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Transient Review
5 years ago
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It’s cyberpunk meets cosmic horror. Whoo?
RATING: 6/10
So Transient is a game where you play as a man named Carter. You and your three friends have recently stolen a MacGuffin from a secret organization in a cyberpunk universe where society cares more about spending their time in virtual reality and uploading their consciousness into computers to converse with one another. One of Carter’s teammates turns up dead. And then lots of weird…shit starts happening. Like a lot.
I’m not gonna go much into the plot. Mainly because it’s intentionally confusing and there are some parts of the plot that I’m not entirely sure of in terms of how it all played out.
Anyways, the gameplay is simple. It’s a puzzle-adventure game. You spend most of the game traveling to different places and areas, occasionally questions certain characters to find more information. Many times you hack computers and other technical objects, scanning the environment and looking for clues that’ll help you progress as you uncover a conspiracy much more disturbing than one could comprehend. Or something. Some of the puzzles are quite easy to figure out; all you gotta do is read a portion of a document that tells you a certain order to complete a puzzle. Other puzzles require you to think clearly in order to figure them out. But none of them are frustrating to the point where you have to look up the answers online or outright rage quit because of how long it’s taking you. Everything is (mostly) straightforward…gameplay-wise, anyway.
The game also mixes things up quite a lot so it doesn’t become repetitive. Chapter 3 in particular has you playing two games within the game—one of which is very akin to Resident Evil. And it’s not just an optional sidequest; you have to play said games to advance in the story. While the controls were a bit ass, I thoroughly enjoyed it! Some mini-games require you to navigate through a computer network to unlock keys or information; some require you to unlock doors in a certain fashion, etc. It’s not a simple key-hunt game or anything like that, which is nice.
The scenery and music is by far the best compliment I can give the game. No, it’s not some triple-A studio budgeted game, but for some game made by an indie studio, the graphics and the levels of detail within the environment is absolutely breathtaking. You really do feel immersed in both the cosmic horror sceneries as well as the cyberpunk sceneries whenever you’re there. And all of the ambient noises and music playing within each location only adds to the atmosphere. Really gives you the sense that you’re wandering around in these worlds.
Character models are hit and miss. Most of the humans (namely Carter) look a bit…meh. But all of the creatures and eldritch abominations look magnificent. Someone joked that the scariest-looking character in the game is Carter himself. To be frank I don’t entirely disagree with that statement. But I’ve played my share of indie games with off-looking character models, so it’s nothing super distracting for me personally.
Game’s pretty short. I beat it in a little over five hours and basically only two different sittings. The final chapter in particular has no puzzles at all and can be finished in ten minutes, even if you don’t know where to go. I also need to point out, besides one segment where you’re trapped in a room and have five minutes to get out, there is absolutely no danger in this game. You don’t even have to worry about so much as falling to your death. It’s purely a puzzle game, not survival horror. So don’t get this game expecting it to be cyberpunk Outlast or something.
THEN THERE’S THE END.
I won’t spoil anything, but the ending of the game is gonna result in one of two outcomes: you’re gonna wanna replay the game more thoroughly to try and see if you missed crucial information, or you’re gonna get frustrated and want a refund. It’s really hard to even call this game’s ending an “ending,” as opposed to saying the game stops. You’re left confused, puzzled, wanting more questions answered, and wanting more from this game. But I highly doubt we’re gonna get it. Now, given the nature of the game, I was expecting the ending to be confusing, if not batshit-insane (Nyarlathotep appears at one point for crying out loud X__X). But there’s a difference between an ending that is confusing and/or makes no sense, and a non-ending that smashes to the credits rolling. This game fell into the latter camp.
So would I recommend this game?
Mm.
Um.
…Yeeeeesssssssss? Maybe when it goes on sale?
As a whole, yes, I did enjoy this game. I was fully invested in the plot and the universe. But the rushed non-ending…kind of ruins the game. Because you spend the whole game expecting answers to be revealed. The game has been building up to tons of revelations. And right when you start to figure out what’s going on, the game stops. And since I don’t believe there are alternate endings, knowing that the game ends this way no matter what you do kind of defeats the purpose of getting invested in the plot. That being said, for some reason I do feel like I missed something somewhere…am prolly gonna replay it at some point in the future.
This game could’ve easily spent more time focusing on the cosmic horror angle more. There’s a point in the game that genuinely made me pause. You can encounter some optional NPC who’s “staring” out a window mumbling to himself. He talks about how everything you see is an illusion. That he’s not real; he’s just a thought of someone’s mind, or that the cosmos have simply fabricated you into a virtual world. And it was evident he was talking about how he knew he was an NPC, but it goes both ways. For all you know, we don’t have identities. We’re not special; we’re not our own beings. We’re just things indescribable deities and monsters cobble together for their own entertainment. We’re just entities who are…programmed to do what our designers designed us to do.
…This is the kind of stuff cosmic horror delves into. And the cyberpunk angle really does work quite well to explore these existential themes. But I feel it wasn’t explored to its full potential. Perhaps I’m supposed to make this review because some…thing is telling me to do it. Perhaps it doesn’t matter whether or not anyone reads this or comments on it. We’re all just things that’ll die eventually when the cosmos gets bored of us. The whole universe will forget about our species and we’ll just be small paragraphs in some history book.
Um…
…
…
…
ANYWHO! BACK TO WRITING PORN AND STANKY CHARACTERS SHITTING THEMSELVES!
RATING: 6/10
So Transient is a game where you play as a man named Carter. You and your three friends have recently stolen a MacGuffin from a secret organization in a cyberpunk universe where society cares more about spending their time in virtual reality and uploading their consciousness into computers to converse with one another. One of Carter’s teammates turns up dead. And then lots of weird…shit starts happening. Like a lot.
I’m not gonna go much into the plot. Mainly because it’s intentionally confusing and there are some parts of the plot that I’m not entirely sure of in terms of how it all played out.
Anyways, the gameplay is simple. It’s a puzzle-adventure game. You spend most of the game traveling to different places and areas, occasionally questions certain characters to find more information. Many times you hack computers and other technical objects, scanning the environment and looking for clues that’ll help you progress as you uncover a conspiracy much more disturbing than one could comprehend. Or something. Some of the puzzles are quite easy to figure out; all you gotta do is read a portion of a document that tells you a certain order to complete a puzzle. Other puzzles require you to think clearly in order to figure them out. But none of them are frustrating to the point where you have to look up the answers online or outright rage quit because of how long it’s taking you. Everything is (mostly) straightforward…gameplay-wise, anyway.
The game also mixes things up quite a lot so it doesn’t become repetitive. Chapter 3 in particular has you playing two games within the game—one of which is very akin to Resident Evil. And it’s not just an optional sidequest; you have to play said games to advance in the story. While the controls were a bit ass, I thoroughly enjoyed it! Some mini-games require you to navigate through a computer network to unlock keys or information; some require you to unlock doors in a certain fashion, etc. It’s not a simple key-hunt game or anything like that, which is nice.
The scenery and music is by far the best compliment I can give the game. No, it’s not some triple-A studio budgeted game, but for some game made by an indie studio, the graphics and the levels of detail within the environment is absolutely breathtaking. You really do feel immersed in both the cosmic horror sceneries as well as the cyberpunk sceneries whenever you’re there. And all of the ambient noises and music playing within each location only adds to the atmosphere. Really gives you the sense that you’re wandering around in these worlds.
Character models are hit and miss. Most of the humans (namely Carter) look a bit…meh. But all of the creatures and eldritch abominations look magnificent. Someone joked that the scariest-looking character in the game is Carter himself. To be frank I don’t entirely disagree with that statement. But I’ve played my share of indie games with off-looking character models, so it’s nothing super distracting for me personally.
Game’s pretty short. I beat it in a little over five hours and basically only two different sittings. The final chapter in particular has no puzzles at all and can be finished in ten minutes, even if you don’t know where to go. I also need to point out, besides one segment where you’re trapped in a room and have five minutes to get out, there is absolutely no danger in this game. You don’t even have to worry about so much as falling to your death. It’s purely a puzzle game, not survival horror. So don’t get this game expecting it to be cyberpunk Outlast or something.
THEN THERE’S THE END.
I won’t spoil anything, but the ending of the game is gonna result in one of two outcomes: you’re gonna wanna replay the game more thoroughly to try and see if you missed crucial information, or you’re gonna get frustrated and want a refund. It’s really hard to even call this game’s ending an “ending,” as opposed to saying the game stops. You’re left confused, puzzled, wanting more questions answered, and wanting more from this game. But I highly doubt we’re gonna get it. Now, given the nature of the game, I was expecting the ending to be confusing, if not batshit-insane (Nyarlathotep appears at one point for crying out loud X__X). But there’s a difference between an ending that is confusing and/or makes no sense, and a non-ending that smashes to the credits rolling. This game fell into the latter camp.
So would I recommend this game?
Mm.
Um.
…Yeeeeesssssssss? Maybe when it goes on sale?
As a whole, yes, I did enjoy this game. I was fully invested in the plot and the universe. But the rushed non-ending…kind of ruins the game. Because you spend the whole game expecting answers to be revealed. The game has been building up to tons of revelations. And right when you start to figure out what’s going on, the game stops. And since I don’t believe there are alternate endings, knowing that the game ends this way no matter what you do kind of defeats the purpose of getting invested in the plot. That being said, for some reason I do feel like I missed something somewhere…am prolly gonna replay it at some point in the future.
This game could’ve easily spent more time focusing on the cosmic horror angle more. There’s a point in the game that genuinely made me pause. You can encounter some optional NPC who’s “staring” out a window mumbling to himself. He talks about how everything you see is an illusion. That he’s not real; he’s just a thought of someone’s mind, or that the cosmos have simply fabricated you into a virtual world. And it was evident he was talking about how he knew he was an NPC, but it goes both ways. For all you know, we don’t have identities. We’re not special; we’re not our own beings. We’re just things indescribable deities and monsters cobble together for their own entertainment. We’re just entities who are…programmed to do what our designers designed us to do.
…This is the kind of stuff cosmic horror delves into. And the cyberpunk angle really does work quite well to explore these existential themes. But I feel it wasn’t explored to its full potential. Perhaps I’m supposed to make this review because some…thing is telling me to do it. Perhaps it doesn’t matter whether or not anyone reads this or comments on it. We’re all just things that’ll die eventually when the cosmos gets bored of us. The whole universe will forget about our species and we’ll just be small paragraphs in some history book.
Um…
…
…
…
ANYWHO! BACK TO WRITING PORN AND STANKY CHARACTERS SHITTING THEMSELVES!
