Jarrod Harrison

“Dead Reset is a confined, blood-stained, interactive movie with some appealing practical effects and a unique atmosphere. What's there is a very solid FMV game carried by a story that greatly benefits from its leading characters, as well as its superb sound design. But it suffers from frequent freezes and crashes that drastically ruin its pacing, a lack of weight in player decisions and variations in the story responding to them, and an ensemble cast where half the characters are forgettable, and even worse, forgotten within their own narrative.”

“Static Dread: The Lighthouse is a disappointing attempt at combining the suspense, dread, and worldbuilding of Lovecraftian horror with the gameplay of Papers, Please. With what little this game does right, such as its incredible character designs and art, it is sadly overlooked by its tonal inconsistencies and its diabolical mediocrity, from its poorly implemented sanity and energy mechanics to its horrendously easy and repetitive gameplay loop. It's an easily forgettable and thematically incoherent narrative, lacking any genuine horror elements, and revealing its eldritch threats too early on. Few games capture the essence of H.P. Lovecraft, and Static Dread falls flat at every turn.”

“For an independent studio's debut game, Luto strongly delivers on Broken Bird Games' ethos of delivering deep narrative experiences that reflect both their passion for video games but also great stories.”

“Out of Sight is a short and simple experience that captures the horror of being a child in an unfamiliar and frightening situation. While its well-crafted audio design and second-person perspective distinguish it from other games of the genre, I was never excited by its flat and predictable story, nor its highly repetitive and bland gameplay.”

“Red Souls Games should be proud of releasing their debut title; there is no doubt about that. But as a game striving to honour the paragons of survival horror, Post Trauma significantly falls short. Its astounding art direction and captivating music create an unnervingly eerie atmosphere that will stick with you well after the game's conclusion. But Post Trauma's muddled and borderline incoherent story, flat characters, frustratingly difficult puzzles, and incredibly easy gameplay, where the stakes are never felt, are a real disservice to what is a clear love letter to horror.”