Close To The Sun

Just finished playing Close to the Sun (CttS) and after clockin in at around 5 hour, I'm grateful for a bite-sized game that doesn't stretch out the experience beyond what's necessary. In short, CttS is a very Bioshock-influenced walking simulator with a sprinkle of horror and some running sequences where you are being hunted by various menaces. You play as Rose Archer who travels to the gargantuan Helios, a mix between a science vessel and a lavish cruising ship. The Helios is being runned by Nikola Tesla who has attracted geniuses from all over the world who excel in their respective field and they - of course - run all sorts of experiments who - of course - goes terribly wrong. If the Bioshock-esque setting wasn't obvious enough, the Art Deco could be considered the exclamation point. The enviroments in CttS is by far it's biggest strenght with some really impressive vistas that you will visit during your hours aboard the Helios. Lush greenery in the in-house garden, thunderous machinery in the engine halls and of course the enormous concert hall that Rose navigates through on her quest all makes their respective impression. On your way you have to solve an occasional mini-puzzle and you can read documents and newspapers if you wish to learn more about what happened aboard the now dilapating ship but otherwise there isn't much interaction with the world. While CttS may look rather impressing in screenshots and and carefully picked snippets of gameplay, sadly this doesn't convey the actual gaming experience very well. CttS is an indie title which you will be reminded of on several occasions. The character animations are stiff at best and comically bad when you get up close. The voice actress for Rose sounds like your average teenager at the mall and sometimes the music stops playing for a couple of seconds before the soundtrack starts to loop again. On top of that, the performance is horrid even on a beefy graphic card so expect stutter and frame drops.

This looks like the developers finished the art assets before they even had a full game outline. This is basically Bioshock without any action. I played a few hours and stopped at the first "Chase" sequence. PROS: Exceptional artwork if your device can handle it Really big areas. Game feels like one long sequence without loading Voice acting is OK CONS: - very weak story mostly told through scraps of paper - world is sterile and uninteractive - collectables are just scraps of paper

The exploration is great. The mood due to sound and environment is great. The story is interesting. The little bites of lore you find around are often short peeks into what happened before. I only have a few complaints: 1) The story at the end is unfinished. I mean you can infer what happens after, but it would've been more interesting to have just one or two more chapters actually DOING that. 2) Burned-to-death guy showing up later makes no sense. 3) You vow to kill Aubrey, but don't actually get to.... as far as I can tell. He might've been one of the two who you fry in the last chapter; but according to prior audio, Tesla already took care of him earlier while you were on the way. 4) the chase scenes suck! You have to find your way through mazelike corridors that are poorly lit. You have no previous experience in any of those area, so you have to figure it out as you go. The monsters move FASTER then you do while sprinting. This all combines to make the chase scenes a boring chore that you have to repeat over and over just to pass them! :-( In a suspense game where you can't fight, the monster should not actually show itself to the end... end pop out over and over and over! These lightbulb-in-mouth things are far more suited to a game where you can fight back, like bioshock, etc.

Tries to be Bioshock and fails miserably. The world looks interesting, but it is handled in such an arbitrary fashion movement wise that it feels constricted. The story, again, also seems to copy BioShock infinite (time paradoxes, etc). So many little things that make the experience poor, no way to run faster (the character decides when it suddenly sprints), no use of defensive weapons plenty of stuff to defend against an incoming creature, yet, stereotypically, the lady just screams and dies, very woke) One collects notes and schematics for no purpose whatsoever besides achievements. Sometimes a very tight spot allows you to move thru, sometimes an open section but with some blocks becomes an impenetrable obstacle. Voice acting is acceptable, Rose sometimes does not match the seriousness of what is happening to the character, but overall it is good. Graphics are basic for today’s standard, and while the world is rich enough in detail, the people are not. I finished it but the ending was a huge disappointment, there is not even enough ancillary details (notes an documents) to forge a view on the other inhabitants, they could have had full correspondence and personal conflicts strewn throughout the ship, just to add character and make it interesting, but they did not. An interesting short play that has a high chance of disappointing you.

Close to the Sun is a horror walking sim where you play as journalist Rose Archer, as she travels to find her sister in the massive ship Helios, created by famed scientist Nikola Tesla as a utopia for researchers, scientists, and like-minded people away from the world. As you'd expect, the ship has fallen into ruin, and she must avoid dangerous beings and solve some puzzles to reach her goal. What caught my interest in this game is because of another game: BioShock. Other than the Art Deco aesthetics on a ruined city with dangerous creatures, some story elements are similar, like the reasoning for Tesla's and Ryan's creation for their utopia in the middle of the sea, you being assisted by a man with a heavy European accent. The level design is beautiful and really screenshot material, with cool areas such as a theater and a Tesla museum. Collectibles are also unique and thematic, changing types depending on the level. Like in one chapter it's passports, then masks, notes, blueprints, etc. Puzzles aren't that hard as well if you're worried. However, CttS has some flaws as well. The most important one being the story. The big mystery teased in the beginning isn't even solved, only lightly referenced and touched upon. It's been almost 3 years since their initial release, and no signs of a sequel. The second issue is the FOV, it's too narrow, and even if you change it to a slightly wider value (I use 70) everything looks a bit stretched. Lastly, I don't really mind the game being too dark, but it also continues a feature I don't really like in BioShock 1 where the characters are almost never seen clearly, usually only from far away. Close to the Sun is a pretty great walking sim, although I wish it was longer and with the big mystery solved. Get it if you like horror walking sims or simply just a BioShock fan looking to fill that Art Deco hole in your heart. I will absolutely play the sequel if they made one, and hopefully it remedies the issues I addressed.