Horror Games! Buwahahaha! Nope, that wasn’t scary. But some games are. In my so-so journalistic career of 2 years, I have been offered just a few games for beta/alpha/demo testing. Some I played and thoroughly enjoyed, and some… let’s not talk about them.

I have known Dean Clark for a long time. He is one of GameTryant’s most reputed writers, and to my surprise, he turned out to be a story-writer as well. He has written a horror tale called “Hegis’ Grasp” which has been made into a “dark atmospheric survival” horror game of the same name.

Now personally, I don’t like horror games. But when asked to play some, I can hardly refuse. So, here’s my bizarre experience playing Hegis’ Grasp, developed by Salty Goal and published by Global Hive.

Upon starting the game, a popup window appeared (like for any Unity game) asking for preferred graphics settings. And unlike other games, Hegis’ had some great options listed. “Potato PC”, “Average”, “Good Lookin”, and “Beast PC”. Without further due, I instantly selected that vegetable-ish option. That’s how confident I am.

The narration of the game is quite seamless and unexpected at the same time. For an Indie game like this, we call it “top-notch” material. There’s this old-1880s protagonist, Henry Wood, a journalist by profession and an asshole by nature. I mean dude, every horror protagonist has their brains left at home. They know what’s ahead but they keep going. I am still waiting to see some horror games with intelligent protagonists that actually respect their existence, where they have dialogues like, “I know what’s there, and I have no interest in discovering it out. I’m going home.” – The End.

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The story of a journalist and writing of notes when stuff gets discovered, gave me flashbacks of my Outlast days. And the fact that we play outside, refreshed my Wick memories. The game was too plain at the beginning. You’re running through the woods, getting lost quite often and finding pathways to unlock that bloody gate.

As I was saying, Henry Wood, our dope-ass protagonist arrives Hegis, the cursed village where the game takes place, along with General Samuel Miller and Jacob. The trio encounters a huge locked gate that leads to the village. Now as Samuel Miller and Jacob chills and hangs out near the locked gate, Henry is tasked to explore the woods, check for people that can help, and find a way inside. But why Henry alone? Why not go together? A simple answer would be…

“because that won’t be scary.”

But as you keep playing, the game starts getting intense. Firstly the bear traps. They are barely visible when it’s dark, and drain a hell lotta health if you ever step on them. I tried hurting myself once, but it’s just not worth it. Later, you’ll have to survive a shit load of foes, and that’s when your health-bar matters the most. Next, comes the saving system. The checkpoints of the game are all inside houses and buildings. At least, till the portion of the game I played. And we all know about houses in horror media right? They’re the devil’s workshops! My “Henry Woods” was constantly turning back to check if someone’s on the door. The moment you think you’re all good, sound effects will creep inside your ears, and you’ll see dead men marching all along.

What I liked about the game is that it allows you to think and plan your actions. Unlike other games, Hegis’ Grasp doesn’t rely on jump scares to scare its players. The constant feeling of getting hit from the back and the slow marching enemies builds all the tension required to keep the player engaged.

In overall, I enjoyed the game. And I hope most of you will enjoy it as well. The game is still in an early stage, and we hope to see it in Early Access this month. The most satisfying moment for me was to see “Dean Clark” flashing in huge bold letters in the start-credits of the game. I was like, “Hey! I know that guy! We’re friends on Facebook!”.

As an indie game, I was expecting a lot of bugs. But surprisingly, there are just a few that I noticed. Other than that, the game lives up to its expectations. I’ll be true to my words now… I suck at horror games. And that’s the first of a hundred reasons, why I isolate myself from that genre completely. In fact, I played a couple of them back when I was a kid, but it took me not more than 20 minutes to release a deadly shout and 2 seconds to smash the “Uninstall” button.

I haven’t played much of the game yet, most probably I’ve just played one-fourth of the game. As I said, horror games are not my type. Or maybe because I’m a pussy. Either one suits me. Nevertheless, let’s hope for the best. I’ll try to play horror games more often, and I hope the next time I write about one, I’m all prepared.

Check out the game on –

Steam

IndieDB