Daymare 1998 DEMO Review
*Contains Spoilers*
Very Much A “Work in Progress”
I decided to give the Daymare 1998 demo a try this evening. Two hours and much frustration later, I can say the game definitely needs some adjustments.
You are Agent Liev of H.A.D.E.S. sent in to evaluate the zombie-like outbreak at an AEGIS lab caused by an escaped bio-weapon substance and retrieve the sample. Liev is a no-nonsense “orders are orders” operative who is charged with eliminating any survivors of the ordeal along with the undead as he explores the lab.
Those of us who enjoy the Resident Evil series will immediately draw comparisons between the situation and storyline. Several key players from various Resident Evil titles are a part of the game’s development, so that RE feel makes sense and as a long time fan, I appreciated it.
The laboratory’s design is visually appealing and littered with zombies, gore, and is in general disarray from the recent outbreak, as one might expect. The soundtrack is slow and ominous, but could honestly use more energy for certain encounters, such as the fight between Agent Liev and what appears to be an experimental creature that breaks free from its holding tank. The music is a bit slow and somber where, with more energy, it could really help set the mood and give the player a true moment of panic and fear.
The Data Interchange Device or “D.I.D.” (tech strapped to Liev’s right arm that contains his inventory, files, map, health status, and other info) is an effective way to display valuable information in a realistic way, but the inventory management mechanic could use some work. I’ll talk about that more in depth later on.
The voice acting, for the most part, is convincing and filled with emotion, but playing as Liev really makes you wonder “Why is he so angry?” He’s a hardened military man so you would expect him to keep his anger in check, but minor issues seem to set him off in a fit of swear words and bitterness. The insults as a whole in Daymare are on another level completely, illustrated by this actual line from the demo’s dialogue:
“I don’t care what titter-ridden cow curdles the milk those pasteurizing big shots call us in to mop up.”
Yeah. I know.
The character and enemy design could use some polishing. The introduction on the helicopter shows operatives with squinted faces and static facial movements. Though it is slightly distracting in the cutscenes, it’s not an issue for general gameplay as the player takes on an over-the-shoulder view of Liev’s trek through the lab. The single major fight you have with the escaped experiment in the holding tank was slightly comical because its movements were so strange. It would run at you, arms wide like it was going to give you a big bear hug and I found myself more amused than scared. Other enemies speedily lumbering at you were anxiety inducing, but this one in particular just didn’t hit the mark.
I appreciated having the ability to sprint with a clear stamina bar indicating how much longer I was able to run. It is a tiny detail a lot of indie horror games tend to leave out. The movement overall felt fluid, but it was incredibly easy to be grabbed by a zombie when Liev would run by them, even when they were not poised to attack you.
The tiny dinosaur collectibles were very similar to the Mr. Raccoon toys found in the RE2 remake, but in Daymare ammo is so rare I decided to leave them behind. I have played many survival horror games, all where headshots are absolutely essential to ammo conservation, and I have become adept at landing them. That was not the case with Daymare. It seemed as though the act of shooting was slightly delayed and it was just enough to ensure nearly all my shots barely missed my target, which was incredibly frustrating.
The puzzles in Daymare were designed in the spirit of old Resident Evil games, but a few were lacking key context that would have made the solutions far less obscure. However, my real quarrel with this game lies in the inventory management mechanic.
From the start, the player is overwhelmed with information about loading and reloading, managing extra clips and health items, and mixing items, which was not immediately necessary to know. I found the constant need to stop and take time to manually reload my extra clips or circle back to pick up clips I accidentally dropped by simply reloading my weapon extremely cumbersome. I felt as though I spent more time trying to navigate the overly complicated inventory system than I did playing the game. I would like to see mouse interaction replace the need to use WASD and F to select, combine, and drop items.
Daymare 1998 has real potential but after playing the demo, it appears to be an overly ambitious project. While the inventory management and reload mechanics are certainly more realistic, I feel it complicates and detracts from what is otherwise fun gameplay. Some of my woes may have been alleviated by playing the demo with a controller, but as a PC player, I want the ability to play a zombie shooter using my mouse and keyboard with the same quality and ease a console player would expect with a controller. It is my hope that some of these items will be addressed in the final release.
[Lady played the Daymare 1998 demo on PC with a keyboard and mouse around 5 days before the full release on Steam]
You are Agent Liev of H.A.D.E.S. sent in to evaluate the zombie-like outbreak at an AEGIS lab caused by an escaped bio-weapon substance and retrieve the sample. Liev is a no-nonsense “orders are orders” operative who is charged with eliminating any survivors of the ordeal along with the undead as he explores the lab.
Those of us who enjoy the Resident Evil series will immediately draw comparisons between the situation and storyline. Several key players from various Resident Evil titles are a part of the game’s development, so that RE feel makes sense and as a long time fan, I appreciated it.
The laboratory’s design is visually appealing and littered with zombies, gore, and is in general disarray from the recent outbreak, as one might expect. The soundtrack is slow and ominous, but could honestly use more energy for certain encounters, such as the fight between Agent Liev and what appears to be an experimental creature that breaks free from its holding tank. The music is a bit slow and somber where, with more energy, it could really help set the mood and give the player a true moment of panic and fear.
The Data Interchange Device or “D.I.D.” (tech strapped to Liev’s right arm that contains his inventory, files, map, health status, and other info) is an effective way to display valuable information in a realistic way, but the inventory management mechanic could use some work. I’ll talk about that more in depth later on.
The voice acting, for the most part, is convincing and filled with emotion, but playing as Liev really makes you wonder “Why is he so angry?” He’s a hardened military man so you would expect him to keep his anger in check, but minor issues seem to set him off in a fit of swear words and bitterness. The insults as a whole in Daymare are on another level completely, illustrated by this actual line from the demo’s dialogue:
“I don’t care what titter-ridden cow curdles the milk those pasteurizing big shots call us in to mop up.”
Yeah. I know.
The character and enemy design could use some polishing. The introduction on the helicopter shows operatives with squinted faces and static facial movements. Though it is slightly distracting in the cutscenes, it’s not an issue for general gameplay as the player takes on an over-the-shoulder view of Liev’s trek through the lab. The single major fight you have with the escaped experiment in the holding tank was slightly comical because its movements were so strange. It would run at you, arms wide like it was going to give you a big bear hug and I found myself more amused than scared. Other enemies speedily lumbering at you were anxiety inducing, but this one in particular just didn’t hit the mark.
I appreciated having the ability to sprint with a clear stamina bar indicating how much longer I was able to run. It is a tiny detail a lot of indie horror games tend to leave out. The movement overall felt fluid, but it was incredibly easy to be grabbed by a zombie when Liev would run by them, even when they were not poised to attack you.
The tiny dinosaur collectibles were very similar to the Mr. Raccoon toys found in the RE2 remake, but in Daymare ammo is so rare I decided to leave them behind. I have played many survival horror games, all where headshots are absolutely essential to ammo conservation, and I have become adept at landing them. That was not the case with Daymare. It seemed as though the act of shooting was slightly delayed and it was just enough to ensure nearly all my shots barely missed my target, which was incredibly frustrating.
The puzzles in Daymare were designed in the spirit of old Resident Evil games, but a few were lacking key context that would have made the solutions far less obscure. However, my real quarrel with this game lies in the inventory management mechanic.
From the start, the player is overwhelmed with information about loading and reloading, managing extra clips and health items, and mixing items, which was not immediately necessary to know. I found the constant need to stop and take time to manually reload my extra clips or circle back to pick up clips I accidentally dropped by simply reloading my weapon extremely cumbersome. I felt as though I spent more time trying to navigate the overly complicated inventory system than I did playing the game. I would like to see mouse interaction replace the need to use WASD and F to select, combine, and drop items.
Daymare 1998 has real potential but after playing the demo, it appears to be an overly ambitious project. While the inventory management and reload mechanics are certainly more realistic, I feel it complicates and detracts from what is otherwise fun gameplay. Some of my woes may have been alleviated by playing the demo with a controller, but as a PC player, I want the ability to play a zombie shooter using my mouse and keyboard with the same quality and ease a console player would expect with a controller. It is my hope that some of these items will be addressed in the final release.
[Lady played the Daymare 1998 demo on PC with a keyboard and mouse around 5 days before the full release on Steam]
I never played the demo, but I really like the game. I'm not comparing it to RE. Just as a standalone zombie game. When I first started the game, I was disappointed in the inability to remap controls. And I didn't like the developer's excuse that it would end up breaking the game if he tried to add remapping. But I quickly got over it. The controls are intuitive. The inability to remap the controls did not diminish the game at all. My one major beef is that in the version I am playing, the audio and video for cutscenes are way out of sync. If the audio and video is only half a second out of sync, that is enough to ruin a game. And in my case, the audio and video were 2 minutes out of sync. I had to watch the cutscenes on YouTUbe. This is 100% inexcusable. I found the video files in the game directory, and most of them did not have audio. Why would they make the audio and video separate? I will never understand that. As for the method of reloading, it didn't bother me in the least. In fact I liked it. In most zombie games I play, there are a ton of zombies. So in those games, I need fast reloading. But in this game, you usually only encounter a couple of zombies at a time. In scenarios where there are dozens of zombies, you just need to sprint around them and get to a safe zone. As soon as I kill a zombie, I just put more bullets directly into the gun. And I keep my clips full too. It only takes like 1-2 seconds to do it, because I just press the buttons really fast. I never fast reload, so I never drop clips. I do the slow reload (hold down R). I don't think the voice acting was that great. It wasn't horrible, but it wasn't exactly good either. I get a feel for the characters. Like Liev is an egotistical psychopath with a grudge who is willing to kill innocents and non-enemies alike. Sam is an ordinary guy who quickly adjusts and is mainly consumed with his one objective. But the dialogue seems a tad bit cheesy/lame. It isn't worded that well and some of the speech is slow and badly paced. It isn't how normal people would talk. If 5 was decent/average voice acting, I would put this at a 5. Maybe 6. Other than that, I am enjoying every bit of the game. I really like the action, the gameplay, the DID, the reloading, the story, the zombies, the scenery, the details. Virtually no lag and I play on a non-gaming laptop NVIDIA 940MX with only 8 GB RAM and 1 GB VRAM. I remember just going through an alley, and back behind some garbage and debris, in a part of the alley that I couldn't get into, there was a DeLorean 'Back to the Future' car with the license plate OUTATIME. Just so much detail. I want to play this game a few more times, just to take in the scenery. I'm playing on he easiest settings and I am using way less ammo than I find, maybe 50% or less of what I find. I don't ever use melee because I feel like it is too dangerous. I have a lot of hollow points that I never use, regular 9mm that I use a lot, shotgun ammo that I use when I'm against a more powerful zombie or when I'm in a tough spot, and magnum ammo that I am saving. Later in the game, you find a storage box to put extra stuff in, but that is one thing that could be improved. It isn't helpful because you can't access that storage at any other time in the game, and other characters can't access it either. I wish that it was available for all characters throughout the entire game, or at least available in two stages of the game for Sam. I haven't fought any of the bosses yet. I have around two more Chapters to complete. So in summary, I love the game except for the audio and video being out of sync, and the voice acting could have been a tiny bit better.
ReplyDeleteOh, one more thing. Some of the puzzles were at the right degree of difficulty where it didn't take much work or brainpower to solve them, but were still slightly challenging. Then there were one or two puzzles that I got stuck on. Turns out the solution was simple, but I just screwed up and did them wrong. So all of the above puzzles are fine, but there was one or two puzzles that were just ridiculously hard that I would have never figured out in a dozen lifetimes. The one where you have to type Greek letters on a typewriter is the one that I am talking about. I just searched for the answer online. It wasn't worth my time.
ReplyDelete