De-Void, a first person story driven adventure game developed by Pulsetense Games and published by KISS LTD, is a story driven adventure game which puts you in control of a lone survivor trying to find out what happened to the rest of the outpost that you inhabit. The game is designed to be very atmospheric and to have a good story that was thought provoking and philosophical. You work with an AI known as WILCO who will help you and guide you through the different environments you explore. I actually did the review for Solarix, another game done by the same developers and published by the same team that you can find here. Some have said that they think these are actually based in the same universe or the same part of space and time, the developers have said that this isn’t true but I can definitely see some recurring themes throughout both games, for example being alone on an alien outpost.
From the start, you can see that the graphics are a bit subpar. Don’t get me wrong they do the job, but in my opinion it is harder to build an atmosphere for a game when the graphics aren’t on the same level as the atmosphere you are trying to build. Take Outlast for example, the game and the atmosphere wouldn’t be anywhere near the same if the graphics weren’t top notch. From my experience of the game there are clipping issues, pop in issues and texture issues where textures seem to smooth over the further you are from an environment. It’s a shame because this is an exploration and adventure game, you would hope that you would find some cool stuff that would have an interesting an awesome look to it.
There are parts of the game that the lead character has to use a VR headset to see through the eyes of their AI companion to see emphatic waves…….and that is where most of the interesting graphical stuff happens. There was a giant alien ball that looked like a giant spore which was rolling towards me, it did look pretty cool but there is one issue with this VR headset thing, everything is in Black and White and I mean everything, there is absolutely no colour when looking through this headset, maybe it’s because the AI can’t see colour or something but whatever the reason it makes all the interesting stuff you see through this headset fairly redundant because you have no idea what it is.
The gameplay basically consists of running around wherever this AI tell’s you to go, finding computer terminals and clicking on them, then you go to another location and do the same thing, or putting the headset on and listening to a voice monologue in your head and tell you about humanities short comings, it does make the game a bit more interesting but I have to say the rest of it is basically a walking simulator. You are given very brief instructions as to where to go and then you have to find your way around the landscapes, in the first area it isn’t too bad but the second was massive and it took ages for me to find my way around.
On that note the actual explanations weren’t the best either, I was told that I had to go to the excavation site to have a super black and white VR experience and after I was finished in the excavation site, which took 25 minutes to find, my character then said something like “Right, I need to go to the excavation site now!” and I was like “Excuse me?” So after looking around for another 25 minutes I finally found the other excavation site and was teleported to a ship in the middle of the desert having no idea what I was meant to be doing. The issue with this is that there is no tutorial or anything to teach you the mechanics of the game. Another issue I have is I cannot save the game, I played through until around the second area where there is a massive plant, went away to eat some food and when I came back to it I had to start the game again which was super frustrating.
The game does have a lot of good qualities including the sound which I was very impressed with. The music that they have put into the game works very well with what’s happening and the different areas. The voice acting is absolutely amazing, from the lead character to the voices in your head the actual voice acting in this game is very impressive. The sounds themselves really helped to build an atmosphere, that same as Solarix really, the music and the audio in that game really made for a terrifying experience. Both Solarix and De-void seem to use the same graphical engine and they look like they were made in 2006 which is a shame and really does affect the atmosphere of the game.
The story of this game is very promising, but you are really thrown into the deep end straight from the start no explanation as to where you are or what you’re doing on this outpost and you would hope that you would understand what WILCO is and everything if you have been on this outpost for a while. None the less the story is very promising once you get past the Walking simulator. This game isn’t the best game I have ever played, I found it a bit hard to get into and the graphics looking like they are from 2006 really throws you off, that when mixed with the glitches and issues wouldn’t be so bad but having to walk for 20/30 minutes with no interaction is difficult when the environment doesn’t look amazing either. The game is currently £5.59 on Steam but I don’t think I would recommend this one.
Rating: 4/10
+ Promising Story
+ Good sound and voice acting
– Graphics are outdated and glitchy
– Walking simulator
– Not much interaction
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