- played on PS4
- developed by Simogo
- published by Annapurna Interactive
- review first published 22/04/2025
Recently, I was left heartbroken. A firm, strong thing of six years turned soft and weak. Naturally, these past couple of months have led to some major life changes. While I am still spinning too many plates, I feel more comfortable with it all. Just before the floor collapsed around me, I played Sayonara Wild Hearts! How fitting! Maybe the universe was trying to tell me something :)))
Sayonara Wild Hearts is a jet fuelled arcade music experience that takes you for an incredible ride. Think of Sayonara Wild Hearts like a playable album! At the beginning of your journey, the narrator (voiced by Queen Latifah holy moly) briefly alludes to some metaphors, and you are then immediately plunged into the fray. You are the Fool, and you must push forward through enemies to keep going. No joke, after five minutes you will already know you’re gonna have a gnarly time.
Its storytelling is entirely told through symbols and the accompanying music tracks. There is no outright correct interpretation to the happenings of Sayonara Wild Hearts. It leaves enough room for interpretation to let the player form their own powerful meanings during play and the game actively promotes this kind of reading. What is here is pure fun! Tight controls, well paced rhythms, and bizarre crazy moves! There is no doubt that this is an emotional psychedelic rollercoaster backed by an amazingly produced soundtrack and hyper stylized cinematic visuals. The hype and sombre flourishes elevates the game to become an empowering experience for its players.
While the runtime of Sayonara Wild Hearts is the same as your average album, its core gameplay loop reveals itself after you finish it. No big spoilers here, but let’s say you just won’t help yourself replaying your favourite songs straight away! It has that effect on you. The journey the game takes you on really did open my eyes on a personal level.
I couldn’t help but interpret the main opponents, the wild hearts, as versions of myself, formed from past beliefs, feelings, and memories. A negative energy connects all these versions together, clouding their mind and sense of self. Ultimately, they are you as much as you are them, and that fact haunts you. You can still feel their influence in your day to day life, and try as you might to ignore them, sometimes they hijack and make you think in ways you don’t want to. The game caught me at a time where life looked bleak, and the future was uncertain. However, in this moment playing this video game, I took a step back, and realised how cool this experience was and what the game was alluding to in its symbolic messaging. What a lovely reprieve!
Sayonara Wild Hearts literally showed me that it is possible to actively confront these negative influences in a loving way, highlighting the challenges in doing so when you are mentally in a dark pit. While I’m not exploding people into lovely hearts with a single punch or wall riding with a crazy cool motorbike in real life, Sayonara Wild Hearts brings out this mode of self reflection in me, and it is beautiful.
Sayonara Wild Hearts is a kinetic energy that permeates through your gamer senses, leaving a lasting personal impact during its short stay. It fully commits to its symbolic interpretive messaging and capitalises on it by delivering an excellent, honest, video game experience. The world can test you, and Sayonara Wild Hearts tells us we can still be positive in the face of a bitter reality. Sayonara Wild Hearts teaches you to be kind to your past selves by accepting your anger, acknowledging your sadness, and allowing love to be the reason to live life!
Just like the Fool, I am now on that same journey, slowly learning to love all my wild hearts.
Stay safe out there guys, you all deserve to love yourself! Keep groovin’!