Some good jump scares and atmosphere killed by pacing and story issues.

Bought this on a whim as I love sci-fi horror (Dead Space, Aliens, Event Horizon, Soma etc.) and the start of the game is pretty promising moving around a creepy space station on Mars, as the game progresses however that tantalizing promise slowly falls apart.

The issue seems to be this game doesn't know quite what it wants to be. The story beats seem inconsistent with several arcs of mega corporations, cosmic horror, and sci-fi survival all mixed together but without the narrative thread or gameplay actions to tie them all together. It feels too much like several different game ideas put in one place and the result is that the pacing of the game feels unbalanced. One second a creepy oppressive atmosphere of a cloying nightmare, the next drearily playing mini games to fix solar panels. While I am all for down time to give the player time to compartmentalize and react, this just doesn't work here and I found the ending with it very unsatisfying.

That's not to say it's all bad, there are some genuinely disturbing moments that made me jump. The visuals are quite good for a title on a budget and I loved the more down to earth sci-fi designs of the base and equipment its just a shame it couldn't pull all the threads together it was trying to weave.

+ Nice sci-fi base and equipment designs.
+ Atmospheric at times.
+ Some good jump scares.

- The game is inconsistent it what it wants to be.
- The story can't pull all the pieces together in a satisfying way.
- Pacing is all over the place.