The Subject

Length 1hr + Getting lost and confused (2 hours for me) Of the Darkstone Digital games, the Subject is the first released and there are many positives and negatives to the game. This is the perfect example of how a developer refined the game design into future games. While I have a lot of praises for ‘The Subject’, with how my gameplay went I just cannot recommend the Subject. The Subject is effectively a giant puzzle exploration game set of an orbiting space prison, through the game the player will be looking for buttons, switches and passcodes as they complete puzzles rooms, and further explore the vessel. The further they explore opens new areas, gives tools to access further so they can reach the end of the test chambers. Only they are not alone, awakening a monster which will hunt the player, you will need to make use of hiding location to escape. Exploration is actually really fun, while there are variations in the hallways of the prison, the seeking for buttons and the multitude of them means you will always stumble across something. Early on this is great, as nowhere feels like a wasted trip and when you discover more tools new places become open to you. I can’t tell you how much enjoyment I get from just finding a random red button to press hidden in strange spaces. The problem comes as the game goes on, as you complete puzzles you will open more pathways which connect the whole prison into multiple loops. While corridors do look different the interconnection makes a jumbled mess and when you only rely on little maps on walls it is really easy to get lost. By the time I was in the fourth chamber I had the prison fully open and spent over 1hr getting lost and dying. This alone destroyed all enjoyment I was having, the endless slog was the train completely derailing. Literally having a mini map, or one you could open up, would instantly fix all of these problems. I actually really like the puzzle in ‘The Subject’, some could have more visual cues but overall they were great. Literally large three dimensional puzzles that means you need to think of how to engage with them. The only puzzle that required any level of thought is the revolving puzzle where you need to click three times to line up the plates. The problem with this puzzle is that it looks like a giant lock. I see three buttons and think I have to catch each disk in the correct spot. The puzzles' visual design and lack of active cues is what makes this hard, not the puzzle itself. This can be made cleaner by using the three lights on the console, if you had one of these light up each time a button was pressed the player would better identify what the puzzle needed. Beep, Beep, Beep, the player could quickly identify that the lights meant you needed to press the correct arrows. The other puzzle which could have been improved is aligning the discs to let only certain lights be visible. The puzzle is simple, just tedious, I found no decent spot to identify if it was done correctly. If they were made to be lasers instead of lights this would have been so much better, you could actually tell where problems were without blindly guessing. The monster is not really a threat, though hiding does not always work. I was literally shocked when it opened the door to kill me and did not see it coming. At most it is just a point to stay on your toes and listen out for the threat. ‘The Subject’, if it had a mini map you could access at will and a few minor puzzle alterations would be amazing. There is no inherent design point which destroys the game, simply the capacity to get lost and confused which could easily be remedied with little changes. It’s to the point that ‘Kohate’ is literally the refined version of ‘The Subject’ the only sad part is the game did away with the puzzle rooms which to me destroyed some of the most imaginative puzzle design for the escape game. Literally if those few aspects were changed the Subject would be a must play puzzle game but till then, I really recommend you play the other two in the series ‘Our Secret Below’ is my personally favourite puzzle room game, and while Kohate is lacking the puzzle aspects, the exploration button pressing is still top notch. To those wanting a really cut down gameplay video I will leave the link below, I recommend you not watch too much as you will spoil the puzzles: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IbVVpeU-9UU Looking for horror games, check out my curator page there is always more spooks to find: https://store.steampowered.com/curator/41770172/

Annoying!

Great concept but the puzzles you have to solve at each hall are incredibly difficult and tedious. Takes away from any desire to continue playing when you've spent 3 hours on one puzzle trying to figure out what to do, clicking the same thing repeatedly.

I am a seasoned gamer and for the past 20 years have played the most difficult adventure games possible and platinumed all the dark souls and bloodborne games with ease. That being said, when I say the puzzles in this game hardly make any sense, I mean it. I walked around the same 5-10 rooms for an hour and a half and did absolutely NOTHING to progress the game. I think there may be a bug because I watched a walkthrough on youtube after I was done with this game and there was a button on the wall where in my game there was not. Unless it is randomly generated I dont know. There is ZERO direction in this game. There are little buttons everywhere to push and you have no idea what they do. All while a monster is chasing you. If this sounds fun for you go for it, for me it was 90 minutes of wasted time and goes down in the bucket of the 0.1% of games that I will never finish.

Um escape room de terror com integração com a Twitch. Se desloque por um labirinto e resolva puzzles antes de ser pego por uma criatura horrenda. Se for streamer, será trollado pelo seu chat.

簡單來說， 就是擴大科幻版的Slender Man 你必須在大到不行的太空站中找一堆有的沒的 還沒甚麼線索 被怪物追殺後來也沒有恐懼 只剩下憤怒而已

I love the idea of the game but the execution is lacking. One of the first puzzles is a sliding puzzle but 3D and I'm certain almost nobody likes those. You need to align glowing tubes to the outside part of the puzzle but you can't always see said tubes due to the 3D nature of the puzzle. It makes an already unfun puzzle into a memory game affair. The monster that stalks the area you're in is locked out of main puzzle areas which begs the question why the monster even exists if its not a core gameplay element. Lethe Episode One has a few puzzles in it that has a monster stuck with you while you try to solve the puzzle and that's been one of the scariest gaming memories I've had. The Subject takes the easy way out while also have less fun/interesting puzzles. The map you can see of the area is also pretty useless but the area you're in isn't too big but it can be tedious to wander aimlessly. Basically, I'd recommend Lethe: Episode One over The Subject. The Subject has the better premise but Lethe has the better game. And they're similar spooky experiences to boot.

Let me start by saying I love Darkstone Digital and this is just the first game that was made. While you may want to skip this one, I certainly recommend some of the newer titles such as Our Secret Below and The Mortuary's Assistant. As some others have said, this game is a good example of a new game developer who has taken negative reviews very well. It seems like every game after this release has gradually improved on the things people did not like about this one. While Kohate is essentially an improved version of this game, games after that changed it up completely. While I can't recommend this game I will be looking forward to future releases from Darkstone Digital.

10/10 would crap myself again

I had no fun playing this game. The first puzzle already seemed totally random to me .. I did not get the game principles, the puzzles. I already wanted to uninstall the game after being stuck in a simple room with switches that are hard to recognize and whose operation made no sense to me... right in the beginngng... I also absolutey did not understand why I was able to proceed after a while. In the next level, I ran around some corridors, found nothing interesting ... Where is the horror? As the protagonist, I would rather die in that spacestation than solve those boring puzzles ... I quit the game... The presentation is above average! It looks quite good! .. It could have been something.