Can be very rough in the first 15 minutes or so, it's not a difficult game but it can be punishing until you figure out what you doing, just not a good first impression with various design problems, strange control mapping, and other technical issues. If you can look past that, I do think the game has some interesting psychological moments, the jump scares were generally done in good taste, I liked the models for the sea monsters, and the last labyrinth section had a very foreboding feel to it with an interesting conclusion.
It plays like a diving game with some 'resource management' and horror elements, you swim around using a turn-based gameplay similar to old dungeon crawlers, avoiding monsters, collecting various items, and selling them at the store when you surface. How deep you can go is limited by how much rope you have saved, you will have to do a bit of grinding before you can get to the lowest part, and on the bottom there is another location which you have to figure out how to unlock. There are a few items that can help you avoid monsters and navigate, although they can be a bit tricky to use until you have more experience with the game.
I would say it's a 2 hour game at most, but it can be potentially longer depending how lucky you are, or how long it takes you to understand certain weird nuances within the gameplay, and some of them are not very intuitive. Some parts of the game had good visuals, although I didn't feel that quality was consistent in every aspect, there are still some places in the game that could maybe use a little love, text panels in particular, as well as the surface area with the store.
[h1] Pros: [/h1]
(+) While I didn't find the visuals in the game consistently good, generally the jump scares and atmosphere were decently made, I liked the models for the monsters, and I think the last part (the labyrinth) was the best part of the game, both with the visuals and the mood.
(+) Has some neat horror/psychological vibes, you dive deeper and deeper into the "water", feeling lost with a sense of dread and weird noises coming from all directions.
(+) There was something interesting to the story especially toward the end, but it's another thing that I feel could have been done better, the game kinda feels like it's trying to explain the gameplay while having a story, and it does not work super well IMO, you should be able to teach the player through gameplay, not through text walls.
[h1] Feedback: [/h1]
[u] First Impression/Maybe improving the first area [/u] - I think the worst part of the game is the first 10 minutes, not just confusing gameplay loop and the feedback you get, but also the visuals on the surface maybe not looking all that great, like UI elements and the store pages look like you just gave zero thought to them, compared to some other parts of the game it just does not look great.
Maybe you could consider making the surface like a 3 area location, sort of like a hub for the player, (like a store area, diving area with manual entrance, and maybe a lore area), where you can explore between them. Another thing you could consider, perhaps adding a diving animation before you go into water, would feel more intuitive and immersive.
At the minimum I would say maybe improve those UI elements for text boxes and the store pages so it matches the lore/aesthetic of the game. Perhaps animate that guy on the surface a bit.
You could also add more basic resources in the first few diving levels, just so it's easier for new players to get into the rhythms of the game.
[u] Some random things [/u] - the location of atrium key seemed kinda misleading, I had to [spoiler] scroll the special store [/spoiler]. In the labyrinth you have control tutorial for one page, and a separate control tutorial for turning back, like nobody would expect that.
Maybe you should keep like a random "quarter" of your items on death.
(had some technical issues which I reported to dev already)
[b] Overall Thoughts: 6/10 [/b]
I think it's an interesting game if you can get past the awkward learning phase and a few punishing systems, the visuals toward the end were pretty cool and the atmosphere was generally very tense. Maybe you should work on the overall presentation of the game (the UI elements for text and store look so plain, they really stand out), and perhaps making the starting dives a bit easier to grind, so it's less awkward to learn. So kinda neat, but difficult to recommend in good faith in the current state. Ehh, maybe not completely terrible.
[code]Niche, obscure and underrated games: http://store.steampowered.com/curator/31294838-Hidden-Gem-Discovery/ [/code]
