The Portsmoor Abysm

The Portsmoor Abysm is a Boulder Dash-like game I recommend playing, with the fitting cosmic horror theme with enough differences and quirks that stand out from the other similar games where they take place underground with vague fantasy themes; one strong example being that gravity-oriented objects fall faster than the player's speed. Unlike most Bolder Dash-like games, there's a relatively light story to unravel though on the mystery on what's going on investigating through the catacombs, but lacks a level editor currently. Unlike all of the other games I played on Steam reviewed or unreviewed before this, I was recommended by the One More Gem dev to the dev of The Portsmoor Abysm to consider me playtest their game before release. I was cautious, [url=https://itch.io/t/1659440/psa-beware-the-try-my-game-scam]because of those 'Play my game!' scams on tricking people to download malware disguised as a video game via websites or Discord[/url], but they assured me they're real and provided a Steam key for me to help out. Steam isn't perfect as even with anti-virus scanning, [url=https://www.gamespot.com/articles/steam-game-update-reportedly-distributed-malware-and-stole-money-from-cancer-victim/1100-6534915/]inevitability bad stuff would slip by through software updates as it happened back in 2025 September[/url]. I accepted playtesting on 2026 February because I enjoy these rock and gem kind of games, and did bug reporting and giving feedback in the past before Steam user reviews. Thus, this Steam user review differs from my other reviews in that due to having direct involvement in aiding the game prerelease, a bunch of mostly small negatives that would've been listed cease to exist since they've been resolved by the dev upon feedback, ranging from user interface issues, to addressing potential player frustrations, specifically crafted a mindset of one who never played these kinds of games before, and never played a video game before, while preserving the game's difficulty curve intentions. Thinking back on my experience on first time playtesting, I enjoyed it, but there's a limit for me to whether spend time on playtesting on unrelreased or early access games, or play already released games, especially bought games. Playtesting in this manner, even for a game that is overall finished, but would ideally desire polish, is even more different than my experiences playing and going through released games because of the spending more time than just normally playing the game's content from start to finish. Just don't wanna burn out when I wanna play released games, since I spent 15 hours playtesting that's separate from 5 hours of normal playing. The most fun I had is expanding the dirt remaining statistic at the level end results, to find interesting levels that play differently from normal playing with a minimum or maximum dirt tiles remaining to be made as Steam achievements, something that the dev incorporated from feedback; this wouldn't be interesting to have if it weren't for the fallable objects being able to fall faster than the player's movement. I really enjoy the idea of repurposing content in general and seeing it realized. [table] [tr][th]GOAL[/th] [td]Collect required effigies in each level while dealing with various obstacles and enemies while exploring through the catacomb depths investigating.[/td][/tr] [tr][th]EXPERIENCE[/th] [td]Around 2 decades worth of Boulder Dash-like game playing experience.[/td][/tr] [tr][th]SETUP[/th] [td]Fullscreen, default game speed, with 2x graphics scaling.[/td][/tr] [tr][th]CONTENT[/th] [td]4 levelsets, with 18 chambers each, 72 chambers total. From top to bottom from the levelsets to play through: [list][*]The Catacombs[*]The Decay[*]The Deep[*]The Temple[/list][/td][/tr] [tr][th]BOUGHT[/th] [td]Game was given to me for free in exchange for a bunch of playtesting the game before the game release on 2026 March 20. [/td][/tr] [tr][th]ENDGAME[/th] [td]Finishing the game in one go from start to finish as an endurance run for a Steam achievement.[/td][/tr] [tr][th]PLAYTIME[/th] [td][b]311.5 minutes, or 5.1916 hours on campaign[/b][list] [*]The Catacombs - 39.5 minutes. [*]The Decay - 69 minutes. [*]The Deep - 89 minutes. [*]The Temple - 114 minutes.[/list] [b]32 minutes on earning Steam achievements on clearing all dirt tiles with 'X cleaned up and finished'[/b][list] [*]Pilae, Avalanche, Baen, Motsats, and Throng - 2, 13, 9, 2, and 6 minutes.[/list] [b]10.5 minutes on earning other Steam achievements[/b][list] [*]Growth purged from growth - 3.5 minutes. [*]Laqueum finished with dirt remaining - 3 minutes. [*]Gladius cleaned up as well as possible and finished - 1.5 minutes. [*]Laquem finished with more than a single dirt remaining - 2.5 minutes. [/list] [b]354 minutes, or 5.9 hours on everything except for the 'Finished the game in one run' Steam achievement thus far.[/b] Playstyle consists of going through the game linearly without using level skips.[/td][/tr][/table] [h3]MY POSITIVES[/h3][list][*][b][u]The cosmic horror theme matches the game mechanics audiovisual and atmosphere-wise;[/u][/b] the earliest example is that instead of shiny objects to collect as a per level goal that disappear, there's effigies to collect from effigy statues, which are a mix of a gem and a boulder, they are 'gems' to collect by pressing onto it, but their existence is still present as 'boulders' after being collected from. Later, there's effigy boulders, which are closer to gems, in that they disappear upon collecting their effigies, but it's different enough that they play out from the usual object collecting concept. The way collecting effigies work makes it fit neatly with the theme, and it applies to all the other objects and obstacles throughout the game.[/list] [h3]MY NEGATIVES[/h3][list][*][b][u]There's no built in level editor to make custom levels;[/u][/b] it's uncommon for Boulder Dash-like games to lack a level editor from my experience. [url=https://bsky.app/profile/msandin.bsky.social/post/3m25v4xle7s2s]The dev made the levels through a text editor[/url], which is [url=https://bsky.app/profile/msandin.bsky.social/post/3mbmuq6jgdk24]likely transferred from graphing paper[/url]. Due to the story-based nature, there's at least 2 elements that would be difficult to use or repurpose through a level editor, but besides that, there's a lot of potential of unexplored scenarios, object combinations not done yet. The dev may implement a level editor in the future, but can't guarantee when this will be realized, as ideally they want to implement it with Steam Deck working in mind, not just on mouse and keyboard on computers. I'm not to what extent they'll do this, if it's loading levels from files, or if it'll have Steam Workshop support. [*][b][u]Upon game opening, the 'Right-Alt' keyboard key gets automatically pressed;[/u][/b] really oddball thing, ideally shouldn't happen at all, since that's my microphone mute toggle keyboard shortcut on Discord.[/list] [h3]MY EEHS/NEUTRAL FEELINGS[/h3][list][*][b][u]Gravity-oriented objects when interacting with ice physics onto the ice blocks is odd in that instead of the object's momentum stopping once sliding past the ice block, it stops ontop of it as if there's a blocked path even though there's empty space ahead;[/u][/b] I was really baffled by the dev's decision on how ice physics work on regarding non-ice boulder objects, because it feels like it goes against what the other video games in general that I played. It'd be like if framing it from a top-down point of view, in a game like Chip's Challenge, instead of stopping player momentum upon reaching the other side of the ice tile, you stop on the ice tile itself. I tried convincing with that example, but they wouldn't bulge, sigh, oh well, I guess it'll make some interesting puzzles with this quirk either way, my personal mixed feelings is at least my own, and not something that's made up by generative AI.[/list]

As an effective stranger to the 'Sokoban' genre, I'd say this is an excellent introduction to the genre as it's very approachable. The game has pleasant and fitting music , graphics and difficulty. If you find a particular level frustrating you can skip it , meaning if you can't figure it out right then and there, you can always come back to 100% it.

The Portsmoor Abysm is a unique nod to Lovecraftian horror through the mechanical lens of a Sokoban. It feels like these retro game mechanics are used as an abstract medium to paint a story, and it works monstrously well. The visual and auditory atmosphere alone draws you in, but it is by no means shallow, it is richly steeped in lore, and even includes a variety of other cultural references. Aside from Abysm's multi faceted depth, the puzzles don't disappoint; They aren't so obtuse that they feel impossible to solve, neither are they so one dimensional that they feel like a means to an end. little by little, the mechanics are laid out in a way where they are easily learned and every level layout helps you along without being too revealing. Each level leaves plenty of room to experiment, but once you realize a solution, the challenge is having the coordination to perform the steps involved, which i find fun and intuitive. That being said, I recommend The Portsmoor Abysm to all puzzle and Lovecraft fans alike, I'd definitely consider it one of my favorites. 9.8/10

I might be biased since I am a big Boulder Dash fan to say this game is amazing, but stepping a bit back and not letting my enthusiasm speak I still would recommend the game if you like puzzles in general. This game, while being a BoulderDash genre game does well with the puzzles in a way that is not only action directed, but rather actually make you think about the structure of the level and what the items on screen do and how they interact. I did not finish the game yet, but the first two chapters are already amazing.

[h2]A puzzle-heavy Boulder Dash with a dark, Lovecraftian atmosphere[/h2] [i]Review after finishing the game[/i] I did not expect that this would work, but it does. The concept has potential for some great puzzles. So why the negative review? Because the puzzle design is just all over the place. There are some really good, well designed and fun levels, but I'd say half of them are just not like that and feel like uninspired, boring filler, or just poorly tested levels that are easy to break with unintended solutions, making some rooms way too easy. The game has 4 chapters, each with a boss at the end, most of which is fun, especially the final boss. From chapter 3, the game starts to regularly use and rely on one weird gimmick I was not a big fan of at all. This game also loves to use red herrings, also something I don't really like that much. The levels are dark, sometimes it is hard to see where is what in the level. Most puzzles hinge on timing and execution, not just thinking, and if you die you have to start over the level, which can be really frustrating as one simple mistake will ruin your entire setup. The game really does not respect your time, there are no 'undo' or 'rewind' options to correct minor mistakes causing your death/making you stuck, or a 'fast forward' button to speed up very slow animations (looking at you worms and tongue hoists). These QoL features could have been alleviated most of the frustration. I was on the fence because there are some genuinely good stuff here, but overall I lean towards not recommended.