Vaporum

Some of the puzzles are just f***ing stupidly difficult, making you die and load over and over and over and over again. I like puzzles, but not to where they're absolutely frustrating.

You like grid based first person dungeon crawlers like Grimrock? Well this is that, but different. Instead of having a party of 4, you are solo, and the combat is more weighty. Attacks aren't instant like they are in Grimrock, there's a slight delay to all attacks. This game is definitely harder than Grimrock, at least combat wise. Vaporum, however, introduces the Bioware Tactical Pause Time™ system where you can toggle the flow of time, and can advance it by holding LShift, moving, or taking an action while it is enabled. It can help with tougher combat scenarios, and some trickier time sensitive puzzles. Then you have your gadgets, which is essentially your magic. Gadgets you have to find throughout the levels, and have about 4 ranks each, becoming more powerful and costing more energy to cast with each rank. You can specialize as a dual wielding maniac, a gunslinger, a mage, a tanky shield knight, or a little bit of everything. (I was a blunt weapon dual wielding battlemage maniac) Like Grimrock, you have your various enemies to fight, traps to avoid, puzzles to solve, and secrets to find. The game is a bit stingy with restorative items, so make sure to make good use of the lifesteal gadget when you find it, and probably get 3 points in the school that gives you up to 25% max hp regen at the 3rd rank. Vaporum certainly has Bioshock on the mind in it's aesthetic and plot. The protagonist is an amnesiac in a Steampunk world, returns to the place where he once lived, crazy scientists discover some eldritch energy that drives everyone insane, and all that jazz. You aren't a big daddy, but you are A dad, and are wearing somewhat massive armor, and the protagonist's daughter resembles a little sister, so close enough. Plus, the shotgun and sledgehammer wielding thugs have a fair resemblance to a certain Bioshock staple. I shall nickname them.... "Massive Fathers" I like Grimrock a good deal better, but Vaporum is cool too, if a bit frustrating at times....

Nothing really special here. The devs understand the formula behind games like Legend of Grimrock, but they lack any real spark.

Pretty good game, I'd say about on par with Grimrock 1. The game is not too long, but about the perfect length for the content. While the game is very fun in the beginning, it does start to become a bit stale as the environment does not change much and you are only controlling one character. While the art style is nice, it doesn't really sell the idea of a giant tower as you are always confined to insides without windows or anything to sell you the idea. The story is okay, but the voice actors are a bit hit and miss. This may sound a bit more negative than it is: The game is a fun dungeon crawling experience which you kinda don't get otherwise. Everything works and the puzzles and combat are fun. So overall, definitly recommended if you have played Grimrock and/or like a nifty Steampunk aesthetic.

In short, it would be easy to say that Vaporum is "Legend of Grimrock meets Bioshock". And while that wouldn't be necessarily wrong, I think Vaporum stands nicely on its own. And that is in big part thanks to its great atmosphere, which is the reason why I chose Vaporum as my first Dungeon Crawler. I love the Steampunk setting and the game captures it nicely while adding a creepy twist to it. However, even tho, I came for the setting, I stayed for the gameplay. However with different weapon types, exoskeleton rigs (your 'character class'), gadgets (your 'magic/spells') and character progression options, Vaporum encourages different playstyles which adds greatly to the replay value. And you will need to put some effort into refining your chosen specializations since the difficulty will eventually ramp up. Enemies require different approaches (depending on your skills). It's a challgne, but doable. Hard but fair. And that goes for puzzles, too. As a newcomer to the genre, I was at first intimidated by the puzzles and while I found them challenging, they weren't illogical at all. And being able to make notes on the map helped a lot to solve some of the more elaborate puzzles and not getting lost in general. All in all, I greatly enjoyed Vaporum and if you like the genre and setting, I think you will, too.