Indie horror game Darkwood was released on Steam today for early access and it is terrifying. The game, created by indie game developer Acid Wizard Studios, sets you off on a horrifying adventure through a haunting forest, which more-often than not lingers in the overnight hours. In most cases, a game likes to walk you in by giving you the basics on what it is you’re supposed to do and how. Darkwood more so puts you in a pair of roller-skates, sets you at the top of a hill and gives you a nice slap on the back.
Mere moments into the game you find yourself scavenging through a ruined house looking for anything your sweaty palms can wield to protect you from whatever it is that’s lurking around the corner, when you hear a voice calling out for help from the opposite side of a door. At this point your instincts are telling you two things simultaneously. One being, “don’t open the door because that guy is crazy.” The other, obviously being “open that door because you’re crazy.” The psychotic man turns out to be your first engagement of the game and either you have cat-like reflexes and figure out how to fight back and kill him, or you die. Quite often you fall into the latter category, but fret not because in Darkwood dying happens. It’s natural, in my case it seemed more natural than living.
It’s quite obvious that the team at Acid Wizard Studio designed this game to make players suffer, and suffer they will. When you die you find yourself reawakening the day after, and about 10 minutes into playing I had very easily made it onto day five. The game plays very well putting players in an top-down view sandbox world with the stressing need for survival.
The top-down style makes seeing what’s in front of you very difficult, which really takes a toll on the players mind leaving you to wonder if you’re seeing things, or something really did just run back into the brush. More often than not I found myself rooted to the spot staring in one direction thinking something was coming my way. The controls are fairly basic, although having not played a top-down adventure in a long time I found myself having difficulties adapting. It’s hard getting used to “up” always being “up.” The combat is fairly unique, making use of both, right mouse button (RMB) and left mouse button (LMB).
The awkward violinist who thinks you’re not from around here
The game does it’s job in providing a haunting atmosphere. The environment sounds always make you feel like something is watching you and the music is enough to make the hairs on the back of your neck stand up. Along the way you run into some pretty unique characters who add to the complete oddity of it all. The Wolf Man was the first character I met in the game and he brought back memories of the Merchant from Resident Evil 4.
The next character I ran into was Piotrek, who can be seen in the above video, and he was actually a delight to find. He’s goofy, and he made me forget where I was, but once the conversation came to a close the fear resumed. Although the game is still in development, chapter one of Darkwood has be an overall enjoyable experience and leaves me greatly looking forward to what the future holds for the story, and the game. So if you’re looking for a great indie horror game to get your blood boiling, and thoroughly enjoy dying on a regular basis, then you will certainly find console in Darkwood.