Ceramic Soul

I was enjoying myself well enough; after the Bride was introduced in the dining room, I get to work trying to decipher the puzzle that I had already failed. I spent about 20 minutes swapping the dolls back and forth in their seats to no avail. Alas, I began to get restless, and stumbled upon a hidden white-box UI with the Tab key. I navigated to the "Quit" selection and found myself returning to the title screen with the soundscape of the dining room lingering. Once I tried to continue, my camera was stuck inside my own body and I had lost all my controls. After being forced to reset the game, I discovered that the doll who is already seated is meant to indicate the painting's orientation. The game has a bit of clashing elements in the "Action" genre category, which is not often talked about in these reviews because even when there are multiple methods of input, it's more often than not that one takes precedence over the others. In this case, the spotter elements of finding key items and locations within the level to interact with have overtaken the mazer elements of running away from the Bride and exploring the layout of the house. Horror games work best when I'm winning the game, and if the losing isn't carefully tailored, I'll easily dispel the essential feeling of thrill for myself. If these thrilling elements took more precedence, it would also likely shift from a Mind game about understanding the literal and thematic riddles of the house to a Nerve game about the very real threat that progressively prowls around the house. It's clear that you aspired to both of these genres in addition to a Land game (as is the custom trio for your obvious influences) but it's a lofty goal for a student project. Think about how the door transition in Resident Evil isn't just optimizing the game and improving performance. Horror video games frequently invoke House of Leaves; the ability to warp the conception of space in real time relative to myself is unique to video games. Your sequence befitting this trope is shockingly identical to Arkham Asylum but I won't hate on learning the greats. It's a low bar but the thematically pointed design of the environment is surpassing Resident Evil with some of Gone Home's sensibilities on the impact that such a thing can have. Ceramic Soul gets an A for Arms without Hands or Claws.