Oh, what I would give to go around in an adventure with a dog. Just not this one, poor guy is constantly afraid to while creepy zombies lurk about, seeing haunting specters, while pretty much being the one who has to follow the scent of Mia's daddy.
What an interesting choice to make a game based on a popular tabletop series from Brazil, it was confusing at first when character are dialogues are like talking about things happening that hasn't come to me yet. But these seem to be well-established characters that anyone who's into the occult be immersed into. Enigma of Fear goes further than being an investigation title.
Yeah, there are survival horror elements, and lots of puzzle solving. If you think that's your obstacle for delving more into the main narrative, you probably missed on a number of cool things, like yours truly did. Continuing to astound me in its myriad of ways.
That's the main menu screen, obfuscated by the symbol below before pressing leave, clicking on begin tells me to enter symbols. They're blood coated, and I fidgeted around till I pressed the enter button. Thus, my journey begins with the girl and the dog, inside a haunted cult mansion.
Right from the bat, it tells you to pay attention, put my intelligence and observation skills to use all the while some blood soaked zombies lurk about, and they're easy to kill with a few pistol rounds to the face. But man, the controls feel a little stiff, like if I get a few pixels close to them, they can scratch hard. Few more, and I'm a goner. That dog isn't any help either.
Mechanics boil down to playing in an isometric adventure where the camera changes in certain locations, so part of the horror also comes from obscuring the view. Mia's biggest instruments in her investigative abilities are her pistol, flashlight with UV option, and her dog.
This little guy can enter holes, trace scent, and also makes noises while sneaking around. Munition is limited, so a crowbar should be the easy solution. Just know that approaching these things are very tricky. At just a slight proximity, they'll scratch me. All I do is run around, keeping distance till I get ready, and kill them. If not, 3 or 4 bullets should do the trick.
Later, more is revealed about those zombies, they can't see clear but can hear or sense my presence, long as I'm quick enough. A back attack should end them quickly. They're not that scary once I figure out how to kill them. In multiple numbers, however, the anxiety catches up. The puzzles are very tricky, they require deciphering, finding hidden notes, and exploring areas found through keen eyes. Again, yours truly messed up till I did. This is also where the dog comes around.
You can only do so much to drive any player to the story, investigation games leaving only a few clues to use the information provided much as possible. This one has an overabundance of it, that I read it to the point of misunderstanding the puzzles.
This game has so many intricate points, as well as hidden depths. I had so many questions diving into the mansion, following trails of her father, before learning a number of things like Mia's family, and this God of Fear business as well, involving another family worshiping a deity.
You know, all the answers were pretty much infront of me, but I was so caught up with figuring out the character ties, and stories, I pretty much got lost, and took longer to solve this door. Which needed me to match symbols. All of which the clues were scattered around the mansion.
Mia arrived with two of her friends, so finding a comms radio allowed me to ask them certain questions they could somewhat answer for. Also, all of these dialogues are voiced, this takes place somewhere in Brazil so, I'm reading translations of the original Portuguese dub. Which doesn't entirely pan out well, what sucks even more, I can't separate the text and voice options.
Right after gettin downstairs of the mansion, there's a room plastered with manic writing. In the center of it, is a paper. Soon as I touched it, the screen started glitching like crazy, I saw the symbols, and then flipped the paper to see a drawing of a hidden entrance. But when I tried to leave, the glitching got intense, and I was back to the main menu. Going back to the room again.
This is where I also I found out those symbols were supposed to be for the main menu entry. Instead of clicking on the ones with bloodstain, I pressed the new one, and now I'm playing as Veritas. Her father, just slashing demons like it's Tuesday, and having an all out battle with her uncle.
There's no depth of ridiculousness untouched by this game, I never felt so intrigued about playing a survivor horror detective this badly. It has a unique touch to how it introduces its mysteries, but also opening them up, leading to crazier, and crazier discoveries.
It's a lengthy journey too, like some players clocked in hours into it. Others beat it in less a dozen. It's not entirely perfect, some shortcomings include like aforementioned dialogues. They're not all well translated, but the voice acting is still convincing. Outside that, it's pretty much close to being a flawless experience. I also forget to mention the dense atmosphere, and eerie sound design.
