Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy Preview
As someone who previews a lot of games, I’m used to them being rough-around-the-edges, incomplete, or not ready for release. What a pleasure, then, to preview a game that’s not only related to a favorite franchise, but exceptionally polished and confident. Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy is a prequel and spinoff of sorts. The new game leaves behind the stealth adventure of A Plague Tale: Innocence (2019) and its sequel. Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy pivots towards action, combat, and puzzles. Lots of puzzles.
A Plague Tale: Innocence and A Plague Tale: Requiem were set in the late 14th century. They told the story of siblings Amicia and Hugo de Rune fleeing both the French Inquisition and rat swarms spreading the Black Death, while trying to understand and cure Hugo’s ancient, rat-controlling blood curse. The second game brings the pair to the mysterious island of La Cuna in search of a cure. Providing transport is the fierce pirate Sophia, who assists and guides the siblings using her refractive prism device.
A Fan Favorite Returns
Set 15 years before A Plague Tale: Requiem, Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy focuses on Sophia. Abandoned by her mother to be raised in a convent, Sophia escapes and joins her father’s gang of smugglers. Leaving the gang, she travels to the mysterious Minotaur’s Island. On the island, she experiences visions of ancient mysteries and horrific monsters. I’d love to tell you more than that. I won’t though, because I don’t want to spoil anything. And also, the two chapters of the game I played only provided a glimpse of the narrative.
I will say, however, that Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy has a pace that’s entirely different than the other Plague Tale games. Very much in the same wheelhouse as Uncharted or Tomb Raider, the focus is on environmental puzzles, action, and combat. Which is not to imply that story and characters don’t matter. They receive the same attention that the developer was known for in the Plague Tale games.
Shine a Light
I said at the outset that Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy was polished and confident. It’s hard not to be impressed by the game’s environments, performance capture, lighting design, and music. They’re uniformly excellent. The first chapter I previewed featured Sophia and her friend Leni exploring and puzzle-solving. Aside from detailed character design, the writing was entertaining and their relationship felt believable.
The earlier Plague Tale games favored stealth over combat. Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy flips the script. Combat will feel familiar to fans of action adventures, with light and heavy attacks, blocks, dodges, and a few other moves. At least right now though, combat feels a little unpolished. Animations can be a few frames short of smooth and there’s a hint of delay in the controls. Overall, it’s still an enjoyable element of the game.
Combat is an important part of the game, but there are long stretches without it. The second chapter I played was largely about escaping a terrifying monster. This sequence was more puzzle-like in concept, using the environment to great advantage. Thanks to some impressive visual design and effective audio, the sequence was tense and exciting.
Joining the Adventure
Speaking of puzzles, it’s surprising how puzzle-dense the game could be. The first chapter I played almost entirely focused on Sophia and Leni solving a nested series of puzzles. Many of them involved using Sophia’s Prism device to align or reveal paths or objects to manipulate. As someone who is deathly allergic to bad or arbitrary puzzle design, I thought most of them hit the sweet spot. Sophia uses a notebook that often contains hints, but not outright solutions.
Focusing an action-oriented game on fan-favorite Sophia makes total sense, given her backstory as a rogue and a pirate. Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy will feel equally coherent to players familiar with the Plague Tale series as to newcomers. Only having played two chapters, I can’t, of course, speak to the entire game’s quality. But I was genuinely impressed with what I saw and played. I’m excited for the full game’s release on August 27th, 2026.
***PC code provided by the publisher for preview***
