One of the very many games advertised to me as "having no jumpscares" only for it to have jumpscares. Either my definition of the word is very different from other people's, or I'm easy to own.
Probably the best of these indie horrors with a vague and confused "retro-inspired" aesthetic I've ever played, which doesn't put it very high on my actual quality barometer. It essentially has every single idea you've ever read in an ideas guy greentext horror game thread. I struggle to lend any points for originality (the elevator was cool!!). Still, it's just a lot of nice ideas bundled together into a neat package that is suspiciously just as long as it takes an average Youtube audience to drop off a Let's Play. Hmmmmmmm????? Probably a coincidence.
In the interest of fairness, I believe to know the appeal here. This game's success makes total sense; it's the genre in a shot glass, a Now That's What I Call Horror compilation album with all the bang and none of the fuss. But the devil is in the details. After learning that the developer of this game previously made Spooky's Jumpscare Mansion, it all kinda made sense. "No new ideas under the sun" etc., but horror only works for me when it is introducing ideas that feel in some way fresh, with implications that allow them to stew in my subconscious during/after the runtime or for themes to be navigated in a way that evokes something in me.
Lost In Vivo succeeds at what it tries to do, which is take elements from Silent Hill and SCP Foundation, among many others, and allow the player to fight through the layers of horror hell. Enemies with insane designs screaming towards you as you blast them with your shotgun, defiantly keeping your cool under the setpieces and crushing atmosphere that strings the game together like a roving epic. There's an "Abandon all hope ye who enter" graffiti tag near the start of the game, so I mean yea. I find it all a little too grating, obvious and cheap, but hey.
Probably the best of these indie horrors with a vague and confused "retro-inspired" aesthetic I've ever played, which doesn't put it very high on my actual quality barometer. It essentially has every single idea you've ever read in an ideas guy greentext horror game thread. I struggle to lend any points for originality (the elevator was cool!!). Still, it's just a lot of nice ideas bundled together into a neat package that is suspiciously just as long as it takes an average Youtube audience to drop off a Let's Play. Hmmmmmmm????? Probably a coincidence.
In the interest of fairness, I believe to know the appeal here. This game's success makes total sense; it's the genre in a shot glass, a Now That's What I Call Horror compilation album with all the bang and none of the fuss. But the devil is in the details. After learning that the developer of this game previously made Spooky's Jumpscare Mansion, it all kinda made sense. "No new ideas under the sun" etc., but horror only works for me when it is introducing ideas that feel in some way fresh, with implications that allow them to stew in my subconscious during/after the runtime or for themes to be navigated in a way that evokes something in me.
Lost In Vivo succeeds at what it tries to do, which is take elements from Silent Hill and SCP Foundation, among many others, and allow the player to fight through the layers of horror hell. Enemies with insane designs screaming towards you as you blast them with your shotgun, defiantly keeping your cool under the setpieces and crushing atmosphere that strings the game together like a roving epic. There's an "Abandon all hope ye who enter" graffiti tag near the start of the game, so I mean yea. I find it all a little too grating, obvious and cheap, but hey.