With DARQ, the new gold standard has been set for spooky horror puzzlers. Limbo did this back in 2010, and Undertale again in 2015. Every once in a while, a game comes along that reshapes the indie landscape. I almost just left the entire description as, “it’s an indie horror puzzle platformer,” letting your mind palace fill in the rest.
If there were a Geiger Counter reprogrammed to detect levels of indie, DARQ would make it squeal like a parrot with its nuts in a vice. Is… this the nightmare world? Or just my apartment? Presented in a stark sepia tone, the game is quite dark both literally and narratively. There he must navigate puzzles and avoid monsters, all which represent different nightmarish mirrors of his real-world trauma. In his nightly dreams, Lloyd is transported to a strange world where the laws of reality don’t apply. You know the type: wide eyed, young, big head, alone in a hostile landscape, pursued by grotesque monsters, etc. You play as Lloyd, who is the protagonist of an indie horror game. Wlad is a one-man team and auteur who has very famously told all publishers and the EPIC Games Store to shove off. Mentally insert after every sentence, “but it is very short.” That’s the kind of community teamwork we here in the Dread family love to see.ĭARQ is a new indie horror puzzler from Unfold Games, which is a weird way to spell Wlad Marhulets.
While writing the first draft, I found myself constantly inserting phrases like, “if not for the length,” or, “I just wish we had seen more of it.” So instead of repeating myself, I’m just going to make you do the work.
It’s a bitter pall to cast over the review, but a necessary one. Writing about DARQ must come with the caveat that it is very short. Even $5 games can get chewed out if they clock-in at under a few hours. I’m going to frontload this review with a question for you to mull over: how much would you pay for a 2-hour game? Gaming is far different than film, where people routinely shell out $10 bucks for 90 minutes of car chases and The Rock being large.
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