The entire game is an intentionally hazy nightmare.
I’ve thought of little else since I finished it.
Though, as with any good tale of terror, there are no easy answers to be found.
In her shoes you will be exploring, gathering tools and weapons, managing resources and fending off monsters.
It’s a grounding that makes each increasing departure from reality all the more effective.
This is a place out to get you.
Retro applies to more than its aesthetic and mechanical call backs to older games, mind.
It’s woven into the setting itself.
VHS tapes in space!
It’s delightfully archaic.
Even the weapons are decidedly lo-fi, almost vintage.
Though, it is asking more of players than assembling colour coded jigsaw pieces.
The Metal Gear Solid-style radio, which can be tuned to various frequencies, is a perfect example.
Which made it all the easier to be frightened.
To Signalis’s credit, there is no reliance on jump scares.
I counted only a small (extremely effective) handful throughout.
Instead, we have a classic bit of the old slow-burning dread.
Long stretches of nothing happening, dwindling supplies, locked doors.
So many times Signalis will feel like it’s building to an ambush only to subvert expectations completely.
If there’s a system or way to anticipate these revivals, I never figured it out.
You’ll never feel safe.
Signalis will spend hours establishing rules only to upend them, breaking even its own continuity.
I always found an elegant internal logic behind these twists.
Signalis is steeped in influences, ranging from Ghost in The Shell to Stanley Kubrick and everything in between.
I’ve been left thinking about its own moments, not those of the works it touches upon.
Funny, for a game all about struggling to hold on to your sense of self.
Each subplot and allusion is a tragedy, all overlapping, imparting meaning to the other.
Where is the line between love and obsession?
In all of that horror, Elster remains a rock.
Like Elster, I never stopped fighting to reach the end of her mission.
Hope is all you have.
Through its formidable scares Signalis lets light into the wounds of a horrifying existence.
This is a game about more than overcoming living nightmares.
Science fiction and survival horror that uses the past to craft something thoroughly modern.
Like a dying star, Signalis burns bright: beautiful, terrifying and unmissable.
