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Lies Beneath Review | Oculus Quest

11/4/2020

 
Lies Beneath Review | Oculus Quest - Pass the Controller

Horror is a pretty overcrowded genre when it comes to VR, owing mostly to the platform’s greater level of immersion making it easy to provoke a reaction from players. Oculus exclusive Lies Beneath manages to differentiate itself by travelling the survival horror route while adopting a dark and pulpy comic book aesthetic. Throw in some exciting action gameplay and the team at Drifter (Robo Recall: Unplugged) could be onto a winner.

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by Sam Sant
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@SlamShotSam

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Developer: Drifter
Publisher: Oculus Studios
Platforms: Oculus Quest, Oculus Rift
Players: 1

Published by Oculus Studios and released first on the wireless Quest - it’s due 14 April on Rift, with one purchase granting access to both versions - Lies Beneath is intentionally framed as schlocky fiction. You play through three issues of the titular comic series, which promises “lurid lore to alarm and harm” throughout the eight-hour campaign.

Lies Beneath remains steadfastly true to its gimmick, boasting cel shaded visuals and floating text boxes in place of spoken dialogue. Combined with trademark verbs like “thwack” emanating from your actions, it might be the closest any piece of entertainment has come to having you step inside a comic book world. Fans of the medium will appreciate that massively, especially since there’s actual quality writing and sequencing to accompany the basic framework.

Players are cast as a young woman named Mae, who’s homecoming to the quaint Alaskan town of Slumber quickly goes wrong. Throughout the story you navigate twists and turns as the truth regarding the setting and its inhabitants gradually comes to light. It’s not all that big of a revelation due to a reliance on familiar horror tropes, but it's possible to dig a little deeper by taking the time to inspect environmental storytelling elements and collectible lore items.

While Lies Beneath looks great both stylistically and technically, choosing to convey the narrative through text occasionally proves troublesome. Small font sizes are used in places and are hard to make out without leaning right into them, which is, of course, an option that you’re afforded in VR, but it’s irksome when playing room-scale and plain irritating with a stationary setup.
Regardless, the game does a great job of building an unnerving atmosphere through eerie environments and lighting. It’s close to pitch black at times, with only the piercing red eyes of enemies visible in the distance and the faint glow of your trusty lighter illuminating the more immediate area. PSA: If that lighter goes out and takes a few attempts to spark back up, prepare for an unpleasant jumpscare. Otherwise, the direction of its flame is a handy means of setting you on the right path and it’s light also reveals enemy weak points.

Many locations are adorned with grotesque, ornamental butchery that melds animal and human body parts; meanwhile, frantic banging emanates from the next helpless victims that are trapped inside nearby crates. The soundscape in Lies Beneath is strong on the whole and using headphones is an in-game recommendation we’d echo, but, failing that, the built-in Quest speakers do a decent job of outputting fairly immersive 3D audio.

When time comes to combat the deranged townsfolk, there are three tweakable comfort modes and three difficulty settings to ensure everyone can do so enjoyably. Whatever you opt for, Oculus Touch motion tracking works pretty much flawlessly; a great test in any VR game is to throw something, and Lies Beneath gave us no trouble lodging axes in enemy heads from meters away.

There are plenty more melee weapons to wield beyond just axes, which do different levels of damage and cover various ranges. Unfortunately, however, their collision is wildly inconsistent. Weapons collide with and lodge into certain foes and surfaces, but clip right through others, which is distracting enough to pull you out of the experience at times. 
Similarly mixed is the amount of damage that specific enemy types can absorb, especially in the late stages of the game. Two identical nasties can take vastly different levels of punishment, which, in theory, could’ve served to ramp up terror through uncertainty, but is more annoying than anything else. With checkpoints being limited at that point in the game, it’s almost enough to have you pulling your hair out.

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If that tempts you to drop the difficulty a notch, know that Lies Beneath significantly steps up (or down) with each setting. Easy is a cakewalk, Normal can get pretty challenging, while Hard, above and beyond to its name, is absolutely gruelling.

The difficulty level doesn’t just affect incoming and outgoing damage, but also the resources available to you in ammunition and health-replenishing foodstuffs. There’s a hard limit on what you can carry, with your back designated to a hunting rifle and a non-lethal harpoon gun, while your right and left holsters can be used to store anything from a silenced 9mm pistol to a tin of tuna.

Covering all of the bases with a melee weapon, some food and a pistol is most often your best bet to prep for enemy encounters. That’s especially true for a few set piece holdout sections reminiscent of Resident Evil 4, in which you’ll also be afforded bear traps and gasoline cans to strategically place around the battlefield. That being said, the best laid plans quickly go awry when you’re charged by tankish pigmen and forget to do something simple, like flick your wrist to reload the six shooter or cock the hunting rifle with your spare hand.
Lies Beneath Review | Oculus Quest - Pass the Controller
Although there are no multiplayer or secondary modes to lean on after finishing the inventive final chapter, it’s worth going back to try and find all of the collectibles for the extra lore and greater access to resources they provide through unlocks. Beating the hardest difficulty can definitely be worn as a badge of honour, while multiple endings and achievements (which a lot of Quest games don’t have) should also help to keep you coming back.

Oculus Quest is a platform that’s largely packed with shorter VR “experiences” and arcade-type games suited to brief bursts of play. That isn’t necessarily bad, considering the generally more casual audience, but it can leave some owners wanting in terms of substance. Lies Beneath brings just that, providing spine-tingling scares that can be as challenging or accessible as you’d like. While it might be frightening at times, the action and comic book leanings impart the necessary mass appeal to see it stick the landing as a flagship Oculus exclusive available on Quest.

Pros

  • Satisfying action combat, with great motion tracking
  • Varied, often gruesomely gorgeous environments
  • Engaging comic book trappings

Cons

  • Inconsistent collision detection
  • Damage needed to bring down the same enemies is erratic
  • Text pop-ups can be illegible without physically moving closer

8/10
0 Comments

Doom Eternal Review | Xbox One

7/4/2020

 
DOOM Eternal | Review | Xbox One - Pass the Contoller

Intense. That's the first word that springs to mind when you get to grips with Doom Eternal. The pace has ramped up even further from the lauded 2016 reboot and hits you right in the face so hard that, if you happened to be an in-game demon, you'd be inclined to evaporate into a pool of blood.

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​by James
 Michael
 Parry

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@James_Parry

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 Developer: id Software
Publisher: Bethesda Softworks
Platforms: Xbox One, PlayStation 4, Switch, Stadia, PC
Players: 1 - 3
The return of the Doom Slayer has been much anticipated, with fuel only being added to the proverbial hellfire following an excruciating four-month delay. Developer id Software seemingly took that extra time to deliver visual polish so detailed you can almost feel juicy enemy giblets jumping out of the screen - at least on Xbox One X.

Elsewhere, environments stretch out way into the distance and hellacious weather effects successfully bring the underworld to the surface. Perhaps the only missing detail that’d really push Doom Eternal’s presentation over the top would be twisting real-world landmarks to fit its purpose, as seen in the likes of Devil May Cry V.

In fact, it’s possible to lose yourself so completely in the stylised setting that you mistake it for taking place on a different planet as you travel between enemy strongholds. Creatures within them are varied and plentiful, quickly forcing you to get to grips with the Slayer's arsenal in order to dispatch them with severe prejudice.

There’s once again a focus on making individual guns go as far as possible, rather than offering an overwhelming slew of options. Each firearm has one or two secondary functions - such as the super shotgun’s grappling hook, or the plasma rifle’s deadly microwave beam - and you'll most likely find your favourites fairly quickly. That being said, you have to be ready to switch weapons on a dime when different enemy types call for you to target weak points, or, perhaps more likely, you run out of ammo.

​While in Doom (2016) supplies weren't plentiful, in Doom Eternal resource management constantly demands that you efficiently balance your time between gathering health, armour and ammo. Glory kills – devastating executions you can perform when an enemy is staggered and close to death – still grant you health and the chainsaw still grants ammunition, but now regenerates one pip of fuel which is a welcome counterbalance.
The game-changer here is the flame belch, which coats your enemies in fire and causes them to drop protective armour upon death. Armor is vital to your survival, even on lower difficulty settings. Those looking for a challenge have plenty of headroom to push themselves in Doom Eternal, while slayer gates (somewhat secret combat challenges) will push those with a real glutton for punishment even further.

Getting around as the Slayer has never felt so rapid, and traversal has taken a more vertical approach in the sequel. A dash ability combines with the familiar double jump to let you traverse huge open spaces, plus there's even wall climbing thrown into the mix, although, regrettably, it contributes frustration and variety in equal measure.

Often you can see where you need to go but getting there requires a level of dexterity that takes some time to grasp. Unhelpfully, at one point, a floating platform didn’t respawn following a failed attempt and stranded us in an area before a quick restart restored it. Fortunately, technical performance elsewhere is as impressive as the game's visual presentation.

Another weaker point was the many facets of the upgrade system, however. There are runes, which modify the game experience, weapon mods, which unlock those alternate fire modes, and suit stat points, which can be spent on another range of skills. It's a lot to absorb, and even if you have an idea of your play style it can be difficult to know which elements you will and won’t use.

You can respec skills in your ship, which hovers in orbit as a hub between levels. It starts off fairly locked down, but collecting sentinel batteries as you mow your way through levels gradually lets you access more sections of the ship. One useful area you can get to straight away is the training room, which does pretty much what it says on the tin.
Of course, we'd be remiss if we didn't also mention Mick Gordon’s pounding soundtrack. The world of Doom has never been so metal, and neither has its music, complete here with a growling intergender choir. Its predecessor’s OST was exemplary, yet somehow, Eternal hits the mark even harder by slowly building to indicate trouble before exploding into frantic confrontations.

There's competitive multiplayer to dive into as well, if you fancy a distraction from the campaign. Battlemode takes an asymmetric approach as two demons tackle one fully-equipped Slayer; there’s definitely some fleeting fun to be had, but the main focus of the game is clearly its campaign.

While there are a lot of similarities to the 2016 reboot, this latest Doom outing offers more bang for your buck. Some of the shots that id Software have taken don't hit the mark, but the effort and care put into the game shines no matter where you look. It’s immensely satisfying, if relentless to the point of being dizzying at times, but Doom Eternal knows what it is and wholeheartedly embraces it to great effect.
Pros

  • Gameplay builds on Doom 2016 while retaining the fundamentals
  • Environments are breathtaking
  • Killing has never felt so satisfying

Cons

  • Platforming and climbing lose their shine after a while
  • Upgrades upon upgrades fail to hang together
  • Multiplayer is limited to just one good idea, and so feels incidental

9/10
0 Comments


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