A review of Dark Matter - A finished unfinished game

[wiredhands]

Lets get started with this.

The game opens up and I'm welcomed by a reasonably well structured menu which allows you to do what most menu's do, start a new game, continue, load a game, settings and quit.
This is all looking alright so far and the semi silent eerie background music is setting the mood.

Ok after setting things up to run as I please I start a new game.

I'm greeted by a (lets be fair here) not so triple AAA intro, which more looks like a hand painted canvas with a spaceship on it than any kind of animated awesomeness, but it gets the job done thanks to the narrator and well it's to be expected with a game in this price range. Actually there is a tutorial before this it teaches you the movement, and some things that you wont actually be using in the game (or they were cut out due to funding running out it seems).
The character you play is controlled by a few buttons (wasd, space, ctrl and a few more buttons) and the mouse, this is simple and it works quite well.

Enter the game, the game is basically set in a huge spaceship (anyone having a deadspace flashback ???) except it's in 2.5d (a 2D game with depth I suppose it is). For this purpose the graphics do their job and it looks ok.
For all purposes though it is a sidescrolling semi platform exploration bugkilling game where you can backtrack.
At the start I'm given a few pointers by the 'presence' that woke me up and away I go(holding my trusty sidearm and flashlight).
You can find new recipes, weapons, keys and some other things lying around. You also have a simple crafting system that you will use later in the game.
There are ladders, switches, doors and elevators that take you to different parts of the game/levels.
The game does an excellent job of setting the mood for some scary things to happen, low light scenario, flashlight that barely light up places and some quite good background music...
unfortunately, it doesn't deliver. The first time I'm near a 'monster' I hear the clank clank a mile away from them walking on the metal floor and when I encounter it I almost can't help laughing at it.
It looks like a cuddly sausage with legs (really I think they were kinda cute).
None of the rest of the monsters in the game are scary, so if you are in it for 'THE HORROR' this is not your game. I's not scary at all.

The game is quite short, I went SLOW (and I mean slow) and I finished it in just about 5 hours, and lets just say it out loud cause so many others already have said it

THIS GAME HAVE THE WORST ENDING EVER !!!!!

Really the end to this game is worse than one of windows's dreaded BSODS, thats how bad it is.
It's quite clear that the developers ran out of funding and just had to abruptly finish the game, and it's really a shame. I were up until the end really enjoying the game and was qite eager to learn more about the infestation, the presence that woke me up and what the hell actually happened here.
And now I'm left without knowing it..DAMMIT thats not fair !!!

I ll grade the game using a scale of 100, where 100 is superbly unparalleled awesomness and 0 is the uttermost horribly smelling piece of a turd (and 50 would be the middle of the pack average suberbian housewife)

I try to grade the following : Graphics, Sound, Music and Gameplay

onto the ratings

Graphics : 65/100, even if our heroine looks a bit out of place, and the monsters are laughable(and cute) the graphics gets the job done, but not much more so you wont be going OH MY GOD that looks awesome with this game

Sounds : 50/100, this I feel is one of the weak parts, the sounds in general are good(guns, doors, flickering lights and such), but the monster sounds could really use and upgrade to add to a more paranoia kind of atmosphere and make things more scary, I mean these monsters sound like hamsters they make the most annoying walking sound and you can hear them miles away when they walk over the floor..really, this needs to be improved, big time

Music : 80/100, The music is great, it adds so much to the eerie mood the game tries to set, and it's not the musics fault that this fails

Gameplay : 65/100, it's ok, you ll have a good time as long as it lasts, but it's nothing revolutionary and you'll not be going OMG how did they get this idea

Overall : 50/100, the game scores 50/100 overall cause its ok, but not much more, it's to short, it ends way faster than I would want it too(and the end is ♥♥♥♥ ♥♥♥♥ ♥♥♥♥ !!! Really totally unfair to the people buying the game).
It could be so much more than it is, the setting is there and it's clear that the developers had more in mind, but they either ran out of time or money (which is usually the same) and had to release or die trying to finish the 'full' game.
Another thing that annoyed me is that it's sold as a survival horror game, lol, this is not a horror game not even sure it's a survival game. I would call it an exploration bug killing game (cause thats what it is atm).

If the game was 5-7 hours longer(aka more stuff to explore) and had more scary monsters and better monster sounds it could probably climb into the 75/100 range. Cause the potential is there, it's clear there is some sort of story that just haven't been finished for whatever reason.


MY personal rating : 70/100, This is one you can take to heart or ignore completely, cause it's 100% my personal rating it has nothing to do with graphics or what the rating 'should' be. This is my personal rating of the game, I here overlook the obvious flaws, the stupid ending and instead look at how much fun I had playing it and really I had fun, I LOVE to explore big derelict spaceships, finding quirps from long dead people that were there and getting to shoot things now and then....I just wish it would've been sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo much longer with at least twice the amount of levels so I could spend even more time exploring this place and finding out what happened.


If you've gotten to the end of this wall, I hope you found it informative and that I didn't give away to much of the story in the game. feel free to comment or post your own view of the game below

[T Rex]

THanks for the info. Too bad they couldn't finish the game. Sounds like it had some promise.