Dreadout

A long while ago I tried a demo of a game called Dreadout

Well the full game has finally been released and thanks to the Steam Halloween sale I was able to nab a copy and give the full version a whirl. 

If you can't be arsed to watch the video or if I didn't mention it, Dreadout is a horror game based on Indonesian ghost stories so if nothing else we have quite a unique setting.  I've played plenty of horror games based on Japanese folk tales or the more American style of horror of something terrible trying to cut you into little bits, but I know fuck all about Indonesian folk stories and ghosts so that alone was enough to draw me in.

The game starts out with a group of high school students and their teaching getting lost somewhere in Indonesia where they stumble across some kind of deserted town.  The curious school kids run inside to explore and eventually come across an old school.  The silent protagonist and her friend stay outside while her buddies go exploring and when they return one person's gone missing.  Upon reentering to search, ghostly shit starts happening and the game begins for real.

Before I talk about the game play I HAVE to talk about the graphics because they suck to a degree that is actually shocking.  If you have ever seen any games on the Xbox Live Arcade indie thing, it LOOKS like that.  The characters just look fucking weird when moving and the environments look like something from an early PS2 game or worse.  I'm aware it's a small indie developer working with what they can but they are terrible to the point where even someone like me, who cares very little for fancy graphics, had to raise and eyebrow and say "oh god".

The best way to describe Dreadout would be poor mans Project Zero (Fatal Frame).  You walk around the school, solve puzzles and every so often you'll encounter a ghost which you must photo to death with your camera phone.  At lost of the ghosts, however, won't die with camera power alone and you must solve a little puzzle or 2 to figure out how to off them once and for all.  The camera is also used for a number of puzzles so it's a little more than just a weapon to fend of the nasties.

Combat is a big problem in this game though because it sucks a massive dick.  There isn't much "real" combat as such and most ghosts are easy enough to stun away or flat out kill just by keeping a good distance and snapping when the little damage indicator comes up.  There is one boss fight though which takes the absolute piss and almost ruins everything.  The boss fight involves you being stuck in a small room with a ghost that you can't see without the camera being readied and once it takes a certain amount of damage it starts to frenzy.  When it's mad, you have exactly ONE chance to snap it for damage otherwise it will stun lock you to death and there is fuck all you can do about it.

This leads to the games next big problem which is death.  When you die, you don't get a simple game over or anything like that, you get sent to limbo.  Limbo is a black screen with a big white thing at the other end that you run into in order to revive.  The first time you die, the white thing is really close but each subsequent death makes it move further and further away.  This becomes a pain 2 or 3 deaths in because you just want to try the fucking boss again but now you have to wait so that the developer can give you tips for things you already know or thank you for buying the game, which they could have fucking done in the credits.  It's just obnoxious.

The other complaint I have about this game is that it's too fucking short.  I was expecting a little more since a great deal of time passed between the demo and the final release and the two are totally different.  Granted, the second act of the game is being provided as a free update but the game is like £15 on Steam and for a title this short and budget looking, £15 is a little steep.

To sum up, disappointment is what I feel for Dreadout.  The Indonesian folklore setting was enough to get me excited for the game back when the demo and the demo was fun enough for me to want to buy the full thing.  The full game however, is a mess of shitty puzzles and shitty combat and only takes a couple hours (if that) to beat.  That said, I'm still looking forward to act 2 because I'm hoping that they will learn from the mistakes of this one and make the next act much better.

I can't recommend Dreadout while act 1 is still the only thing available since it's pricy for what it is, a bit crap and very short.  If you see it in a steam sale for 75% off or something, absolutely grab it but until then you can play any of the much better horror games on Steam. 

Dreadout Demo (With Video)

First of all watch the video of me playing the Demo

Right, now to discuss some of my thoughts.

First of all, I was really impressed by the graphics, it looks real slick considering that we're dealing with an indie developed horror game.  The last indie developed horror game I played was Lone Survivor and that had fucking pixel art, so it's nice to see a small developer going the extra mile with the graphics.

Mechanically it works very well, the controls are nice and slick and easy to figure out without looking at the tutorial.  Basically if you have played a game on the PC ever, you will instantly be able to figure out how to control your character.

The puzzles in this game I both enjoy, but have sort of a problem with.  For example there is a bit near the start of the video where I get stuck for a short while because I wasn't able to figure out right away that I had to walk through the wall.  One thing I am glad about is that the game didn't tell me what to do, it let me work it out for myself.  That said I feel what it should have done is maybe made the hole in the wall pop out a bit, like having vines growing out from around the edges or something to indicate that it's something you can walk through.

The other problem I had, puzzle wise, was the candles.  There is an edit where I wasted a shit ton of time trying to figure out what to do, and this is because I think the objective was badly put forward.  What I was doing was trying to use my camera to light the other candles.  I was clicking around, pressing buttons on my keyboard to try and activate the flash and all sorts of shit.  I was even convinced at one point that there was something in the sky I had to snap in order to make the puzzle work.  At the end of the day it wasn't a puzzle, it was trying to make me go back and fight some enemies.

You see the problem is that a blue border pops up when you get near the candles, which means something important is there, so I was convinced for a long time that the key to those candles was in that area.  You could argue that the music was an indication of something being there that I had to go kill, but I thought the music was playing because of the big hangy dude.  If they had just played a sound of something crawling out of one of the nearby graves or ANYTHING.

Finally, is it scary?  Well to me, no, not really, but the potential is there.  The scene with the ghost facing the wall in the room was quite effective as you can probably tell from my reaction in the video, but I find there is no tension in the combat music when you fight the dudes in the graveyard.  The dudes are slow and crap, probably because they are there to teach you about combat, but the sound design for these encounters is a little weak.  Take Silent Hill for example, where the monsters sound truly horrible and the music that plays does a good job of making you panic. 

It's a good demo worth checking out and there is the potential for something really good here I think,  With it just being a demo and no release date in sight, I'm hoping that they will be able to put out a finish product that will rock our socks and fill our pants with large volumes of wee.