Another day, another batch of indie horror games for us to enjoy. Today’s offers are pretty neat, however, as there is something for every kind of horror fan in here. Let’s take a peek, shall we?
First on the list is Lucius II: The Prophecy, a game that fills me with nostalgic joy. The original Lucius was the first game I ever reviewed for Rely on Horror and in retrospect I was probably a bit soft on it. In this series, you play as the son of Satan and your only goal is to set up “accidents” for people to blunder into. It also had terrible stealth sequences and a horribly misguided combat segment, but the core idea was pretty cool and the mansion it all took place in was a beautiful setting, kind of like playing in a slasher movie from the perspective of the murderer, rather than the dwindling number of survivors. This sequel takes the game out of the mansion and offers more freedom to kill people in different ways, which is a bit of a shame, so I hope the lack of the iconic locale is made up for with improvements in the gameplay.
For the fans of puzzle games set in scary environments, there is Decay: The Mare. This is actually a collection of a series, as Decay is a trilogy inspired by titles like Silent Hill, Phantasmagoria, and The 7th Guest. The version that is now on Steam is a bit vague about this, but you do actually get all three games and for about $10 that certainly isn’t bad deal. The series is about a drug addict trying to straighten out his life and having to deal with frighteningly-realistic hallucinations. The game is published by Deadalic, but is sadly not part of the The Daedalic Armageddon bundle as of right now.
Finally, there is Damned Nation Reborn, which features a bible quote instead of an actual description. I’ll be honest here and say this zombie game doesn’t feel right with me, as it’s an early access title that states “We have decided to go with Early Access to help us make the game what you want it to be.” That is not what you want from your Early Access title and makes it seem like the developers have no vision of their own for the project, plus the biblical references seem a bit pretentious at first sight. The idea of the game is that you have to find survivors, create a safe haven and fortify it against “a unlimited warm of walkers”. The developers also inspire little courage, as they engage in childish arguments with commenters on the Steam hub and the game reportedly released in a less-than functional state. With an estimated 7-9 months of Early Access development ahead, this might be an interesting game sometime down the line, but for now I recommend sticking with State of Decay if you like the idea of surviving with your AI pals.
