DEMON DUST

i was recommended this because it was compared to outer wilds. yes the exploration style is similar. you chip away at your understanding of the world in time restricted loops until you eventually can get to the end in minutes. that's where the similarities end though, everything else is very different. very weird and interesting. pick it up if you are into experimental indie stuff.

A weird puzzlebox of a game. I got *an* ending at least. I have everything for the secret? ending. Or maybe just like ending 2? But either way I can't get past the final weird shmup bit. But hey one ending is good enough for me! The game is such a strangely unique experience. Everything from how it controls to how you unravel the mysteries of it to the timer on a run necessitating multiple tries until you're zooming to the last couple of areas to find remaining secrets. There were a couple bits I had to look up, I'm not too proud a gamer to admit that. I feel like there are still lots of things I haven't seen but I do think overall I got my worth out of the game. This is one of those games that I wish I could properly describe and recommend but the way you unravel it feels so unique I can't compare it to anything else. Even my steam doesn't have anything in the "Is this relevant to you?" section to compare it to. I'd say if the vibe of the trailer interests you, pick it up. It's an interesting game and I think you could do a lot worse than this for $10

정말 재미있습니다! 내용 찾아보지 마시고, 트레일러 보고 마음에 들었다면 바로 플레이해보세요. 플레이 타임 3시간 미만의 리뷰는 믿지 마세요. 장르는 미스터리, 탐험 형식은 던전 탐색(RPG 아님), 서바이벌 호러 인터페이스는 울티마 언더월드 지형은 메가스트럭처 진행은 Outer Wilds와 유사한 탐험 중심 아래는 아쉬운 점입니다. (-) 시점 회전은 AD, 이동은 QWES라 조작이 상당히 불편합니다. 게임 내에서 키 매핑을 지원하지 않아 외부 프로그램을 사용해야 했습니다. QoL 패치가 있으면 좋겠습니다. (-) 미스터리 탐험 게임임에도 로어 텍스트가 적은 점이 아쉽습니다. 그래서 플레이어에 따라 한두번의 플레이(Run) 동안 약간의 인내심이 필요할 수 있습니다. [spoiler]Outer Wilds와 진행 방식은 유사하지만, 이 게임은 플레이어가 왜 이곳에 왔는지, 왜 나가야 하는지(EXIT), 데몬들이 왜 플레이어를 위협하는지 등에 대한 힌트가 전혀 없어 동기가 부족합니다.[/spoiler] (-) 레벨 디자인이 아쉽습니다. [spoiler]주사위나 씨앗은 게임 세계관과 다소 동떨어져 보여요. 시스템을 위해 억지로 넣은 요소처럼 느껴집니다. 이건 로어 텍스트가 부족한 점과도 연결되는데, 게임 내에서 이런 아이템들이 왜 존재하는지 설명이 부족해서 몰입이 깨집니다. 후반부 지역은 텅 비어 있는 곳이 많기도 하고요. 일부 오브젝트는 (제가 못 찾은 걸 수도 있지만) 혼란을 줍니다. 예를 들어, Lvl 2의 벽화(?) 같은 경우, 단순 장식인지, 퍼즐 요소인지, 힌트인지 구분하기 어렵습니다. 엔딩 본 뒤에도 제가 생각한 의미를 확신할 수 없어요. 또 감옥의 초록색 벽도 혼자 다르게 생겨서 부술 수 있을 거라 생각했는데 부수지 못하네요.[/spoiler]

One of my favorite games this year. satisfying and solid gameplay.

Demon Dust is a delightful game of discovery and exploration. I LOVE it when games make me take notes, note down important information, codes, and pieces of the puzzle. Another thing I love is when games play with the “user interface”. In this case, I mostly mean the frame around the screen and the inventory/items system. It was also really fun finding random items that broke the homogeneity of Demon Dust’s spooky corridors and rooms, such as paintings or mannequins that always have something interesting to say. All that for such a low price! Loved my time with it, hope you will too.

Truly unique experience with just interacting with items on the fake computer screen alone. I can't say I've played anything quite like this to compare it too.

Honestly a really really cool game at least when it comes to level design. I think the story was a bit barebone and not really enhanced by the exploration, and it can be hard sometimes to launch a new run as the game can be a bit intimidating as you have to repeat a lot of steps at the beginning of every run. That being said, I think those shortcommings are secondary and what the does right, it does really ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ well. The ability to have your mouse movements not being linked to your character body motion is great. Allows for a lot of cool uniques mechanics. I don't want to spoil much because discovering those and solving them is a big dopamine rush. Basically, structure wise, you always start at level-1 and you need to progress, being guided naturally by the game level design, deeper and deeper into this dungeon crawler. However you discover pretty quickly that the game is full of secrets! Secret mechanisms, stealthly hinting to the player where to go, carrots on sticks everywhere to learn the more obscure mechanics, and always always rewarding experimentation and looking out for details. I went blindly, didn't need a walkthrough, and every discovery was a dopamine rush. I was always wondering how to get that collectible, or how to open a specific door, and then, mechanic by mechanic, I ended up solving it, putting the puzzle together, and in the end, completely mastering the level design and mechanics of the game to end up conquering it. Even better: there's not only one solution to many problems, if a door is locked and you don't know how to unlock it, there are ways to avoid it, and that also feels amazing, to have the liberty to come up with your own solution to the one problem. The ending has some big huge loud impact, I wish it had more interesting environmental story telling during playthroughs, especially with the fact that random events can trigger in levels with random encounters or interactible being there, hinting to something more... But I never managed to access this level of understanding with the game's lore, and I never truly felt teased correctly for the big ending, which is a shame. That's my only complaint about this. Everything else is unique and definitly worth a play! Buy it! And share it around! 65 reviews is way bellow what this game deserves. There are game with way more attention on them in the dungeong crawler genre, like dungeons of blood and magic, that offers way less in terms of innovation and quality. And it's making me go crazy. Like why? Thanks to anyone reading this like wtf lol