Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy Hands-On Preview – The Plague Tale Franchise Enters Its Tomb Raider Phase With Impressive Results

We got to go hands-on with Chapters Five and Six of Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy, set for PS5 release on August 27, 2026, and were rather impressed to say the least with what we saw.

Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy takes place 15 years before the events of Requiem. The game focuses on Sophia’s backstory, the girl who became the protector of Amicia and Hugo in the other two Plague Tales. Sophia is a smuggler and member of her father’s pirate gang.

She chooses to flee her pirate gang and goes to the Minotaur’s Island. There she starts experiencing flashbacks – she becomes connected to the past through a figure called Theseus. The game often jumps between present and past, with the past being playable sections as Theseus. On Minotaur’s Island, Sophia must escape a maze, all while enemies are trying to hunt her down. Many puzzles, trials, and traps await.

Action-packed Combat

The game is more combat-oriented, and less about stealth than the previous two Plague Tales. You frequently encounter groups of enemies. Enemy attacks are indicated by a yellow color when they can be parried or red when they must be dodged. You can block with L1, perform quick attacks with Square, strong attacks by holding Triangle, Kicks by tapping Triangle, dodges with Circle, and grappling hook pulls with L2. The grappling hook is particularly helpful to pull archers down from elevated positions. The preview build was locked at Normal difficulty, which featured three health bar segments. Every time you get hit, it takes away one health segment. Every time you kill an enemy, it refills one health segment.

You can buy skills using Resonance Points, which are small interactable items you find in the environment. You can also find Charms in treasure chests, which give permanent passive bonuses. Exploring side areas for these items is worthwhile to make combat easier. There are different blades (weapons) too; each has passive boosts to certain attacks. Your only melee weapon is the blade.

More Emphasis on Puzzles

Our playable preview started in Chapter Five on Minotaur’s Island. Just like the other Plague Tale games, it’s a linear game design. Chapter Five has a slightly more open design where you can go in different directions. After fighting past some enemies, you come to a gate with three locks. Then the path splits toward three trials. You must clear all of them but can tackle them in any order. One thing that upset me as a completionist is that, despite the open design of the level, you can’t go back to previous areas once you squeeze through a gap or progress to a new sub-area. Even though the areas are connected, you are then hardlocked into the current section and can’t go back and forth.

With all the optional paths, it’s not clear to the player which path forces a point of no return, and then you can’t explore the side paths anymore and miss out on the bonus items, forcing a chapter replay. There are no manual saves either to keep a “backup” from each area. Even though I spent a lot of time exploring thoroughly, it often felt like a waste when I unknowingly took the path that forced a point of no return.

The gameplay feels much closer to an Uncharted or even Tomb Raider than it does to the other two Plague Tales, just without guns. You are effectively a treasure hunter, going through a maze of puzzles and traps. This time you don’t control rats. I do like the different setting, yet familiar gameplay style. The graphics are also amazing, especially the outdoor areas where the lighting is better. It’s worth noting our preview build was on PC.

The Chapter Five trials highlighted different gameplay features. Two of them focused on light reflection, and one on climbing and jumping on symbols in the correct order. It does take some trying around, but if you make no progress the game offers a hint when pressing D-Pad Up. The hint frequency can be adjusted in the game settings.

Chapter Six was a lot more linear, consisting of running away while being chased. The chapters took around one hour each to complete. The developers indicated a game length of 15-20 hours depending on how thoroughly you explore.

Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy is shaping up to be the most exciting release this August. The treasure hunter vibe is a big departure from the first two games, but will be appreciated by fans of similar games like Uncharted, Tomb Raider, or Indiana Jones. The combat sections are fun, the puzzles strike a good balance of not being too complex while still being unique and requiring some thinking. Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy is very much worth keeping an eye on!

Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy releases for PS5 on August 27, 2026.

Preview code kindly provided by PR.