Quick answer: Trek to Yomi is a five-hour black-and-white samurai story that looks like a lost Kurosawa film and plays like a fairly basic side-scrolling brawler. Critics landed around 71, players lower at 6.3. At $19.99 — often far less — the presentation alone justifies it. Two things to know before buying: it was day one on Xbox Game Pass back in 2022 but left the catalogue in October 2023, so this is a purchase now, and the Switch version scored 64 and is the one to avoid.
Original illustration created for IGGG Guides.
Some games are worth playing for one reason. This is one of them, and the reason is how it looks.
Trek to Yomi is shot entirely in black and white, in fixed camera compositions, with 35mm grain over the top and scratched film artefacts marking the edges of combat arenas. It is a direct homage to the samurai cinema of Akira Kurosawa, and on that count it is genuinely remarkable. Everything you actually do inside those frames is a good deal less remarkable, and whether that's a problem depends entirely on what you want from five hours.
What the scores say, and the unusual bit
| Version | Released | Metacritic | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Xbox Series X/S | 5 May 2022 | 72 | Launched day one on Game Pass — but it left the catalogue in October 2023 |
| PC | 5 May 2022 | 71 | Best place to see the art direction properly · OpenCritic 72 all-in |
| PlayStation 5 | 5 May 2022 | 69 | Also on PS4 |
| Nintendo Switch | 30 Jan 2023 | 64 | Avoid. Softer resolution, culled foliage lighting, long loads, and characters too small to read in handheld |
| Players, all platforms | — | 6.3 / 10 | That last row is the interesting one. Across nearly every mid-budget game we've looked at, players score higher than critics. Here it's reversed. Critics, who review for a living and are well placed to appreciate deliberate cinematography, rated the presentation highly. Players, who were buying an action game, found the action thin and said so. |
Individual reviews split hard. Forbes gave it 9 out of 10 and PCMag made it an Editors' Choice. GameSpot gave it 5, Game Informer scored it 6.75 under the blunt headline "Slog Through The Afterlife", and IGN's aggregate sits at 6.7. The divide is almost perfectly along one line: how much the look is worth to you. We saw a similar disagreement, running the other way, in our Terminator: Resistance review.
The presentation really is the point
This was the vision of independent creator Leonard Menchiari, directed by Marcin Kryszpin at Polish studio Flying Wild Hog and published by Devolver Digital. That matters, because it explains why the thing feels authored rather than assembled.
The camera is fixed and composed shot by shot, the way a film is staged, with foreground and background layered against each other. Whole sequences play out in silhouette. The audio is deliberately analogue. Even the edges of a combat arena are marked by scratches on the film rather than an invisible wall or a UI prompt. Very few games commit this completely to a single idea.
And the presentation is also the problem
Original illustration created for IGGG Guides.
Fixed cinematic framing and readable combat pull in opposite directions. The camera regularly pulls back to make a beautiful wide shot, which shrinks Hiroki and his attackers to the point where you cannot read a wind-up. Foreground objects, a tree or a stand of grass, drift between you and the fight. In a game built on parry timing, where there is deliberately very little signposting, that is a real cost.
This is exactly why the Switch version falls apart. Shrink those compositions to a handheld screen, add a softer resolution and a monochrome palette where everything already blends together, and reviewers reported genuinely straining to pick out characters — Nintendo Life gave it 6, noting the worst of it appears in handheld, and several outlets concluded plainly that if you can play it anywhere else, you should. Long loads and visible foliage culling finish the job.
The combat, honestly
Light and heavy attacks chain into combos, with parries, dodges and blocks, plus unlockable ranged tools including a bow, shuriken and eventually hand-cannon ammunition. On paper that's a decent kit.
In practice the parry window is generous enough that most encounters resolve into parry, counter, repeat, and the ranged weapons mostly make an already easy fight easier. Swings lack weight. If you have played Ghost of Tsushima, the contrast is unflattering, and we put that game's scale in context in our measured open world comparison.
It does improve. By the final act, with the full combo list unlocked and enemies arriving in groups, stamina management becomes a genuine pressure. That is roughly four hours in, which is most of the game. Start on a higher difficulty if you have played action games before — the tiers run Kabuki, Bushido and Ronin, and the default Kabuki flatters you badly. Finishing the game unlocks Kensei mode, in which one hit kills you outright; it's the hardcore lap the combat finally deserves.
Five hours, and more than one ending
Original illustration created for IGGG Guides.
Tracked playtimes put the main story at about five hours, six and a half with the collectibles, and roughly twelve and a half to thirteen hours to see everything. Director Marcin Kryszpin said openly that it was never meant to be a big game and was designed to run about five hours.
The gap between five and thirteen is the branching. Hiroki's choices lead to different endings, and the reviewers who logged ten hours or more were replaying for those. The draft version of this complaint — that the story is thin — misses that the thinness is partly a function of only seeing one path. It is still not a deep story, and the romance subplot in particular is underwritten, but the structure is doing more than one playthrough reveals.
Buy, wait or skip
| You are | Verdict | Why |
|---|---|---|
| A fan of Kurosawa or samurai cinema | Buy | Nothing else in games has committed to this look so completely |
| Hoping to play it on Game Pass | Too late — buy it instead | Day one in May 2022, but it left the catalogue in October 2023 and hasn't returned as of October 2026 |
| Wanting a short, finished game | Buy on sale | Five hours, no live service, no store, no filler. It has dropped to around $4 |
| Here for the swordplay | Skip | Combat is the weakest part and never really recovers |
| Only have a Switch | Skip | 64 on Metacritic. The one version where the art direction is actively damaged |
| An experienced action player | Buy, but raise the difficulty | Default is far too forgiving to show the combat at its best; Kensei mode waits at the end |
Where to get it, and what the studio did next
It's $19.99 on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S and Nintendo Switch, with a download of roughly 8 to 11 GB depending on platform, so it won't cost you an evening of bandwidth. PC minimums are ancient-era friendly — an i7-4770S / FX-9590 with 8 GB RAM and a GTX 970 / R9 390X clears it. Discounts run deep and often, down to about four dollars at the low end. Do not wait for it to resurface on Game Pass: it launched there day one but left the catalogue in October 2023.
As for Flying Wild Hog — an independent Polish studio under Supernova Capital ownership since 2019 — it has spent these years co-developing one of the most-watched remakes in the industry: Tomb Raider: Legacy of Atlantis, with Crystal Dynamics and Amazon Game Studios, a full UE5 rebuild of the 1996 original. Revealed at The Game Awards 2025, it slipped from a 2026 window to a confirmed 12 February 2027 launch on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, Steam and Nintendo Switch 2, with pre-orders live. Embracer's restructuring of its Tomb Raider holdings is the backdrop to all of it, and we covered what that did to the wider industry in why big budget games stopped being fun.
Verdict
Recommended as a short film you hold a controller for, not as an action game — 7/10. The cinematography is exceptional and completely committed, and the five-hour length means it never wears out its single idea. The combat is shallow, the camera that makes it beautiful also makes it hard to read, and the story is slighter than its themes deserve. Play it on PC or Xbox, not Switch, and turn the difficulty up. Assessed across platform versions as of the current builds.
Frequently asked questions
How long is Trek to Yomi?
About five hours for the main story, six and a half if you collect everything on one run, and roughly twelve and a half to thirteen hours to see all content including the alternative endings. The director intended it to be around five hours.
Which version should I buy?
PC or Xbox Series, at 71 and 72 on Metacritic respectively. PS5 sits at 69. Avoid the Nintendo Switch port at 64, where the resolution, lighting compromises and small on-screen characters undermine the one thing the game does best.
Is Trek to Yomi on Game Pass?
Not any more. It launched day one on Xbox Game Pass in May 2022 but left the catalogue in October 2023. As of October 2026 it is purchase-only — go in on a sale and it costs about as much as a coffee.
Is the combat any good?
It's the weakest part. Combos exist and stamina management matters late on, but the parry window is forgiving enough that most fights resolve the same way. Raising the difficulty from the start helps considerably, and a one-hit-kill Kensei mode unlocks after the credits for a proper challenge lap.
Does it have multiple endings?
Yes. Choices through the story lead to different conclusions, which is why completion times run to around thirteen hours against a five-hour first playthrough.
Who actually made it?
It's credited to independent creator Leonard Menchiari together with Polish studio Flying Wild Hog — directed by Marcin Kryszpin — and published by Devolver Digital. Crediting the studio alone understates how much of it was one person's vision.
Is there a sequel?
No, and none is announced. Flying Wild Hog is now co-developing Tomb Raider: Legacy of Atlantis with Crystal Dynamics and Amazon Game Studios, delayed from 2026 to 12 February 2027 across PS5, Xbox Series, Steam and Switch 2.
Where to go next
- Terminator: Resistance, where critics and players reached opposite conclusions
- Chernobylite, another small studio leading with atmosphere over mechanics
- F.I.S.T.: Forged In Shadow Torch, another side-scroller where the version you buy changes the score
- Saints Row, and what happens when a studio's last game underperforms
- How big open world maps really are
- Why a five-hour game can beat a hundred-hour one
- Browse more Action and Adventure guides