Monstrum (Steam VR)

VR Shop Score – Gold Award

System: Oculus Rift Only
Price at Time Of Review: £11.99
Comfort Rating: Red
Genre: Horror, Adventure
Input: Gamepad, Keyboard & Mouse
Best Playing Position: Sitting
Multi-Player: No
Age Rating: 18+

 

Description: Monstrum takes the traditional survival horror formula and remixes it completely with procedurally generated levels, permadeath, and AI driven predators, ensuring that nowhere on its derelict cargo ship is ever truly safe.

Offering up a challenge to even the hardiest of gamers, Monstrum will force you to use your wits and whatever tools you can find to outrun or outsmart your pursuer. Attempt to escape from an environment that is out to kill you while evading the lurking terror that could be around any corner. Can you survive Monstrum?

Review: This is a great horror game that is begging for an expansion. It’s simple: you are stranded on a cargo ship, “alone”, and you must find a way off. There are three damaged avenues of escape that all require various items scattered about the ship in order to be fixed. While you are searching through the confusing and disorienting hallways of the ship, you are being stalked by one of three monsters.

Each monster has its own personality and style. One is loud, fast, in your face, and impossible to shake. Another is ethereal, quiet, smart, and gosh darn scary. Another is sneaky, patient, and… well, actually, not as scary. To be honest, the monsters described as the Brute and the Fiend are the hardest and most fun. The Hunter is absent, not as scary, and (relatively speaking) the easiest of the bunch. There are three ways off this deathtrap, but each requires a spread of items that must be collected from around the ship. The layout of the ship is randomised every time you play, as are the item locations and your own starting position, so don’t expect to memorise any of the key locations. Every attempt is going to take significant snooping around, from the engine room all the way up to the observation deck.

Regardless of which monster you face in your playthrough, the game is very difficult and very suspenseful. It’s best played in a dark room with friends. When you die, it’s someone else’s turn. Monstrum takes what is consistently scary (the unknown) and puts it into every aspect of the game. Unknown layout, unknown item placement, and unknown enemy and all that combined turns this game into a great experience and one that is simply horrific in VR. You could literally play this game a hundred times and it would still give you a few jump scares. One of the very best horror games on the Steam VR store.