Gloomwood is a new game by New Blood Interactive that’s currently in Early Access on Steam. It’s described as a ” stealth horror FPS”, but I prefer to call ’em ‘sneaky sneaky, stabby stabby’. I’ve been into this sort of a game a while now, since Thief and Dishonored, so I decided to give this a try.
You play a Doctor in a dystopian Victorian ear world, where you wake up in the bottom of a pit surrounded by blood and dead fish (Happens to the best of us). A mysterious figure offers you a way to escape, and you’re off. Other than a few pointers at the start you have to work things out yourself. You use the shadows to sneak around and escape your predicament, trying to avoid the guards who look like plague doctors with extra lighting effects.
And believe me, you need to sneak. This is no game where being stealthy is just one of the ways to play, such as Dishonored, these guards hit HARD, so you need to avoid being detected at all costs. And they aren’t your run of the mill, lazy inattentive guards, they take notice of the slightest sound. And unlike some games, the type of surface you are sneaking across makes a difference. Metal flooring and tin roofing makes your footsteps louder than wood or other softer materials, so you have to plan which route to take so you make as little sound as possible. There is no minimap to show guards positions and their field of vision. You find a ring in the pit you wake up in, and that’s how you tell visible you are. the more it catches the light, the more visible you are.
Bear in mind though this game is still only in early access. You can only play one section of the game. And this also impacts the accessibility of the game. For those hard of hearing, there are no subtitles yet. And there are only two difficult settings; Crescent Moon, which I am guessing is ‘normal’, and Full Moon, which is more challenging. There will be two more difficulties, one that I am guessing will be a more casual setting and one that will be a much hard setting. If you are looking for a more something less taxing, then I’d suggest waiting for the full game to be released. Same if you enjoy making yourself cry with the hard settings. And like the old Resident Evil games, there are no quick save or autosave settings, so you do find yourself heading back to the Grammar-phone save points in case you twitch at the wrong time and break cover. Personally though I find sneaking type games more forgiving that in-your-face action; if I miss time something then I can wait ’til the next time the guard comes round. Just remember the lighthouse….
In a nutshell, Gloodwoord is a brilliant game, and if you don’t mind replaying the same old bits until the full release, then it’s a game you need to pick up. Otherwise, wait with baited breath. And I’m pretty sure it will be worth waiting for.