Phantoms [Review]

Phantoms is a first-person pixelated horror game developed by Solitude Software and published by TheGamePublisher.com. I was intrigued by the game because of its retro art style. I figured it would be a good, short game to try.

I played this game on my Steam Deck, unfortunately, I had some problems with this. The game crashed a few times and I couldn’t crouch. I managed without for some time but eventually, there would be a flesh-like vine that stretched across the train’s hallway that blocked me from continuing. This wasn’t the only glitch I encountered, the worst one being the first time I died. I respawned in a completely black area, I had to actually turn the brightness all the way up to see why I couldn’t move. When I was able to see, I saw the enemy that killed me stuck in the ceiling and wall with my character right next to him. I was unable to move and had to go back to the main menu.

I like the aesthetic of the game, the pixelated and old-style horror game is one of my favorite styles for horror. But, this game doesn’t feel scary. And a lot of that is because of its insistent tutorials and HUD. I couldn’t turn the HUD off while in the game so I had to go back to the main menu, and even then when I returned to the game the HUD was never turned off. I don’t like when the controls are constantly displayed in a horror game, it takes me out of the moment and can make things less scary. And there is an option to turn it off, it just doesn’t work.

The tutorial pop-ups, though, are the main problem. It feels like every minute a blue box with white text comes up telling you what’s going on and what you need to do. One even tells you “Because… Well, the conductor is not the only thing trying to kill you.” I wasn’t even aware that the conductor was trying to kill me at that moment. These pop-ups can’t be turned off and they come up every play through. So, if you die and have to restart, you also see the pop-ups once more. Some pop-ups show up multiple times through the same playthrough, like if you stand in a room for too long you will without a doubt get a box telling you that if you don’t move you’ll be killed.

I think Phantoms had a good art direction but that wasn’t enough to save the game. It was glitchy and I couldn’t absorb myself into the world because of how many things were on the screen at once and all the tutorials and text boxes that kept coming up. It makes it less scary. I’ll be giving the game a 2/10. It’s currently available on Steam.