HROT

If you love Chasm the Rift you will love this. It might have the brown aesthetic of Quake but it's not Quake and it's not meant to be. It's a wonderful atmospheric Chasm the Rift set in the Soviet era in spirit. Great game.

HROT is simultaneously one of the cleanest most tightly designed first person shooters and one of the most charmingly strange video games I have played to date. Most importantly the level design is FANTASTIC. It's really dirt simple but profoundly creative. If you're searching for well hidden secrets and expertly crafted combat encounters this game has them perfectly paced from start to finish. The enemies and weapons all have unique roles, interact well with each other and are placed smartly within the environments. HROT also has some of the most impressive atmosphere I've encountered in a game. Without fanfare the game just slips and melts into a puddle of gritty pixels and flickering fluorescent bulbs over muddy concrete government office buildings and let's the drab sparse world speak for itself. There is just enough hint of the reality of the old soviet days and the German invasion to make you feel and maybe think a little before you find the secret level and get lost trying to figure out what a pack of small rat terriers has to do with repairing an old broken astrological clock. Great game, expertly crafted with a lot of heart.

Hits all the right notes, surprisingly creepy. I'd say it does for Quake what Dusk did for Blood. Excellent game, would recommend.

and that's not a bad thing. HROT is as absolutely fantastic as it is unhinged.

pika