In gory detail, “Lies Beneath” is a first-person shooter game that makes you walk through a hellish version of suburbia, filled with grotesquely modded humans and the undead. You are Jason, a lone survivor of a zombie apocalypse who is wandering the landscape, searching for any sign of your murdered family. What you find is a world ravaged by the zombie virus, and even more twisted by a series of seemingly random and senseless murders.
The last month has seen the arrival of two VR titles that have all but made virtual reality a household name. ‘Lies Beneath’ is the latest in the ever-growing list of horror-themed VR experiences, with a focus on creepy atmosphere and gruesome action.
Drifter Entertainment, the company behind Gunheart (2018), Rise of the Gunters (2018), and the Quest edition of Robo Recall, has released Lies Beneath, a single-player survival horror game (2016). Drifter is a dark, gorgeous solo story that offers up equal amounts of violence and terror, making it a distinct offering in Quest’s still rather modest catalog of games. Despite a few flaws that prevent me from really enjoying it, Lies Beneath is a very beautiful and functional shooter.
Details: What Lies Beneath
Drifter Entertainment is the game’s developer. Oculus Studios is the publisher. Oculus Quest is where you can get it (Rift coming soon) Quest is a game that will be released on March 31st, 2020. Price: $30
Gameplay
The vehicle has veered off the road. Your father has vanished, and a trail of blood leads into the cave, beckoning you within. When you see a dark figure observing you, the split in reality begins—and you’re not sure where it stops.
With that description alone, you can understand how difficult it was to play Lies Beneath. The game starts off by recommending that players use headphones for full auditory immersion. It’s not a terrible idea if you want to block out anybody else in the home who’s lazily bouncing about, since you’ll start to listen into every directional audio signal for indications of your impending death at the hands of the game’s ghastly monsters after a time.
Despite the fact that isolating yourself from the game’s gritty melange of vibes, which felt like equal parts Tales of the Crypt, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and Sin City, I still went with Quest’s default audio because I instinctively wanted some semblance of separation from the game’s gritty melange of vibes.
Drifter Entertainment provided this image.
To begin with, Lies Beneath is a Quest game that punches far beyond its weight. With a hand-drawn, cell shaded aesthetic that plays out in a gloomy and claustrophobic swath of settings, it successfully conceals its mobile origins. As a consequence, loading new regions is undetectable and fast, adversaries are constantly lurking around every corner, and the pace is kept to a minimum. The game’s unique gauntlet is partly justified by the continuous pressure on the player to go ahead; there’s minimal exploring outside of the main route, but you might easily be misled into believing differently given how lengthy and genuinely winding the game’s stages are.
The game’s continuous strain is only temporarily eased at generic rest stations, which usually include the same set of ammunition supply boxes, weapons, food for mobile health regen, and a fire to treat any wounds you may have. Aside from these regular pauses, there are additional save locations in the shape of lightable lanterns placed around the game.
Drifter Entertainment provided this image.
Because you’re essentially given all of the equipment you need (or inadvertently lose along the way) at painfully apparent times, and in the same predictable pattern, these pauses create a lot more “gamey” vibe than I would have liked. There are a few moments of exploration when you come across discovered things that enable you to locate additional treasure during your rest break, but as I previously said, you’re generally pushed along a fairly straight route.
As you go through the story, you’ll come across a limited number of weapons, including handguns, shotguns, and bladed weapons such as axes, butcher knives, and machetes. Shooting, I believe, is designed for mid- to short-range kills; there are no iron sights, and virtual recoil makes shooting seem a bit unpredictable at longer ranges, keeping the majority of the action inside a few meters at all times. On all except the lowest of the three difficulty levels, ammo is scarce, making your shooting abilities all the more important as you try to keep enemies at arm’s length.
Drifter Entertainment provided this image.
Melee is also important, but it seems more like a clumsy last option than a real shooting alternative since you can’t block or avoid oncoming strikes, forcing you to swing wildly and hope for the best.
As the flame radiates in the direction of your next goal, your lighter gives you with a faint light as well as a continuous indication as to where you need to travel next. Not only that, but it also adds a basic reticle to your handguns and highlights opponent weak spots for one-shot kills. The reticle helps hide some of my shooting flaws, but I like to have functioning sights.
Using all of these things, as you would expect, keeps you on your toes, as you must rapidly switch between bladed weapons, handguns, food, and two-handed weaponry like shotguns. The inventory system is simple, limiting you to holsters: two on your hips, two on your shoulders, and one on your chest for the lighter. If you have arm rests, sitting may be a pain in the neck, so play standing or on a level surface like a sofa so you can easily reach down to holster and unholster things.
Drifter Entertainment provided this image.
One of my biggest complaints with Lies Beneath is the lack of diversity of opponents; despite a dozen or so distinct character models, it’s still on the low side. The game’s 20 levels are filled with interesting-looking monsters, but they’re really just weak or powerful bullet sponges with a few weak places thrown in for good measure, as shown by a few wave-style fights that expose them for what they are. There are boss battles, though, to break up the monotony, and fortunately, the bulk of enemies seemed to be built with the assumption that the player would use a previously acquired ability. One in particular delivered a completely unexpected curve ball, which was a fascinating turn of events.
I never encountered a puzzle in the six and a half hours it took me to complete it. Sure, there are stumbling blocks, but nothing that couldn’t be overcome with a few minutes of training. That doesn’t bother me, but I believe Lies Beneath might have gone the extra mile and included some intriguing brain puzzles to distract the reader from the never-ending screams and gnashing of teeth.
Immersion
When the fight fails to captivate, the atmosphere takes over. It’s like walking into a comic book, with comic book text bubbles strewn throughout the game at crucial moments telling the majority of the narrative. The game’s grey, black, brown, light blue, and filthy shades of red reminded me of Sin City, although without the burst of pure fleeting color amid the game’s dark, black, brown, pale blue, and dirty shades of red. Some may criticize it for being repetitious and perhaps overly gloomy, but the visual style does an excellent job of smothering any chance of a happy ending.
Drifter Entertainment provided this image.
Because of the comic book theme, I found the narrative to be a little difficult to follow at points. The word bubbles seem to be more aesthetically driven, and not exactly what the player would need after being pursued through a labyrinth by a demon wielding a machete. Although to each their own, I would have preferred voice overs to enhance the story at crucial moments when reading what is basically a floating sign board. Although the story isn’t very deep or interesting, it is undoubtedly stylish.
Force grab is the sole method to interact with things, which may be a little unsettling at times when you just want to take a nearby magazine, box of ammunition, or anything. In the great scale of things, this is a small point, but I think you should be able to grasp anything if your hand can ‘touch’ it. As a result, reloading is a continuous source of frustration. When your magazine runs out of bullets, it auto-ejects and replaces it with a fresh one. One-handed closing of the revolver or putting the mag into the gun is possible, although it’s not very intuitive since neither the mag nor the revolver’s chamber are physics-based. Most of the time, you’ll have to holster something in your non-dominant hand in order to reload a pistol with your dominant hand, which may leave you flailing about and swearing in the heat of combat.
Last but not least, firearms do not double as melee weapons. Although you may theoretically block incoming items thrown by villains, flailing with an empty shotgun or bare hands will do no harm.
Comfort
In my usual default playing style, which is free mobility and snap-turning, I found Lies Beneath to be a little difficult. Everything is so twisted and turny that I found myself racing through a slew of near-field items, halting, turning, and generally making myself sick.
Fortunately, you can teleport and look about naturally, but you’ll have to fight the primordial desire to hurry to the next save spot as quickly as possible. Although I don’t mind teleportation, I find free mobility to be much more enjoyable and engaging, thus I tended to adhere to my favorite movement method and play the game in smaller pieces.
Lies Beneath also caters to smooth turning fans, but you should be warned that only a small percentage of players seem to be unaffected by what is basically one of the least pleasant locomotion choices.
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