The Solus Project

This review may contain vague spoilers. This game found its way into my collection when I was browsing for a more story-driven alternative to No Man's Sky. After landing on Gliese 6143c, I was treated with a tutorial-like set of objectives. With the help of these, I spent the first few days surviving as I tried to work out how to get underground. As I explored the depths, carvings appeared all over the place, which fondly brought me back to my experience of ThatGameCompany's Journey. Because of this link, I immediately decided that I was discovering the fate of an extinct civilisation. At this stage I couldn't work out what this had to do with phoning home. But there are always plot twists. After winding my way through the caves and underground structures, the game took on a darker theme. The player begins to empathise with a very human-like civilisation as it becomes apparent that they were helplessly manipulated by another race. At this point, the horror side of the game became alive - the dead begin to... acknowledge me. I felt the need to spend hours at a time playing, desperately wanting to know what happened to them as I wondered how mankind was going to survive - as my PDA, Wallis, kept reminding me. When the power was switched on, the game became a kind of toned-down Magrunner. I felt more and more manipulated by aliens that had a typical Lovecraft attitude to morality. The game went from mere survival to fascinating exploring to bland horror. I appreciated the beacons that helped me get through the game. They stopped me from giving up, although I still had to consult Youtube in order to get through a few puzzles. The ending screamed 'Series!', yet despite loose-ends and plot-holes on all three plotlines (mankind, you, and the aliens) I enjoyed the game and don't regret playing. A small-developer gem. SUMMARY Graphics: 8/10 Music: 7/10 Voice Acting: 9/10 Gameplay: 7/10 Immersion: 9/10 Storyline: 8/10 Family-Friendliness: 5/10 Overall: 53/70 - 76%

This is how story-driven, exploration survival games are done! The atmosphere, the sound, the simple mechanics... everything fits together to make a consistent experience, that keeps your attention as the mystery unravels. I still remember to this day how the first time I experienced a tornado sent shivers down my spine, or going into that first cave made me feel dread of how will I survive there. Many "survival exploration" games just skim over the "survival" part, not here—hunger, temperature, hydration, sleep, wetness, weather... Outward is the only game that I know of does it now in such depth, but that's years after this one. Interactable objects are impressively well highlighted in the environment—not that they would be too much on the nose to detract from the experience, but well enough to not be easily missed. As good as it is it is not perfect. E.g. tracking secrets of what you found is wildly off, not to mention that not all story pieces (achievement for that), can be a small photo in hidden places, so I ended up at 509/514, but don't even know where or what to look for, and the environment is quite large. Also, a pet peeve is the weather anomalies are drawn towards you. I know that will have something to do with the survival part, but it doesn't really make sense now, does it? Despite some of the negatives, heartly recommended, it's astounding. Here's hoping for a sequel!

I'm really not sure if I'm either too picky or the other reviewers are too indulgent. Solus Project is a boring game. The most positive thing to say about the game is exhausted in the statement: It looks good and it has a good sound. Period. The story is stereotypical and feels almost as it could be from the 1950s. The evil alien thing, you know? Why did the developers pick an uninspired, boring story? I don't want to spoil anything - but the story has not even b-movie quality. The opportunity to write a inspiring story for the game: thrown away... The Survival part can be checked off right away. Solus Project is not a challenge. Especially not for 'practiced' survival gamers. I am really not the best survival games player - but even I did not struggle to much to survive. Anything you need is be present in sufficient quantity. It is also not an adventure. Because the whole game content is to collect keys to open gates and to look for parts for a satellite transmitter. In between we waddle with unbearably leisurely pace over rocky islands (which are unquestionably beautiful) followed by wandering through dark caves for hours. Occasionally we are perforated by spears or roasted by flames. Unless a cloudy monster with pointed spikes caught us in the darkness. When we finally leave the caves and the subterranean halls that the aliens left behind, a tornado storm ends our virtual life (which, strangely enough, does not whirl up even the the pages of the diaries that where left behind by our spaceship comrades). The riddles are ridiculous easy. I mean... you do not even have to follow certain sequences when pressing switches... Where is the challenge?!? No, sorry, but for a boring story and boring gameplay I can not give more than 3 points despite the nice and detailed environment and the good sound. Think twice to get it. Or get it on a sale.

I loved the setting and the graphics but kinda hated the damage taken by heat and cold. Actually this nearly ruined the game for me until I found the according orbs later in the game. While of course all this freezing to death, collapsing in the heat and being hit by a tornado stuff adds to the feeling of being exposed to nature on a hostile planet, it somewhat destroyed the exploration for me at first. It's plain stupid being forced to waste hours waiting in a shelter since it's too cold/warm/stormy outside. I need to wait enough in the real world, I don't need to simulate waiting in games. Besides, the "cold" damage is totally over the top. Like the slightest drop of water lets you freeze to death unless you are in the burning heat of the sun. And obviously the sun doesn't even heat the water in the desert world. Well, and of course there is no savegame handling whatsoever. So if you're close to death in your last and only autosave, you can restart the whole game (if you don't manually backed up your save game). I simply don't get how an exploration game and this permadeath concept go together. Then there's the puzzles/secrets and honestly some of them are annoying and illogical. Like switches appearing at solid rocks just because you used some other switch somewhere else without any clues. Bad design. That being said, the story is interesting, the world design is great and I really enjoyed exploring caves, temple ruins and the like including all the scary and dangerous aspects. Still not everything made sense to me (e.g. how the lower race could even build all that stuff in such a short time letting aside how it could then deteriorate so fast, what moves corpses etc.) and the end is a bit of a letdown, but still I wouldn't want to miss the experience. It's just that this game could have been much better with a proper savegame system, less weather damage and some comfort features like a map, fast travel and some kind of quest log or hint system.

A very nice work from the game creators. The survival mechanics are quite nice, and establish something different for a change in gaming experience, with or without VR. Nice soundtrack, good sound effects, and a pretty intriguing story. For me it was worth every coin spent. And I definitely will be looking forward to a sequel in the future! ♥