal transforms a labyrinthine journey into a symbolic escape, packed with environmental puzzles and stealth sequences, all set against a hauntingly majestic backdrop that oozes cinematic flair and environmental storytelling.

REANIMAL is Tarsier Studios at their darkest, and at their most confident. It takes familiar ideas and expands them into something bigger, scarier, and more deliberate. It’s not perfect, but its atmosphere, co-op design, and standout set pieces left a strong impression. One of the most memorable modern horror games I’ve played in a while.

Whether you’re playing with a friend or by yourself, I think this is Tarsier Studios’ best game so far. Putting a few small issues aside, I thoroughly enjoyed REANIMAL from beginning to end. I just wish the whole experience was longer, as I found myself wanting to spend more time exploring its grotesque world and discovering new secrets.

Reanimal is an ominous, tense adventure that puts you in unsettling situations and leaves you to draw your own conclusions about what’s going on. So much so that it almost feels like the end is only the beginning of analyzing what’s happened here. While short, there are some interesting puzzles and encounters, the pacing is good, the NPC intelligence in single-player is competent, and there’s some great character and environmental design elements at play. A few bugs that will likely be patched out in a few weeks aside, it’s a great horror game.

REANIMAL is a puzzle-platformer that does a very solid job at creating a horror themed experience with strong emphasis on subtle psychological fears. Its simple but very efficient story-telling, the somber art style and soundscape, as well as slick cooperation mechcanics between the two protagonists bring shape to a memorable introspective game, which could stand out more if its lifespan was longer and it had taken more risks with the challenges posed by its puzzles.

A haunting, surreal and disturbing journey that sticks with you long after the credits roll.

Reanimal once again proves, if proof were even necessary, the strong authorial identity of a development studio finally unleashed, free to express itself without softening or diluting its vision. Reanimal is an auteur horror experience: deeply cryptic and not easy to decode, yet a bold and genuinely rare work within its genre.

Reanimal is worth it if you're looking for a bite-sized horror experience that's best shared with a friend. The story is gripping, and while it leads to a perhaps not too satisfying conclusion, the journey is more than enjoyable, particularly with a friend.