14 DAY TRIAL // I use my grappling hook to lower Murphy down in a deeper part of the level. Flying aliens attack me halfway down and kill me. My character revives, I shoot a few bullets into the funnel, the flying creatures follow the sound and I take them out before going down. I now need to use my scanner to find the best area to place explosives to go further into Hidden Deep.
The game is created by Cogwheel Software, with publishing handled by Daedalic. The game is at the moment in Early Access on Steam, with the creator aiming to interact with the player base and get feedback on mechanics. Players are controlling members of a rescue expedition heading to a facility under the ocean floor where anomalies were reported. The first team to go in lost contact, probably due to the alien infestation that will quickly start to kill player-controlled characters.
Players will have to explore this deep underground space, trying to find out what has happened and to save survivors where possible. The focus is on exploration, with the game quickly introducing a wide range of tools. Drones can be used to explore spaces to plan ways to advance. A grappling hook is constantly employed to move from level to level or to cross chasms. Scanners and explosives open up new areas. And there are plenty of horror-themed aliens ready to attack the player at every turn.
It does take a while to fully master how to control Murphy, the constantly threatened protagonist. Death itself is not a problem in Hidden Deep but it is easy to run out of resources, which often leads to a level restart. At first, it’s funny to see Murphy ragdoll as he dies on a rope while attacked by flying aliens. But the game needs something more to keep players interested in the exploration.
Hidden Deep is clearly more focused on its gameplay than on graphical fidelity. I like the user interface a lot, but the world and the character have limited levels of detail. I understand the science fiction references it is drawing on but constantly exploring gray levels will get old pretty quickly. The sound design is also pretty basic.
Conclusion
But the entire experience is also a little drab at the moment, offering no unique hook to keep the player engaged. The full release of Hidden Deep needs to make sure that the single player is interesting beyond the initial premise to attract the kind of involved players that can make it a success.
Preview code provided by the publisher.
