Withering Rooms PS5 Survival Horror Game Review
Summary: A fantastic combination of horror, combat and puzzle solving elements, Withering Rooms is one nightmare that you may not wish to wake from!
4
Horror time!
Withering Rooms is unlike anything that I have played in the very recent past. It is one of those survival horror games that you know is of a certain quality that deserves to be pushed out there into the mainstream. I sincerely hope that this review assists in this.
Developed by Moonless Formless, the game has been in development for a few years, but now has hit consoles, including the PlayStation five, the system upon which I reviewed the title. The game is a 2.5 D action rogue-like that really gave me Resident Evil vibes . Now I’m talking old-school RE, not the more recent incarnations, which by the way are fantastic and you should check them out, but yeah I’m talking Resi Evil one kind of feels.
In the game you play as a teenage girl by the name of Nightingale who finds herself in an asylum called Mostyn House, however things aren’t as they seem, and she finds herself trapped in a dream where when you die you just go straight back into the same nightmare, and the whole idea behind the game is to investigate and elude the horrors of the house and ultimately escape the dream that you are trapped in.
The monster design in this game is next level. They are truly scary and I actually felt apprehension, something I’ve not felt for a long time playing a video game. Some might argue that the title is more action than horror, however I kind of disagree with that. I would actually like some of these monsters as action figures, they are so creepy it is ridiculous. The rest of the game has a real gothic feeling to it and the mansion is cast in perpetual night time. The level of detail is fantastic and makes exploration fun and apprehensive all at once.
Audio in the game is damn near perfect and the noises and voices made by the monsters frankly freaked me out. Thank you! I’m a bit of an audio snob when it comes to games and this was just delightful that the sounds were just as horrible (in a good way) as the visuals. The soundtrack itself worked perfectly with all elements of play which added to the foreboding I felt the whole time smashing through this.
Nightingale, if I was to poke at anything in the game, it looks just a little bit odd when she moves about. Sorry! She seems to have a slight hunch and an odd way of moving, though it doesn’t take away too much from the game. The way that her look has been developed and the attention to detail to the game in general is fantastic and you can truly see that the team took a long time to perfect the look of this title.
Withering Rooms also contains elements of an RPG with crafting and item collection taking place. For the most part, when you die, Nightingale will lose most of her gear, giving it a rogue-like dimension to the game. There are a few things that you do get to keep or items that you can track down pretty quickly, which is good and there are areas where you can essentially pop things into a permanent collection.
The game keeps you on its toes, by spawning enemies in new places. This also is true for the nonplayer characters who I think should’ve been left in the one spot as they are some of the vendors in the game that you need to access which proved frustrating. Maybe for you folks who love a crazy challenge this will be welcome but for myself, I like to know where certain things are! Not knowing exactly where enemies are was a fun lesson to learn, as after, I died the first few times, I assumed that the enemies were also part of the puzzle of the game, and ran down the hallways that I’ve already been through expecting to see certain things in place waiting for me, only to find that they may have been behind me or even worse had already found me and were in pursuit.
You will find enough weapons in the game to take on monsters, however the task is working at the timing of your attacks and being sure that you have the right items to take on anything that is in your way. It forms a heckuva challenge, but once again, if you’re into this sort of game, I think that you will love it. The game does allow you to peek through keyholes to see if anything is on the other side waiting for you. However, your range of vision is limited and it is still dangerous to just pop on through a door even if you have looked because who knows what might be doing its rounds in that particular hallway?
Withering Rooms has a variety of puzzles for you to solve, which is fun and makes the old grey matter tick. One of the hardest puzzles in the game is actually figuring out how to use your items! There is not a lot of handholding that takes place in the title which depending on the circumstances can make that frustrating and is pretty much the only thing that really takes away from the experience along with some of the combat and it’s timing. It’s just that little bit off, which makes it feel as though blows are not landing the way they should or that you are countering effectively.
I think Withering Rooms is going to be very well regarded by the gaming community. It scratches a lot of itches and the dark nightmarish settings promise one heck of an adventure into a dream that Nightingale can only wish she would awaken from. I guess Dear Reader, that is up to you. I recommend this game wholeheartedly and would love to know your thoughts about it too. I can’t wait for more from Moonless Formless if this is the quality we can expect.
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