"Underground" must be the word of the year so far for FMs, as it's been the feature of so many of them.
This particular one gets you around two main locations - a big hidden Hammer factory and a portion of an underground city/necropolis. The latter one is the clear winner for me, featuring some nice big spaces and interesting options of moving around with some extra areas. Unfortunately it only constitutes less than a half of the map. The factory part is respectable in terms of aestethics, but it's waaay to repetitve to keep you on edge for the whole playthrough. After a while it starts feeling rather bland and stretches for too long.
Visually, it's TG style with a twist. Apparently this time our good old Hammers decided to experiment with some radioactive chemicals (what could POSSIBLY go wrong) giving their surroundings and creations a greenish-yellow tint. You'll certainly notice the abundance of great pictures of saints and other religious imagery around. These were apparently AI-generated, but you couldn't tell. Wonder if it's the first extensive use of AI-created content in an FM? Probably not, although it'd be interesting to research that.
Not a lot reservations gameplay-wise. The mission is VERY fair to the player. Perhaps trying to be too fair at times, as you will find yourself drowning in excess equipment, while the loot goals are set really low for all difficulty levels. Key loot locations are pretty straightforward, too, without big puzzles to give you headache. There's a lot to be found, including 38 (!) secrets (good luck completionists). You will proceed pretty smoothly unless you find yourself lost. The provided map is so exceptionally detailed it feels scary in the beginning. The problem is, there are very few indications of where you are in the actual level, while the series of corridors and offices in the factory look terribly samey, so you really need to follow the map step by step to make good use of it.
I was also reminded of my personal distaste for fake doors a bit too often, but that's nitpicking.
Overall, "Raising Corpses" offers classic, straightforward, enjoyable gameplay, and even though there are no artistic fireworks, there's still enough novelty to make it interesting. Some quality-of-life improvements could have been made here and there, but there's nothing to really test your nerves. Just wish the underground area was the main feature in this one, and maybe it could be a tad more difficult. Definitely worth your time, anyway. A solid 8.
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star 8 / 10
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