Lightmatter FAQ

[Tunnel Vision Games]

Welcome to the Lightmatter Community Hub. This is a place for scientists, miners, human resources, and journalists to bask in the greatness of Lightmatter Technologies and our illustrious leader, Virgil. Learn more below!

ABOUT LIGHTMATTER

Lightmatter is an atmospheric first-person puzzle game where shadows kill you. It's a game that requires lateral thinking to solve mind-bending puzzles using lights and shadows. Think of it as "the floor is lava" but with shadows instead.

WHO IS THIS GAME FOR?

Do you enjoy games such as The Talos Principle, Portal, The Turing Test, Q.U.B.E., and/or The Witness? Lightmatter is right up your alley!

IS THERE A STORY?

Yes, the game tells a sci-fi story about a maniac inventor called Virgil who has discovered a new type of energy source known as Lightmatter. As the player, you'll be investigating the facility of Lightmatter Technologies, hidden deep inside a mountain. The game is fully voiced by David Bateson, who you might recognize as a bald assassin in another famous Danish game :)

WHAT DOES "FREE TO TRY" MEAN?

Lightmatter is Free to Try, which means you can enjoy the first hour completely free. If you would like to continue playing, you can upgrade to the full game for $19.99 on Steam.
Your save data will carry over and you can keep playing right where you left off. If you'd rather purchase the full game right away (like any other game on Steam), that's an option, too.

DOES IT HAVE MICROTRANSACTIONS?

No, Lightmatter is a good old "traditional" singleplayer game where you pay once and can play the whole game as much as you want. The only difference is that with the Free to Try model, you get the opportunity to try the first hour for free and see if you like the game or not. It's basically like a demo where it's easy to continue playing after the first hour if you choose to purchase the game. There are no hidden in-app purchases or anything like that.

HOW LONG IS THE GAME?

Depending on how fast you are at solving puzzles, we estimate a playtime between 4-8 hours.

IS THIS GAME DIFFICULT?

We have spent a lot of time working on the flow and difficulty of the game. Through many hours of playtesting, we think we have found a good balance. The game is certainly challenging, but we want everyone who puts in the effort to be able to complete the game. So the short answer: if you are curious and observant, you should be able to complete Lightmatter and have a nice experience. If you are in doubt, you can play the first hour of the game for free and get a sense of what to expect (the later levels get more difficult).

IS THIS GAME SCARY?

While the game has a dark and eerie vibe, it's definitely more mystery and sci-fi than horror. Don't expect any creepy monsters or jump scares. Lightmatter is a puzzle game with focus on science-fiction, without any immediate danger or stress, so you can take your time to enjoy the puzzles and the universe of Lightmatter Technologies.

WHAT ABOUT FUTURE PLATFORMS?

Since we are a small team, right now, our focus is on the Windows Steam release.

I'M PRESS/STREAMER/YOUTUBER AND WANT TO COVER THE GAME

If you'd like to cover the game in a video, you can find us via Keymailer or send an email with your name and a link to your channel to [e-mail].

AM I ALLOWED TO MONETIZE MY CONTENT ABOUT LIGHTMATTER?

Yes! Please reach out if you have any issues with copyright/etc.

WHO IS MAKING LIGHTMATTER?

The game is developed by Tunnel Vision Games, a 6-man studio from Aalborg, Denmark. Lightmatter is our first commercial title. The game is published by Aspyr Media.

WHAT'S THE ORIGIN STORY BEHIND THIS GAME?

Lightmatter started out as a university project back in 2013. We wanted to create a game in order to investigate hand-holding and tutorials in puzzle games. We took inspiration from various other puzzle games and made a small 15-minute prototype using Unity. After our student project was complete, we decided to upload a trailer on Reddit. To our big surprise, a lot of people really seemed to like the game and many were asking for an expanded version of the shadow concept. In 2016, we created Tunnel Vision Games to develop Lightmatter into a full game.

DOES THE GAME HAVE CATS?

Yes. If you are lucky, you might get to encounter a four-legged fluffball somewhere in the game :)

JOIN OUR DISCORD COMMUNITY

We have a really nice Discord community, so if you would like to share tips and tricks with fellow puzzle solvers, chat with the developers, learn more about the game and its origin, etc., head over to the Lightmatter Discord via the link below.

IMPORTANT LINKS

• Discord: https://discord.gg/lightmatter
  
• Developer Home page: http://tunnelvisiongames.com/
  
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/tunnelvisiong
  
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/tunnelvisiongames/
  
• Support: Visit Discord or support.aspyr.com for assistance!
  
• Game trailer: https://youtu.be/U0I7jpwolg4

[Direct Flight]

What is Windows 7 not supported now?

[UnableRogue]

Microsoft no longer supports Windows 7 now.

[CrIsCo TeH KlOwN]

Looks like a good game to have for VR as well. Any consideration for this?

[RonjaLin]

I notice that the premise of the game of shadows being deadly, while very interesting from a gameplay perspective, seems to be taken from the X-Files episode "Soft Light" (season 2, episode 23). Is this a coincidence, or are the developers great fans of The X-Files?

[Tunnel Vision Games]

Originally posted by Protoblob:

I notice that the premise of the game of shadows being deadly, while very interesting from a gameplay perspective, seems to be taken from the X-Files episode "Soft Light" (season 2, episode 23). Is this a coincidence, or are the developers great fans of The X-Files?

We took inspiration from many different games and movies, e.g., Doctor Who, Closure, BioShock, Antichamber, The Talos Principle and Portal. Not sure if anyone from the team have watched that particular X-Files episode :)

[Augustus]

so Is there any possibility of co-op where 2 players could join hands together and solve puzzles?

[hepyrg]

why is the game progress reset to zero

[Richness 2x25]

RIP tunnel Vision Games 2016-2020

[RonjaLin]

Originally posted by DukeJay ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥.com:

RIP tunnel Vision Games 2016-2020

What happened? Did the studio close?

[2⊛2]

https://tunnelvisiongames.com/goodbye/

Very sad !

Good luck to all peoples of TunnelVisionGames for the future.
Thank You for that nice lighten game. I did enjoyed it much.

[Steven Seagull]

Originally posted by Direct Flight:

What is Windows 7 not supported now?

Still works well on Windows 7.