Escape from Hadrian's Wall

Let me get that out of the way first: This is not a huge studio game with incredibly polished animations and mechanics, jaw-dropping environments, and witty dialog. It's not AAA, and you should not expect that. It is, however, a pretty fun brain-teasery game that has you moving from room to room with several new and creative puzzle mechanics. Think of it as a really long Escape Room experience, and it gets an absolute buy recommendation from me, there is no way I can find an offer with this much length and Escape Rooms for this price. :-) EDIT: I finished the game, took about 3.5 hours. But I think I went fairly quickly, you could probably spend more time on some of the puzzles. I found them challenging but not too hard. The story and ending was a bit clunky in acting and animation, but that's not really what the game was about, and I still had a blast with all the puzzles. What got me to sleep on this game for a while is the card mechanic in the trailer, since that isn't really my thing. But basically, think of those as puzzles where you are given a number of "moves" (the cards) and you have to find the right sequence and do some simple try-and-fail "attack number" sums to continue. It's simply one puzzle mechanic in the game, just like others that don't stand out as much in the trailer, so don't let this fool you or keep you from diving in. I haven't finished the game, but played 2 hours into it, and I'll update the review when I do.

[h1]Experienced on the Meta Quest 3[/h1] You can view my gameplay & impressions here: https://youtu.be/Je3DCZkR9Lc If you like classic point & click puzzle-focused adventure games, then I think you'll enjoy this one as well. It's solid overall. However, if you're expecting a puzzle adventure experience on par with Red Matter (1 or 2) or Ghost Town, then I think you'll probably be disappointed. This game lacks the production values of those experiences. This game is more focused on the puzzles. It has a card strategy game, that pretty much works as just a different kind of puzzle type. You basically have to solve the card puzzle aspect. Then it's pretty much just solve the puzzle in the next room. Puzzles are usually of the look at the room carefully and try to solve what the symbols mean or how to use the items in your inventory. There is also a bit of story here. Game is running on the Unreal Engine 5. On my RTX 5090, I was getting a steady 90 fps. I did not experience any serious issues or bugs. You have full locomotion, teleportation, smooth or snap turning. You can play comfortably seated. [b]Rate 6.5/10.[/b] [quote]Please note: I received a free Steam key through the Steam Curator Connect program. If you enjoyed my review, please consider joining my Steam Curator group [url=https://steamcommunity.com/groups/Oculus_WMR]Oculus Rift Reviews.[/url][/quote]

[h2]What is this game[/h2] Escape from Hadrian's Wall is a story-based linear puzzle-adventure game in Virtual Reality where you start locked in a prison cell (reminding me of Oblivion) and the witness a dialogue of a soldier with a woman and her child in the cell in front of you. It just happens that this prison/castle is being attacked and you will be tasked by a wizard to find and save this woman and her child. You then start wandering through the castle and doing whatever is needed to progress through the rooms. [h2]Gameplay[/h2] The gameplay is inside that castle, composed of two parts: [list] [*] Environmental puzzles. You get objects and add them to your inventory, and use them, or the environment (e.g. levers, pools, torches, panels), to unlock doors / exits to the next section. [*] Turn-based card battles, which are still puzzles. You are given a predetermined deck of cards and a predetermined set of enemies. You have to find out the way to apply these cards to overcome the enemies. To be able to kill the enemies, you should just have a higher score than they have and then attack. For example, if you add one of your water units in a square with water, you get it on its maximum power, which is 3. If you add it to the opposite element (fire, in this case), you get a 1. If you add it in an earth square, you get 2. You have modifiers (distract, clone, etc.) and different powers you can use. [/list] Both the puzzles and the card battles are clever and challenging and the game can offer you three levels of tips. I found the card battles particularly entertaining because they end up showing you non-obvious ways to win that will help me a lot on deckbuilding games. As far as I have played, though, there is no action in the game, like defeating an enemy with your sword skills. You also have good voice acting (besides the initial presentation, you have contact with some NPCs) and great environmental sounds. Rocks sliding, cannon shots, steps, fire and water sounds, etc. The music is nice and not distracting, although that also makes it a bit forgettable. Tactibility is average to high. Your hands stop on walls and cell doors and interact ok with the environment, and the objects you get also show some physics and handling, like falling on the floor or pouring liquid. I estimate the time it will take me to finish the game will be between 4 and 6 hours, looking at the reports from other players. I will update this review once I do. [h2]VR Options, performance and Linux[/h2] Although it's an indie game made by one developer, the game has all the comfort options you usually need, like snap or smooth turning, smooth walking or teleport. It is done in an immersive way at the start with the options being carved in stone and you changing them by sliding these stones. Performance of the game is pretty good, with stable 90 fps on my RX 7900 XTX. I have tested the game via ALVR, Steam Link and WiVRn and the three software offer the same performance on my Archlinux. You can see my initial gameplay here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8DxGcGeiVk [h2]Conclusion[/h2] A solid title for a short puzzle experience in VR, specially if you like card games. 8/10 [h2]Ok, but who's Hadrian?[/h2] Hadrian is the name of a Roman emperor who ruled from 117 to 138 AD. Hadrian's Wall is the name of a real world fortification in Britannia which started being built during his reign, in AD 122. It spanned 118 Kilometers as per grokipedia. [quote]Please note: I was given a review key of this game for my [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/45753882-VR-Linux/]Steam Curator for VR Games on Linux[/url][/quote]

Quick Note: I played this originally via the Meta store but it wouldn't allow me to leave a review there for some reason so I'm posting it here. Escape from Hadrian's Wall is everything I enjoy in a game. There's a decent storyline, pretty decent graphics and lots of puzzles with some combat thrown in, but even the combat is a puzzle in of itself. I'd love to see some expansion on this game universe such as what happened after they escaped. As others have said the card system used is quite interesting and I'd love to see more of this as well. It's definitely one of my recent favourite VR games and I loved every minute playing it.

Unique puzzle game that's a mix of smart puzzles and a fully-fleshed out deckbuilder strategy game designed as a puzzle mini-game. At times it almost feels like you're getting two games in one with the different styles, which actually helps the pacing a lot since mixing it up keeps either side from too much repetition. The puzzles are challenging without much of modern hand holding, but they're also not too obtuse. The deck-builder is great and feels good enough to stand on its own. In the sea of puzzle VR games, Escape from Hadrian's Wall brings a uniqueness that feels fresh and makes it worth taking a look.

Very enjoyable game, if a bit short. Be sure to pick it up on special.

Escape from Hadrian’s Wall est une véritable pépite en VR. L’immersion est immédiate, l’ambiance historique est soignée, et chaque énigme est pensée avec une intelligence rare. On se sent vraiment prisonnier d’un fort romain, avec la tension qui monte à chaque découverte. Le rythme est excellent, la narration subtile, et la sensation de progression est extrêmement gratifiante. Un escape game VR qui se distingue clairement par sa qualité et son atmosphère unique.