Unknown 9: Awakening

Despite a few interesting ideas, Unknown 9: Awakening is a bland and janky adventure with a generic story and dull combat.

Despite it all, Haroona's journey still charmed me.

Unknown 9: Awakening is a good debut from a first-time development team. This narrative-driven action-adventure has some rough edges but the beautiful locations, intriguing narrative, and well-written characters make it hard to put down. The gameplay doesn't evolve much but the entertaining stealth mechanics add a lot of variety to the skirmishes you find yourself in. Overall, this is a compelling new IP with lots of potential for future adventures.

Playing through Unknown 9: Awakening left me with a cocktail of emotions when I finally rolled credits after 13 hours. I usually pride myself in my ability to see eye to eye with a game’s vision and try to find even footing even if I didn’t have a good time with it, but this is different. The experience of playing Reflector Entertainment's debut title is akin to watching a bunch of trailers for those Phase 1 Marvel movies alongside the opening act of the first Avengers flick. It felt like proof of concept for a multimedia franchise that doesn’t want to give away too much but hasn’t figured yet out what it’s even about. All of this is skinned onto the early 2010s cinematic video game experience which aside from a few fun, if janky combat encounters doesn’t know how to set itself apart. It's heartbreaking because there is a much better experience in between the in-between that didn’t work.

Unknown 9: Awakening is a promising start for a new series once you learn to love its combat.

With some truly interesting ideas and story at times, it is even more of a shame that it's the “game” part of Unknown 9: Awakening that drags down the whole experience. Worth a playthrough certainly, but also lacking in some fundamental areas for the era that has ensured this will probably be the last we see of Haroona and the hooligans.

Not bad – there's fun to be found with this game. However, technical issues hold it back.

Unknown 9: Awakening introduces a world of mysteries and conspiracies, blending stealth and action with rich lore. While its early gameplay and story-driven moments shine, repetitive combat and technical issues hold it back. Despite its flaws, the game teases an intriguing universe that leaves you curious for more.

Unknown 9: Awakening combines a fascinating steampunk world, deep lore and unique mind-control controls. Yet the story lingers in predictability, while repetitive gameplay and technical problems disrupt experience. Despite a few strong moments, the game feels unbalanced and the potential is not fully realized.

You know, there are some games that you say, "I played this game, but why did I play it?"... Unknown 9: Awakening is exactly one of those games.