Reviewed on: PC
Inspired by the ZX Spectrum and the works of H. P. Lovecraft, in Deep Ones the game revolves around a nameless protagonist who apparently loses his submarine. Now, it is up to the diver to cross the dark and dangerous depths of the ocean in the hope of recovering it. Despite the interesting story, the game barely focuses on it. The final journey is hampered by bad design choices, gameplay and controls that will get in your way a bit.
STORY
The game begins with you taking a big dive into the depths of the ocean, and there you already get used to the controls, but it’s not difficult; jump and shoot, something very simple in the 2D game scene. But here we already see the first flaw: it doesn’t let you jump and shoot at the same time. If you perform this action, when you land you fire twice in a row.
The environment is almost always dark, lit only by you, and some brightly colored inhabitants and objects of the environment to help guide you on your way. Your flashlight doesn’t shine very well, lighting perhaps three steps of your path. And this gets in the way a lot at times, making you die simply because I couldn’t see where I was supposed to land. This leads to much more trial and error. It breaks any fun the game tries to convey, throwing it straight down the drain. The game isn’t always linear; sometimes you need to explore the map to complete the level.
GAMEPLAY
The slow gameplay comes from being underwater, but in some moments when you need to flee enemies or run before something collapses, jumping gets complicated. Another factor that gets in the way is the delay the game has in responding to the controller. Sometimes it’s almost 1 second, and it makes you die several times from silly mistakes.
Your weapon fires extremely slow lasers, which are not satisfying. The gun and sword you pick up as you advance in the game are a few pixels that sometimes prove useless. Instead of being able to engage in sword-fighting duels, you are forced to run from side to side, otherwise it is practically impossible not to be hit. It is this kind of classic gameplay that is made difficult, unnecessarily so, by the controls and not by the challenge.
GRAPHICS
Deep Ones is inspired by the ZX Spectrum, but that shouldn’t stop it from trying to go through improvements. Instead, everything is discouraging and tiring to the eyes. If the visuals are not enough to get in the way of the fun you’ll have, the soundtrack is not bad, but doesn’t seem to match the game. A mix of electronic music with 16-bit. We also can’t deny that sometimes it looks pretty on screen, and very colorful, but overall it leaves something to be desired and could be better.
CONCLUSION
Deep Ones doesn’t hold you much; it’s a bit challenging, but because of gameplay problems. This is a game that will test your patience much more than your skill. The soundtrack won’t make you remember it for years, but it may please those who like the style, unlike the visual art.
Narrative: 4
Audiovisual: 5
Gameplay: 3
Max Xavier
Comments (0)
Be the first to comment.