One of the sleeper hits of the last generation of consoles, A Plague Tale: Innocence, earned itself a sequel, and we're thrilled to finally have it in hand.

Moreover, we're also pleased to confirm that Requiem arrives bringing plenty more of an already-good thing, with a longer campaign that repeats the first game's trick with simply jaw-dropping environments and a tense, pulpy story.

Picking things up

Protagonist Amicia and her little brother Hugo have been through the wringer after the harrowing events of Innocence, but Requiem actually picks up with them doing okay, journeying south through France to reach an alchemist who can help Hugo.

That optimism doesn’t last - surprise, surprise. An action-packed opening section takes you from serenity to an explosion of violence and thrusts Amicia into the jaws of trauma once again.

Before long, the rats that have plagued them are back in the picture, along with a recurrence of Hugo’s mysterious illness.

After a dangerous medical experiment, the family decides to head south to an island that has been haunting Hugo’s dreams.

The story is artfully told, with believable discussions and moments of tension between characters old and new. We've been particularly impressed by how Requiem focuses on Amicia's own attitude and mental well-being.

A young woman forced into terrific violence by her circumstances, panic attacks and long-lasting wounds plague her in ways that feel thoughtful and heartfelt.

That said, the story is also, like in Innocence, pulpy at its heart, with fantastical hordes of rats (now numbering in the hundreds of thousands at once) making for scenes that are right out of a dark fantasy novel's cover art.

Requiem comes in waves, like the first game, with moments of serenity slowly ramping up into tension as you encounter enemies and obstacles, leaving you to find your way through a large area or puzzle.

Then, punctuating these even further, the action explodes in chase sequences or large-scale fights, and the whole thing is geared cleverly to follow the rhythms desired by developer Asobo Studio.

Run and hide

If you're looking for a minor quibble, Requiem plays very similarly to Innocence - perhaps slightly more smoothly, but it’s a close-run thing. There are simply more layers added on top of its core gameplay now.

In the more active parts of the game, you’ll navigate around areas teeming with guards and pockets of the plague rats that torment you, trying to get through in whatever way you can.

When it works best, as it often does, this has you mixing a bit of planning and strategy with off-the-cuff panic. The game has some impressively large areas to get through, far more so than Innoncence, and while we successfully picked our way through many without being discovered, others left us sprinting to a bolted door just in time to escape the chasers we’d alarmed.

Along the way, you’ll use a range of tools - for one, the sling that featured heavily in Innocence is back, with a new resin-based missile type that flares up fires. This allows you to stun torch-carrying enemies, among other uses.

A little way into the story Amicia also takes possession of a handy crossbow, for lethal ranged takedowns, although it’s slow to load and ammo is extremely scarce. You’re able to fend off enemies up close (a bit), but fundamentally, if you get into that situation, you’re likely to die quick. Amicia is a slim young woman, and these armoured soldiers are often twice her size.

We really like how Asobo has changed how Amicia adds new skills to her arsenal, making this dependent on how you approach encounters - if you want to get a skill that makes your sneaking quieter, you'd better actually sneak around and avoid combat, as entering into fights will instead progress another skill chain. It's a neat way to encourage players to try different playstyles.

You'll also make increasingly common use of Hugo’s ability to direct hordes of rats, this time in a way that you have more control over. The tension of taking over these swarms to direct them at your enemies, while trying to ensure that you don’t leave yourself open to being devoured, results in some great fun.

We played Requiem on PS5, and special mention must go to its use of the DualSense's excellent haptics, with footsteps and heartbeats making for an added layer of stimulus when you're in a heated moment. Of course, on Xbox the game is on Game Pass, so that's a significant boon to those with Microsoft's console instead.

A gorgeous journey

Throughout Requiem, what's so impressive is how Asobo Studio blends its storytelling with gameplay - from the dialogue that Amicia and Hugo whisper to each other as they hide from guards to the ever-present threat of the rats, it feels like an effective medley.

For much of the game Amicia sports a gnarly head wound and the aforementioned stress summoned up by her moments of dizziness and discomfort is just another layer of canny manipulation from a dev team in its element, tugging on your emotions.

As we mentioned earlier, though, another big part of the game's storytelling is down to some mightily impressive visuals. Innocence had some really great environments at points, but Requiem is on another level.

From the very beginning of the game, outdoor and indoor scenes alike have wowed us with their lighting and detail. Rock formations have the look of photogrammetry, so realistic were their crags and cracks, while forest canopies dappled the light brilliantly and the weather can be totally scene-changing.

There's also constantly clever use of colour - huge swathes of red fabric adorning a camp turn it from a generic sight into a memorable area, for example. Meanwhile, strategically-placed torches light up scenes eerily or reassuringly depending on what the moment demands.

Every time Requiem introduces a new location, it demands to be admired at length, and that's a heck of a bar to clear.

Verdict

Requiem has lived up to our hopes in stellar fashion, offering up a sequel that feels like the polished diamond the first game had the potential to be. It might not be reinventing the wheel but not every sequel has to.

The level of visual fidelity and the careful design of its sprawling and replayable stealth-combat encounters make for another special game. Amicia and Hugo's story is a memorable one, carefully told, and we're thrilled that Asobo had the chance to return to it with more resources - Requiem is just that good.