SubTerra

2 Solid idea, lacks polished presentation
The idea of the game is solid and made me expect some good old room-based puzzle solving gameplay. Unfortunatelly, the presentation is an instant turn-off. Both visuals as well as sound feel very amateurish and are far from coherent and polished.

This is not to say that good visuals and sound are necessary for an interesting game. I have no problem at all with simple visuals and sound which are done well. The problem is – as so often – when the developer(s) overestimate their abilities and try to do something which they cannot do well. It’s okay to aim low and do that well. Its not okay to aim too high and fail at that.

In this case, all visuals of the game lack contrast (this makes me wonder if they were perhaps done on a quite decalibrated screen). On still screenshots it still looks acceptable, but as soon as one plays the game it overally feels quite jerky. The sound in turn is dynamically very overcompressed and sounds clippressed. In summary, the presentation feels like many parts thrown together which however do not really feel coherent and seamless. Most importantly, the presentation does not know the word “subtle” – saturation, luminance and loudness do only know “full on” and “zero”.