Psychopomp is a perplexing, and unsettling 3D dungeon crawler that’s currently free on Steam. It’s intentionally esoteric in just about every aspect in its design. It has a kind of vibe that’s very reminiscent of other indie games like Milk inside a bag of milk or OFF, a sort of dark perversion of early-to-mid 2000s nostalgia with its fuzzy polygonal visuals and its ambient downtempo soundtrack. It’s not a game that especially blew me away, but it was a nice palate cleanser. It’s something different, something new that I hadn’t really played before. It’s very short, only an hour long, and it feels more like a small experiment than a fully realized project, but it was still a pretty solid time.
You play as an unnamed protagonist who is clearly very paranoid and believes everyone in the world is keeping secrets from her. She may even possibly be suffering from psychosis-induced hallucinations. She develops a helmet which she refers to as the “Psychopomp” that allows her to see “a world hidden in plain sight, with all sorts of animals and creatures and dead bodies.” According to her, “there are catacombs hidden underneath every public government building”, and she sets out to infiltrate those hidden catacombs and uncover their secrets.
Despite the game’s cryptic dialogue, I think the themes of its narrative are very clear. It’s very much a game about capitalism and how the system is abused to keep those with money in power while the common people suffer through neglect. The dungeons you explore are located beneath a sewage plant, children’s hospital, and a public school, and you discover how each of these locations feed off of or drain resources and materials from people. It’s commentary on how these institutions can fail those it was meant to provide for. Despite the protagonist’s behavior giving the impression that she’s insane, I think that her belief that everyone is keeping secrets from her is supposed to represent how complacent we as a society are in letting these institutions get away with a lot of the awful things they do. To the protagonist, any sensible person would realize that something needs to be done about the people who are running these places, but no one is doing anything about it but her. For the sake of transparency (and to hopefully avoid any sort of debate in the comments) I will be fully up-front and say that I don’t feel that I’m educated on these topics enough to be able to hold an extensive conversation regarding them, nor do I feel my stance on these topics is necessary to elaborate on for the purposes of this review. I’m just sharing my interpretation of this game’s narrative themes.
I’ve never played a dungeon crawler prior to this, so it was a bit of a challenge getting used to its controls. It may be 3D, but you don’t have a full range of motion, you can only move in the cardinal directions. You’re also limited in your ability to control the camera, you can only look around if you stand still and hold ctrl while moving your mouse. Despite being unusual and taking some getting used to, I didn’t really have any major issues with how the game controls until you’re forced to engage in combat. Combat feels really clunky. It’s very difficult to gauge your range of attack, and I found I often had to get in the enemies’ faces in order to be at a range to do damage to them. This basically forced me to stay in one place and mash left click while I prayed I killed them before they killed me. Thankfully there aren’t really many combat encounters in the game, but I definitely found this to be a sore spot. If you die, you do have to redo the entire dungeon from the very beginning, but the dungeons are so short and easy to navigate that it’s not as big of an inconvenience as it sounds.
The game’s biggest appeal to me is its presentation. Its art direction is excellent. The designs of all of the different creatures you encounter ride a fine line between grotesque and playfully unsettling. While environments can be very dark, the game uses various colored lights to great effect in different areas. I love the artstyle the protagonist is drawn in, it reminds me heavily of that late 2000s anime/Invader Zim-inspired art that could be found on DeviantArt back in the day. The soundtrack is also such a great listen, ambient downtempo is one of my favorite music genres and I really wish that more games used this kind of music in their soundtracks.
Psychopomp was a very refreshing game to play. It’s a neat trip that managed to really enthrall me with its aesthetics. It’s not revolutionary by any means, but I’d be hella down to play something like this that’s longer and more fleshed out, especially in regards to the combat. If you’re looking for something short but different, give this game a shot. It’s definitely not a game that’s going to be for everybody, but it’s free and it’s only an hour long, so you’ve got practically nothing to lose by giving this game a try.
You play as an unnamed protagonist who is clearly very paranoid and believes everyone in the world is keeping secrets from her. She may even possibly be suffering from psychosis-induced hallucinations. She develops a helmet which she refers to as the “Psychopomp” that allows her to see “a world hidden in plain sight, with all sorts of animals and creatures and dead bodies.” According to her, “there are catacombs hidden underneath every public government building”, and she sets out to infiltrate those hidden catacombs and uncover their secrets.
Despite the game’s cryptic dialogue, I think the themes of its narrative are very clear. It’s very much a game about capitalism and how the system is abused to keep those with money in power while the common people suffer through neglect. The dungeons you explore are located beneath a sewage plant, children’s hospital, and a public school, and you discover how each of these locations feed off of or drain resources and materials from people. It’s commentary on how these institutions can fail those it was meant to provide for. Despite the protagonist’s behavior giving the impression that she’s insane, I think that her belief that everyone is keeping secrets from her is supposed to represent how complacent we as a society are in letting these institutions get away with a lot of the awful things they do. To the protagonist, any sensible person would realize that something needs to be done about the people who are running these places, but no one is doing anything about it but her. For the sake of transparency (and to hopefully avoid any sort of debate in the comments) I will be fully up-front and say that I don’t feel that I’m educated on these topics enough to be able to hold an extensive conversation regarding them, nor do I feel my stance on these topics is necessary to elaborate on for the purposes of this review. I’m just sharing my interpretation of this game’s narrative themes.
I’ve never played a dungeon crawler prior to this, so it was a bit of a challenge getting used to its controls. It may be 3D, but you don’t have a full range of motion, you can only move in the cardinal directions. You’re also limited in your ability to control the camera, you can only look around if you stand still and hold ctrl while moving your mouse. Despite being unusual and taking some getting used to, I didn’t really have any major issues with how the game controls until you’re forced to engage in combat. Combat feels really clunky. It’s very difficult to gauge your range of attack, and I found I often had to get in the enemies’ faces in order to be at a range to do damage to them. This basically forced me to stay in one place and mash left click while I prayed I killed them before they killed me. Thankfully there aren’t really many combat encounters in the game, but I definitely found this to be a sore spot. If you die, you do have to redo the entire dungeon from the very beginning, but the dungeons are so short and easy to navigate that it’s not as big of an inconvenience as it sounds.
The game’s biggest appeal to me is its presentation. Its art direction is excellent. The designs of all of the different creatures you encounter ride a fine line between grotesque and playfully unsettling. While environments can be very dark, the game uses various colored lights to great effect in different areas. I love the artstyle the protagonist is drawn in, it reminds me heavily of that late 2000s anime/Invader Zim-inspired art that could be found on DeviantArt back in the day. The soundtrack is also such a great listen, ambient downtempo is one of my favorite music genres and I really wish that more games used this kind of music in their soundtracks.
Psychopomp was a very refreshing game to play. It’s a neat trip that managed to really enthrall me with its aesthetics. It’s not revolutionary by any means, but I’d be hella down to play something like this that’s longer and more fleshed out, especially in regards to the combat. If you’re looking for something short but different, give this game a shot. It’s definitely not a game that’s going to be for everybody, but it’s free and it’s only an hour long, so you’ve got practically nothing to lose by giving this game a try.