This review contains spoilers
Chasing Static is a game by Headware Games, set in rural Wales near the town of Hearth. You play as Chris Selwood, who is called by the old folks home and given his father's diary after his death. This diary tells of his life's work, and in order to confront his past he drives to his old childhood home of Hearth (I think? Unsure tbh). I'm going to go into Spoilers here:
You drive to the Last Stop Cafe, where you meet a waitress named Aneira, who tells you that you made a wrong turn but in exchange for a lift she can give you directions. You agree, make coffee and turn the power back on after it goes off. Freaky s h i t starts happening and you wake up with everything changed. You explore the woods nearby, find a bunker and a disembodied voice named Helen tells you about strange paranormal stuff and that in order to leave you have to contain the nearby sites of which there are three and you're on your way.
You contain the sites before going back to the bunker and going up to the Echo Garden on urging from Helen. Inside you make your way through the facility and downstairs to a special machine where you hook up and you learn some things: Throughout the game, you learn that a meteor crashed into Site C. This meteor seemed to have effected everything strangely, you have a strange connection to the afterlife (Your dad's the head scientist, exploiting you in experiments in order to try to get in contact with his dead wife named...Aneira. That's right, you were talking to your deceased mother early). Other effects include wandering ghosts, strange fungus, and turning one scientist into a psychotic murderer. Helen turned out to be the one nice scientist who saved you and put you in a foster family far away from everyone, being your only friend. You regain your memories and leave with everything going back to normal, that is if this is all actually real and a part or all of it isn't in your head. Endings follow here:
Survivor- Don’t find all collectibles or save ghosts; and you get the normal ending described above.
Foreshadow- If you collect all the notes, echoes (I'll describe soon), and get rid of ghosts it's the same as Survivor except there's a post credits scene of a facility in a snowy area, implying more to come.
Salvation- If you turn on your car 3 times (and don’t get collectibles or ghosts), you drive away only to crash it and wake up in a ditch near the bunker, go through the game and it's the same ending except you hitchhike out.
And Umbrella (cheeky RE reference)- Switch the levers in the final room and it all shuts down and you die by ghosts.
I enjoy the story, it's intriguing and going through the world I just wanted to know more about everything that happened in it, why it happened, what happened? A lot of the plot can be interpreted in different ways and by the end of it all I can say that I'll continue to think about it for a while; the way it tells it's story you can tell it takes a lot from games like Silent Hill and truth be told almost all the way through I felt immersed...except when I didn't. Let me explain.
The Gameplay is basically a "Walking Sim", you walk around, figure out puzzles, and use your ghost detecting device thing to encounter Echoes (visions of past events of which there are 17), read notes (of which there are 9) and contain Sites. Tying into the spoilers, In order to get rid of a ghost at each site you need to get a modified loudspeaker, find the ghost and shoot it. Here's my issue, the walking sim part is great, but if you try for the extra ending it gets tedious. These ghosts are finicky as hell, and if you're exploring you need to be careful cause if you run into them once they're gone forever, necessitating a fresh start. You have to find them (look for three floating green dots that move), shoot them and then they're gone. Even with that in mind, I had a HELL of a time with glitches in this game: certain items and echoes wouldn't spawn sometimes (even if I completed it in the same order) so I had to reload an older save after exiting the game completely and getting back on, I had to restart the story once or twice due to the ghosts (a normal play through may take 2 hours if that). Stuff like that frustrated me and took me out of the loop, If I'm wrong about the glitches feel free to beat me up but it still pissed me off a bit. That being said even though you just walk, solve inventory puzzles (pick up items to use on others), and detect ghosts it's still good and I think that's due to the atmosphere.
This game is creepy as hell, and I love it. From the PS1 style visuals (I'm weak for those), to the unsettling atmosphere and creepy but calm soundtrack, the old sound design when you pick stuff up, the voice acting is spectacular, even the found footage stuff on the main menus, this game does a fantastic job at the atmospheric side. Keep in mind, there are no jump scares so don't expect that kind of game, just walk around and take it all in. I can't express enough how I feel this game presents that stuff immaculately, and truth be told holds the experience up with the story in the end. Once you complete the game you get a New Game (Restless Dreams) mode that's supposedly a visual filter but I didn't really see anything different from my first playthroughs? So who knows what that's about but nice Silent Hill reference.
Overall I recommend this title, I got it as a game from a buddy of mine on sale and on sale it's worth it, just keep in mind that it might be glitchy/frustrating at certain points. I used this guide to help me out with the ending stuff: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2649882944, so in case you need help it's there. I'm also interested in the developer's new game, Hollowbody, which another friend of mine put me on it's kick starter so I'm excited for when that finally comes out.
Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/headwaregames/hollowbody
Steam Page: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2123640/Hollowbody/
From Steam Reviews: https://steamcommunity.com/id/gamemast15r/recommended/
You drive to the Last Stop Cafe, where you meet a waitress named Aneira, who tells you that you made a wrong turn but in exchange for a lift she can give you directions. You agree, make coffee and turn the power back on after it goes off. Freaky s h i t starts happening and you wake up with everything changed. You explore the woods nearby, find a bunker and a disembodied voice named Helen tells you about strange paranormal stuff and that in order to leave you have to contain the nearby sites of which there are three and you're on your way.
You contain the sites before going back to the bunker and going up to the Echo Garden on urging from Helen. Inside you make your way through the facility and downstairs to a special machine where you hook up and you learn some things: Throughout the game, you learn that a meteor crashed into Site C. This meteor seemed to have effected everything strangely, you have a strange connection to the afterlife (Your dad's the head scientist, exploiting you in experiments in order to try to get in contact with his dead wife named...Aneira. That's right, you were talking to your deceased mother early). Other effects include wandering ghosts, strange fungus, and turning one scientist into a psychotic murderer. Helen turned out to be the one nice scientist who saved you and put you in a foster family far away from everyone, being your only friend. You regain your memories and leave with everything going back to normal, that is if this is all actually real and a part or all of it isn't in your head. Endings follow here:
Survivor- Don’t find all collectibles or save ghosts; and you get the normal ending described above.
Foreshadow- If you collect all the notes, echoes (I'll describe soon), and get rid of ghosts it's the same as Survivor except there's a post credits scene of a facility in a snowy area, implying more to come.
Salvation- If you turn on your car 3 times (and don’t get collectibles or ghosts), you drive away only to crash it and wake up in a ditch near the bunker, go through the game and it's the same ending except you hitchhike out.
And Umbrella (cheeky RE reference)- Switch the levers in the final room and it all shuts down and you die by ghosts.
I enjoy the story, it's intriguing and going through the world I just wanted to know more about everything that happened in it, why it happened, what happened? A lot of the plot can be interpreted in different ways and by the end of it all I can say that I'll continue to think about it for a while; the way it tells it's story you can tell it takes a lot from games like Silent Hill and truth be told almost all the way through I felt immersed...except when I didn't. Let me explain.
The Gameplay is basically a "Walking Sim", you walk around, figure out puzzles, and use your ghost detecting device thing to encounter Echoes (visions of past events of which there are 17), read notes (of which there are 9) and contain Sites. Tying into the spoilers, In order to get rid of a ghost at each site you need to get a modified loudspeaker, find the ghost and shoot it. Here's my issue, the walking sim part is great, but if you try for the extra ending it gets tedious. These ghosts are finicky as hell, and if you're exploring you need to be careful cause if you run into them once they're gone forever, necessitating a fresh start. You have to find them (look for three floating green dots that move), shoot them and then they're gone. Even with that in mind, I had a HELL of a time with glitches in this game: certain items and echoes wouldn't spawn sometimes (even if I completed it in the same order) so I had to reload an older save after exiting the game completely and getting back on, I had to restart the story once or twice due to the ghosts (a normal play through may take 2 hours if that). Stuff like that frustrated me and took me out of the loop, If I'm wrong about the glitches feel free to beat me up but it still pissed me off a bit. That being said even though you just walk, solve inventory puzzles (pick up items to use on others), and detect ghosts it's still good and I think that's due to the atmosphere.
This game is creepy as hell, and I love it. From the PS1 style visuals (I'm weak for those), to the unsettling atmosphere and creepy but calm soundtrack, the old sound design when you pick stuff up, the voice acting is spectacular, even the found footage stuff on the main menus, this game does a fantastic job at the atmospheric side. Keep in mind, there are no jump scares so don't expect that kind of game, just walk around and take it all in. I can't express enough how I feel this game presents that stuff immaculately, and truth be told holds the experience up with the story in the end. Once you complete the game you get a New Game (Restless Dreams) mode that's supposedly a visual filter but I didn't really see anything different from my first playthroughs? So who knows what that's about but nice Silent Hill reference.
Overall I recommend this title, I got it as a game from a buddy of mine on sale and on sale it's worth it, just keep in mind that it might be glitchy/frustrating at certain points. I used this guide to help me out with the ending stuff: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2649882944, so in case you need help it's there. I'm also interested in the developer's new game, Hollowbody, which another friend of mine put me on it's kick starter so I'm excited for when that finally comes out.
Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/headwaregames/hollowbody
Steam Page: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2123640/Hollowbody/
From Steam Reviews: https://steamcommunity.com/id/gamemast15r/recommended/