Virtuaverse
As the famous saying goes, you wait ages for a really good cyberpunk adventure game to come along and then two come along at once (or something along those lines). A few weeks ago I had the pleasure to review the fantastic Cloudpunk and now I have the opportunity to review the other highly anticipated cyberpunk game, Virtuaverse. If you are on the lookout for a retro game that feels like the adventure games of the good old days then read on!
You play the game as Nathan, who smuggles modded software and cracked software off the grid for a living. One morning he wakes up to discover his girlfriend, Jay, is missing. He finds a cryptic message on the bathroom mirror which makes him more determined to find her. Needless to say the story becomes more complex and far-reaching as you discover a conspiracy with global consequences and naturally it falls on you to help restore order to the world.
One of the interesting things about the game is the use of the VR headset that can be found in Nathan’s inventory. When you switch it on you see an augmented reality version of the world with avatars of people, neon advertisements and a corporate view of the world which most people in the game are connected to and are unable or unwilling to disconnect from. Thanks to the VR headset Nathan can switch it off and see how the world really is. It’s dank, it’s miserable and it’s no wonder that most of the human race want to escape this reality and live in their own happier reality even if they have to live with more advertisements. The differences are striking and are captured beautifully in the wonderful pixel art graphics. We see trains running in the background and the rain falling and as well as giving a nostalgic retro feel the game’s graphics also help to set the mood and help make the world feel alive.
Throughout the game you get to meet some wonderfully weird characters such as AVR graffiti artists involved in their own turf war, drug dealers, other smugglers of modded software, the last living live music band and many others. Most of the dialogue is not necessary for the overall plot but it really helps to get to know the characters and to know more about the world they live in. There are some interesting conversations about how the world has changed and about the underground hacking culture which also helps to bring the characters and the world to life. Thankfully the dialogue is also not too long and the length is just right. It is clear the developers have done a lot of research into these topics and into the cyberpunk genre as a whole as the conversations and the themes always felt like they naturally fit into this world and never felt out of place.
While it’s a shame there is no voice acting, the music is of a very high quality. The synthesized electronic soundtrack is really nice to listen and is never distracting. I would have liked a little more variety as it does become a little repetitive as it plays on a loop but overall the music never bothered me and I enjoyed it overall. There are also some nice sound effects of rain falling but these are rather minimal and it would have been nice to hear more background sound effects which would have helped further toe make the world seem more alive.
One thing that I did appreciate a lot is the different types of locations in the game. You start off in the backstreets of the city and later on you travel to a gang’s headquarters, the band’s travel bus, a nightclub and other different locations which I won’t spoil here. This also helps to show off the and talent of the artists involved the developers have clearly gone to a lot of effort to make the locations as diverse and interesting as possible and have without question succeeded in this aspect.
The gameplay is also very intuitive. You point and click to move your character around and left click to interact with different objects and hotspots. You can then select either use or examine or talk to someone depending on the hotspot. You also have an inventory which you can view by clicking on the bag at the top left of the screen and which is never intrusive. The exits are clearly marked with flashing arrows so finding them should never be an issue. That said there is some pixel hunting at times so you will need to carefully move your cursor around the screen at times to find all the hotspots. You can save at any point which is always welcome. You also have a journal which the character automatically adds to whenever he arrives at a new location or finds out some new information. This is especially useful to know your objectives and is also very helpful in resolving some of the puzzles.
Speaking of the puzzles, they are challenging. Very challenging in fact. This game is clearly inspired by retro games of the past in the graphics and soundtrack and the puzzles are no exception. Thankfully though there are no timed puzzles, no mazes, no slider puzzles and no fiddly trial and error mechanical or logic puzzles like you would get in other adventure games. In fact most of the puzzles are rather logical and can be resolved mainly by observation of the game’s environment. See a strange looking symbol on a monitor? Better note it down as you will more than likely need to use it at some point later in the game. Likewise if you see a poster of an alien in the men’s bathroom you know that will come in handy later on. You will also pick up clues in conversations with the characters so better take note of anything specific they say. The fact that you need to use your observation skills is quite refreshing and you do indeed get the “Aha!” moment when you resolve a puzzle. The puzzles are mainly of the inventory type where you either use inventory items or combine inventory items to give to people or use on other hotspots. You will also need to distract people in order to use hotspots when they are not looking and for the most part they are logical and make some kind of sense.
All that said, while the puzzles themselves made some sort of sense and there was never any moon logic so common mainly in the older adventure games, some of the puzzles could have been integrated better into the story. For example, at one point in the game you see a dog tied to a leash. On the roof, you see a cat. A character tells you they always fight if they are in the same place so, this being an adventure game, you know that you will need to get the dog and cat to fight at some point. However, while this puzzle itself is not that difficult, at no point in the game are you ever told why you need to do this and the result of this turned out to be completely unexpected. If a character who you needed to remove from an area or distract had said something like “I’m allergic to cats” or “I’m afraid of dogs” then you would have understood why you needed to do this but as it stands this seems to be a puzzle randomly added simply because it’s an adventure game. Similarly, early on in the game you need to distract another character but after spending a huge amount of time wandering around trying to find something to distract him with, I accidentally resolved this puzzle by working on what I believed was a completely separate puzzle involving a different character. Again there was no indication at all that doing this would have distracted the first character and this quickly became frustrating. Thankfully this didn’t happen too often but it did happen often enough to detract somewhat from the otherwise inventive and creative puzzles.
Another bigger issue for me was the main character. To put it mildly, he is an absolute douchebag of the highest order. While it is normal in some mainly older adventure games for adventure game protagonists be quite mean to resolve puzzles, and it can sometimes be fun, this game takes things to new heights. Throughout the game, Nathan commits vandalism, burns down someone’s home, destroys people’s careers and on at least one occasion gets an innocent character killed! It turns out that he gets his girlfriend in trouble early on by impersonating her on a dating site. Quite why she decides to stick with him is anybody’s guess. Granted, his motivations are good as he is initially worried about his girlfriend and he is trying to find her and it is refreshing that some of these actions do in fact have consequences. That said, in this case the ends most certainly do not justify the means as the character could have acquired these items and found out this information in plenty of other ways. Furthermore, Nathan could have been an interesting anti-hero similar to Gabriel Knight and this could have helped explain his actions. However, the writers have really tried to make him out to be a nice guy and several characters mention that he has a good heart despite all evidence to the contrary. It doesn’t help that he is also a bit bland and comes across as a bit of a moaner. I was actually hoping that Nathan would be rightfully murdered for his actions and we would get to play as a more interesting and likable character but alas that never came to pass.
Despite this, it is a testament to the writing that I remained invested in the story all the way through. The game goes to especially interesting places, both literally and metaphorically, and features some fascinating and disturbing themes that are very relevant for the times we live in. The developers also deserve credit for their brave ending. Just make sure to keep watching through the credits.
Overall it is more than clear that the developers have certainly put in a huge amount of effort and time into making this game as professional and as fun as they possibly could. The game took me about 11 hours to finish so it’s definitely longer than a lot of modern adventure games. It is certainly refreshing to have such challenging but mostly fair puzzles and for anyone who laments the fact that adventure games have become too easy nowadays then I would certainly recommend this game for you. While some of the puzzles could have been integrated better into the game and narrative and the main character could have been more interesting and more likable, overall the game did win me over with its fascinating story, interesting cast of characters, diverse locations ,beautiful pixel-art graphics and intuitive gameplay and I would definitely recommend this to anyone who wants to feel the experience of playing an old school adventure.
Pros
Interesting story with fascinating and disturbingly relevant themes
Diverse locations
Wonderfully weird cast of characters
Intuitive gameplay
Refreshingly challenging puzzles
Beautiful pixel-art graphics
Cons
Some puzzles could have been better integrated into the story
Main character could have been an interesting anti-hero but instead is a little bland
Some puzzle solutions involve acts of cruelty towards other characters for no reason
Some minor pixel hunting
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