The Turing Test

For my part you guys could quietly pass on this one.

Very weak plot. Computer gains consciousness and a parade of tired old arguments about self awareness is trotted out in front of the player.  The astronauts behave like children rather than trained professionals. Everything is covered behind massive bloom effect. It's very hard to immerse yourself in it.

The puzzles and game mechanics are good, even very good, but it's not worth the trouble.

If it tells you anything, it took me about three minutes to remember I had already played this.

I read in a review, paraphrased, that this game would've been a wonder in a world where Portal didn't exist. I agree. This game is an alternative, and somewhat weaker, take on the first-person puzzle genre. Instead of working with portals, you have a gun that stores and fires various kinds of energy pellets which activate doors, walkways, or other machinery. Like Portal, the goal is to use your gun and the surrounding environment to progress to the next area. No actual portals to be seen, though,

The puzzle mechanic is actually quite decent, with the puzzles getting more complex with new elements being introduced at regular intervals. As in Portal, alternate solutions exist in some places. Moments of "Oh, duh! How'd I miss that?" abound. I found it a rewarding, and at times frustrating, experience.

There are also "bonus" rooms that require some out-of-the-box thinking, often utilizing a gameplay element that isn't used anywhere else in the game. As an example, and a slight spoiler (so, warning!) one bonus room can be solved by walking slowly through it rather than running, with the walk button being something most players forget even exists because it's not strictly required anywhere else. The bonus rooms were the most rewarding of all for me.

The story tying it all together is rather simple and weak, and gets thinner as the game progresses. The ending is a bit dumb. Where Portal was comedy-horror mix, this game tries to be more philosophical and sombre, delving into deep philosophy while still being accessible to regular folks, and attempting to do that in the interstitial moments between puzzles. It comes off more as pretentious and tryhard. The character you speak to, TOM, is an artificial intelligence, but unlike GlaDOS, he's working quite well, and he isn't much into jokes. This makes him a flatter character, but still, I have to congratulate the voice actor who did a wonderful job with what he was given.

Don't play this for the story. The puzzles are decent. The replay value is low. If you enjoyed Portal, this is a different flavour of the same product. I don't regret purchasing it.

Puzzles are great, just as intuitive as Portal's. Feels very rewarding when you get that "a-ha!" moment when you solve them and complete them. Plot is rather throwaway, with a tacked-on moral choice at the final moment. Unlike those above, I actually enjoyed the philosophy of self-awareness, A.I. rights, and (im)mortality

Disappointing.

This looks like Portal or The Talos Principle but is not even close in terms of quality. The overwhelming majority of the puzzles are REALLY easy to the point where this is almost a walking simulator... which would be OK if the story was good.

It's not.

It makes little sense, it brings a lot of questions but answers none of them, and the ending is really poor. There are hidden "audio logs" but they sound so bad it's impossible to understand all the words, I understand this is an artistic decision but then WHY DON'T THEY HAVE SUBTITLES? Everything else has!

 

To be fair, the music is pretty good and the game is kinda aesthetic, sometimes to a fault. I liked the lighting effects. Sadly there's also a bunch of bugs and glitches, none of them are game-breaking but they can get annoying. Some textures don't seem to load properly.

Also, there is the option to run the game in DirectX 12 instead of DX11. The game looks exactly the same, but runs slower. Go figure.

 

If you want an easy puzzle game with a stupid story that will occupy you for a few hours, honestly you could do worse. I got it on sale for really cheap so I'm not really mad. Just disappointed.

For me, it's just "NOT PORTAL" in every way. Like "Chad Mojito" pointed out: next to "PORTAL" and "THE (f*in!) TALOS PRINCIPLE", it feels so underwhelming, that i have a hard time recommending it, even though it's not BAD at all.