Lighting and effects look decent.

Rest looks so characterless and themeless. Same with Descent too, the games never seem to give a strong sense of what and where you are. 

...if the setting looked more like 15:30, I might hype a bit. 

I think he said it was test assets? 

and are making... decent?

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/revivalprod/overload-the-ultimate-six-degree-of-freedom-shoote

It's interesting that the levels are being made the same away the were back in 95... 

Is out http://store.steampowered.com/app/422970/

�3.99

Again, the art, atmosphere, and 90's ness is A++++ but I wish there were proper levels! 

 

yeah if there was an actual game behind that monster design demo then I might give an Eartha Kitt. As it stands though, errrr..... 

Lots of nice designs, sound and art... gameplay is robotron in first person.

If you think you're getting Doom or Quake then you're going to be really disappointed. If you're expecting an endless arcade shooter with a high score table then it's pretty much that. 

For those who have the game, you can click the eyeball symbol on the high-score page and watch a demo of that run.

Watch the top demo. The game is far more nightmarish than doom or quake IMO. 

DaZ - Stream it so I can save $5. 

I was going to stream it, it's not something stream-worthy really. 

This game is frustrating as fuck.
Graphics: 8/10
Sound: 6/10
Gameplay: 1/10
LevelDesign: 0/10

Overall: 3.75/10 

I like the puzzle designs, and it does a good job of slowly teaching you how to play it while making the learning part of the challenge instead of an insulting tutorial. Also, there are a number of good moments where you think about the puzzles in an area one way, and then discover something that makes you re-evaluate everything previous in a new light.

I also like the environment art, not only is it often pretty, but I especially like the player's flow through the spaces. There are lots of nice feeling paths that lead you to a good reveal, it feels great going past things and through things with good parallax. And the way routes branch, loop back, view the same space from a higher vantage point, etc. are all good. 

bought to check
no Y-axis mouse invert
no sound
refunded
kthx 

Yeah the island is a great feat of level design, which is especially hard to pull off right for open-ended areas like that.

Great game overall. 

Reading Kona's comments about Dark Souls kind of applies to me in a way. Part way through playing SOMA, I decided to install and activate the Wuss mod (appropriately named); not because I was scared but because I was way more interested in exploring the environments and digging through various items to flesh in the story then I was in dealing with enemies. I loved the underwater base settings but lacked the patience to wait out the enemies who interferred with what I wanted the most out of this game. Yes, I spoiled SOMA but ended up enjoying it a lot more afterwards and I would play it again, Wuss mode on, just to take it all in again.

And if I'm not corrupt enough on SOMA, I'm playing Outlast with edited ini files to slow the enemies right down. Without cheats, I'd abandon this game as the darkness and scarcity of batteries for the night vision makes it enough of a challenge for my limited patience. As is, I'm not minding the game too much. Not as good as Amnesia, A Machine for Pigs, because it is so hard to see, but it has a similar vibe.

Not sure if it is age, been-there-done-that combat grinding fatigue or the fact that I find walking sims or less combat intensive open world games (Fallout 3, Oblivion, STALKER series) or immersive puzzlers (Talos, Portal, Swapper) to be more interesting and less likely to be abandoned.What I've enjoyed most in games is immersion and exploration and the ability to progress withion my deteriorating capanilities. Getting mad at a game because I'm not skilled or committed enough making it seem like work is not how I want to use my limited time. 

SOMA had incredibly frustrating level design.

The monsters typically roamed on a very simple path (like, 2 point, 4 at the most) and teleported if they got stuck.

The visuals, atmosphere, story and themes were amazing.

But discussing it at the office I ended up drawing the levels on a whiteboard and redesigning them :P 

SOMA is a really annoying title because everytime I read it I assume it's an acronym for something (like DOTA) and spend time trying to work out what the fuck game you're talking about before remembering, oh, that's just what it's called.

Stupid crap title. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soma 

I've enjoyed two movies on this, Her and Ex-Machina.

Even more so, I've enjoyed three games on this subject. What they all had in common was a background sense of melancholy but these three each had a unique flavour. Also, the player is required to mine information if they want the most complete story, otherwise big holes can be left behind:

SOMA - Good horror, decent voice acting but the lead character was not likable. They did a nice job of filling out the story. Addresses the concept of transference vs copying. Soundtrack suits the game tension but is not contemplative.

The Talos Principle - This one is my favorite in dealing with the subject. Brilliant voice acting; but then again, there's only two voices - one the God voice, the other in audio logs. This Gordon Freeman approach actually makes the lead character feel more like you, the player, especially since you can make some dialog tree choices that are personal. In this game, there is no transference; rather consciousness is imbued to machines artificially. Getting the most story requires opening up bonus areas and searching and exploring every computer terminal you can find. Not doing so will leave out some very important explanations. The music is contemplative and the game just has this rich vibe of wonder and wistfullness that makes it great. The DLC, Road to Gehenna, is also worth playing for its original take on social interactions between these AIs.

Cradle - I really liked the art style of this game and how it feels like interactive speculative fiction. Mining for story items takes more effort then the other two games and if it wasn't for seeing some Steam achievements, there's a pile of documents scattered on the grounds that would go unread and they are worth reading. It deals with transference. The soundtrack is contemplative. The voice acting is okay but the lead character is not that likable.

Not quite congruent to these three but I have to mention it is The Swapper which features intelligent rocks. The Swapper is also a melancholy story and is rich in atmosphere. 

I've decided that watching "Let's Play" videos is one of the absolute best things YouTube is good for. 15-20 minutes of watching someone else play a game is usually all it takes to know if I'd like it or not. It has saved me money and lot of wasted time. It has also introduced me to games that I otherwise wouldn't have given a second look which actually turned out to be very enjoyable. 

I didn't really notice that. It was pretty rudimentary and was vastly outweighed by the exploration, scenery-gawping, and story-telling. I agree though that the latter aspects are the very good highlights of the game, although I didn't mind the gameplay at all and the tension / scare value was pretty good in places. 

both Metro Redux games on sale on GoG... yay no DRM! 

When I said the game gets insane... it does get insane...
I can barely make it past the first few waves -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XSoRbNs9bDk 

The weapons seem really unsatisfying from the video ... weak sounds, weak impacts, etc. Needs some bass.