Sylvio

Evp's in horror have always gotten to me, so a game revolving around them clearly does.

I didn't know what to expect going into this except for that it had spooky ghosts. I was not prepared for the surreal joys of driving from haunted ruin to haunted ruin, through the red mists and buried wreckage, listening to spooky minimalist electronica on my way to conduct ghost interviews. Very strange experience, riding the line between goofy – contrived physics puzzles and blasting ghosts with a potato gun – and profound – uncovering the trail of betrayals and monstrosities that lead to, seemingly, the earth itself rising up to destroy the old amusement park. Somehow, all these strange pieces just feel right together.

Grę polecam jednak zdecydowanie warto wziąć pod uwagę jej mankamenty. Na plus: - ciekawy pomysł na nagrywanie duchów i poprzez odtwarzanie nagrań w różne strony i z różną prędkością odszyfrowywanie wiadomości - klimatyczna muzyka - raczej niestraszny, bardziej smutny nastrój panujący przez całą grę - grafika ma swoje momenty Na minus: - bardzo liniowa rozgrywka z przedmiotami, która potrafią pojawiać się znikąd - fragmenty platformowe, w których wychodzą okazjonalne błędy w grze - grafika kiedy akurat jest niskiej jakości albo prawie nic nie widać Ogólnie jak dla mnie to lekko naciągane 7/10.

Loved the game. It's more of an atmospheric horror and can take some time exploring and finding everything. Though some of the puzzles can have some weird solutions. I loved the voice of the main character. Some of the recorders you find could use subtitles too. The accents sometimes make it hard to hear what they are saying.

I am not fussed on this there are a few bugs as well.

I'm going to recommend this game because it has cool ideas, clever puzzles, great audio, love the voice acting, the music, and there is a peculiar mood that makes it special. And was made by practically one person, such a big accomplishment. This said, I'm going to expose a few things that made the experience quite negative for me. The developer can stop reading now :D My first try, a few years ago, I didn't understand anything, I kept dying, the recorder didn't seem to work and I was really confused about when I have to record things with the microphone. I wanted to kill Kurt Indovina who recommended the game and uninstalled it (the game, not Kurt Indovina). Now I'm cleaning my backlog and decided to take a second try. This time I read the manual first and it was a huge change, because there are a few concepts that are difficult to grasp just playing. I understand that the developer didn't want to use cutscenes to make the game more immersive but it makes very difficult to realize what's happening and some base ideas like shooting nails to clouds don't make sense in terms of logic, and the feedback isn't obvious when you do it, so you think wrongly you're doing nothing when you try new things. My big problem is that I can't see anything in this game. I missed objects that are in front of me, and having like a million collectibles here I only got a few reels. And looking for entrances in the walls was very difficult. The reels are related to the story. I don't know if it made more sense taking all, I don't know what the recorder fast forward and slower were for and worst, didn't get the main beats of the story. Not having subtitles or a transcription for the reels didn't help. So when I ended the game I was totally confused and the only thing I got is that people died in several disasters and there was some kind of experiment and a "twist" that came from nowhere. And I was doing things like morse signals that didn't make any sense and made me jump to the next chapter without any perceived logic. When my painful eyes could see anything behind the fog and the old school confusing and repetitive 3d, the meshes didn't make any sense. I get the idea of everything is rusted and deformed by time, but it's too much, there are objects that doesn't seem remotely what they're supposed to be. The rusted texture was too noisy and illumination didn't help. Even the big balloons were rusted, first time I saw one I though it was a giant stone monster or something. The flutes puzzle was the most cryptic thing I've ever played and I was shooting to the words because I couldn't see a damn thing. The cart get busted and couldn't use it, fortunately, it was fixed turning the game off and on. The other problem I had is in the zoo, were the "it worked like a charm" audio got stuck at the beginning of my save and there was a terrible noise going all the time until I got to the observatory. The alpha of the black clouds wasn't in the correct order in the first level and they were invisible depending of the area. The engine was quite robust and I didn't get trapped anywhere, so kudos for the good work. So, a good/bad experience that needed more accesibility for me. Not going to retry and look for all the collectibles because my eyes got too tired and are difficult as hell to see. A bit of a masochist experience.

Frustrating, stupid and pointless. Invisible things kill you constantly in one of the first parts of the game. Wish I'd read more before I gave these people my money. You've had 10 years to fix this mess, and you failed. BOOO!!

Atmospheric and strange. Great sound design. Probably not for everyone, but if you're a fan of weird fiction and games that are artistic and exploration based it's worth a play. I'd consider it roughly the same genre as Empathy Path of Whispers, but with visuals that are more bleak and haunting rather than epic and fantastical. The story builds gradually and with a sense of dread. "Bleak", "haunting", and "dread" probably make it sound like a downer to play, but the atmosphere is strangely calming, which makes the simple gameplay almost meditative. The ending is baffling, so if you need a conclusive ending it may not be the game for you.

Ok, small game and made by what I can see either a small team or one guy. Has a great idea for a horror concept, having a recorder to help decipher ghost messages and see whether or not it's a threat or a story unraveling. I love it a lot, going through everything, playing with audio is so interesting. Going in reverse, slowing it, making it play faster, just a concept I haven't seen yet. One thing to note about it is that the game is primarily puzzles. Little action that means hardly anything, but it's meaningful nonetheless. And with that, the first puzzle is kinda bad to lock the player to the rest of the game, just felt less clear than it should've been. Beyond that, I suggest you keep this game at max volume. Do not change it or adjust it, leave it how it is. Because there was a moment while in an ashy, red forest, I heard what sounded like distant growling in one direction through the recording mic. Thinking it was an easter egg, I followed it and followed it. It kept going on for what felt like 20 minutes until nothing. Not a sound. Pure silence. Not a single ripple, drop, crunch or anything, just the pop from the mic. It sent chills down my spine and I don't think that was intentional.

I would say that Sylvio 1 is a puzzle game with a spooky theme: it starts out with a few simple environment puzzles, like clearing a blocked path, but quite soon, more complex puzzles of increasing difficulty are introduced. Sound is a major part and analysing what you hear around you is introduced from the start, using your microphone to communicate with what might still be lingering, or gain access to hidden items. Using an old reel to reel player/recorder instead of a modern, digital variant, adds to the spooky vibe as the reels spin up and down. There are no jump scares and the game is more creepy than scary. Communicating with the ghosts can be pretty intense, since you have to listen closely to what they say or else you might miss important clues, and sometimes disturbing or instilling a feeling of unease. The ghosts are more often suggested than shown, but there are times when you have to fight some of them—using one of the best (and possibly also the quirkiest) weapons I’ve seen so far in a game. The story has to be pieced together as you delve deeper, and was pretty interesting with a few twists, albeit a bit “all over the place”. I thought everything connected without any obvious plot-holes, although I haven’t fully pieced everything together yet. Don’t play the game for the story alone, but for everything combined: the developer has squeezed in a lot of great stuff to enjoy and explore. I quite liked how the main protagonist was delivering her lines and thought it made a lot of sense for her not to be loud or pushy. For the other voice actors, I could hear a bit of an accent, which might be immersion breaking if one is extra sensitive to that sort of thing. Sound is mainly provided by the environment, but the game also has a great soundtrack mostly heard when you’re driving between levels, so if you want to take a break and just relax for a while, without leaving the game, you can drive around while listening to the music and, like I did, crashing into trees a lot. Can I recommend Sylvio 1? Yes, definitely, I loved every second of it and I think you would too if you’re into puzzle solving, first person exploration, or sound analysis. On the other hand, if you are obsessed with superrealistic graphics, then you might want to play something else: the game has its own unique style, which I appreciated, but others might not. The crudeness in style is, in my opinion, well compensated by gameplay, atmosphere, soundtrack etc... Full review: https://maskinkultur.com/2017/11/03/review-sylvio-1-2/