With Pragmata, come for the sick hacking and exploration, not the heartstrings

Pragmata is probably one of the more unique games I’ve played in the past few years, especially out of a publisher the size of Capcom. But Pragmata doesn’t innovate through an entirely new premise, but through the combination of very old tropes with a shot of the strange.

If you have no idea what Pragmata is, it’s that pretty generic looking sci-fi game where the man what looks like he’s in a Dead Space is carrying around a blonde toddler on his back. It’s pretty bright and colorful, but the game’s visuals just look a little – and I don’t mean to insult an entire fan base here – Lost Planet to me. 

That’s not to say those games are bad, but they do look like bland sci-fi, and that’s part of why I felt like I knew nothing about Pragmata going into it, despite there being a demo, and trailers at every major reveal show in recent memory. I just wasn’t paying attention. But when the game started getting pretty rave reviews, I was tapped as the member of staff who should check it out. 

Why? Because it’s this year’s Dad Game, like Death Stranding 2 before it. Now, about 12 hours and a 100% complete save later, I am not only familiar with Pragmata, I love Pragmata. And, ironically, it has nothing to do with the “Dadness” of it all.

In Pragmata, you play as Hugh, a real dipshit whose part of a crew headed to the uber 3D printer station on the moon to check out why nobody is responding to their calls. Things go sidewise almost immediately, Hugh’s crew is unceremoniously killed (including the guy who talks about how great having kids is to a cynical Hugh – didn’t love that part, to be honest), and the station’s security bots attack.