Trek to Yomi review – a tropey but reverent tribute to Japanese cinema

Xbox Series S/X, PlayStation 4/5, PC; Flying Wild Hog/ Devolver Digital
This grainy, gore-soaked katana caper slowly morphs into a compelling meditation on vengeance

Even in the prologue, Trek to Yomi features more samurai cliches than you can chuck a katana at. Three levels of joyless brutality made me believe that this was going to be an exercise in gratuitous gore. Yet after a lot of monochromatic murder and speeches about duty, honour and bloodshed, it slowly morphs into something more compelling (though also hardly under-explored in Japanese cinema): a meditation on the inherent selfishness of vengeance.

Sporting a try-hard, Kurosawa-inspired black and white aesthetic - complete with filmic grain - this game's influences are less worn on its sleeve than embroidered into the entire kimono. Still, credit where credit's due - solid Japanese voice talent helps this Polish/American collab feel more authentic. Trek to Yomi inevitably lives in the shadow of 2020's Ghost of Tsushima, US studio Sucker Punch's similarly reverent tribute to samurai cinema. Where Ghost breaks up the bloodshed with jovial jaunts chasing foxes across its open world or solving people's problems, Yomi is a slash-happy side-scroller that doubles down on brutality, channelling the manga series Lone Wolf and Cub's sadistic spirit.

Trek to Yomi is out now; 15.99