Combining action and escape room mechanics, Oxide Room 104 is a chilling single-player body-horror game set inside an old motel. Kidnapped, at the mercy of a ruthless scientist and stalked by a horrible creature, you must try to escape from there using common sense, just as you would in real life.
I must say that I’ve been a fan of horror games for quite some time, so writing this review of Oxide Room 104 made sense to me. I really like these AA experiences where you don’t get a perfect game, but they tend to go for ways to make you uncomfortable, to give you a hard time (in a good way), and to make you feel terror, not just from screaming, but from that other one you keep thinking about.
Certainly, there are many games that bet on formulas and scare already-used, common places. Oxide Room 104 is located in the middle point between a good AA job and a medium-sized game. between a very well-achieved visual and sound environment and crude or poorly developed voice acting and animations.
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Reviews of Oxide Room 104
Making this review of Oxide Room 104 I was faced with several problems that did not cause a good first impression of the game. But if you resist those first moments where the flaws shine through, you will find a game that will give you the experience you are looking for in the horror genre. Yes, it’s focused on puzzles rather than action and can be a bit clunky. But it does have a genuinely oppressive atmosphere, its puzzles are engaging, and its time-loop mechanic adds an exciting twist. It also has a fair length.
If you’re wondering what Oxide Room 104 looks like, you should accommodate your expectations to the kind of game it is. Like all AA, it’s not perfect. In fact, the cinematics with faces, hands, and so on leave something to be desired. But what the game does shine in is the creation of terrifying scenery, atmosphere, and sound. Perhaps the voice of the protagonist lacked more expressiveness. But as far as sound design goes, the game does pretty well.
Play Escape
This is one of those games where you will have to learn by losing. You wake up trapped in a small room from which you will have to find a way out. And this will be what marks the style of the game: you will be escaping all the time, and in escape room style, you will have to get out of the motel you are in. There are many things that can kill you if you don’t make wise decisions. Poison, traps, and strange monsters. But as I said before, dying will not be the end but an apprenticeship with the loop mechanics that the game has.
You will also have good tools that you will be gaining: antidotes against poisons, bandages against wounds, and pistols against monsters. Of course, as a good survival horror game, everything will be so limited that you’ll have to use your resources well. If you run out of any of these things, you’ll probably die when you face some of the challenges that constantly appear in the game. And finally, there is no melee combat here.
A loop that changes everything
My first attempt to escape the hotel during the making of this review of Oxide Room 104 didn’t last long. I haven’t played too many survival horror games for quite some time, and that made me suffer from its challenges. But also, that motivated me to keep at it despite the frustrations. I had to face And when I died for the first time, things started to get better, as it turned out that it was not the end of the game, but a change of experience.
You die, you get a cinematic, and then you’re back in the room at the beginning. But things are no longer the same. The objects change places. The number of enemies you face also varies. But not everything changes for the worse: some of the puzzles you encountered before can be easier to solve. It is precisely death that will make you learn how to move in this hotel full of horrors that will kill you and that will finally lead you to victory.
Duration
This is one of those games that bets on replayability as it has several endings; you get a different one depending on the decisions you make throughout the game. Your first game can take you between three and five hours. The difference in the length will depend on how much you want to spend investigating and solving the puzzles. If you’re interested in getting the other endings, then you’ll start over. A good reason for doing so is that subsequent games will most likely take you two hours or less.
As for what the game has to offer for these three to five hours, on the one hand, there are many rooms that you can and must visit in order to escape from the hotel. In addition to giving you some kind of puzzle to solve or danger to watch out for, if you search in a dedicated way, you can also find documents in which you will have part of the story and which will broaden your understanding of the game universe.
Conclusion
Room 104 may tire many with how crude it can be. Especially when it comes to voice acting. For some, this will have its charm, assuming it as a reflection of video games past, but for others, it is something that will be annoying and distracting. The animations are basic, the combat is complicated by the limitations. In addition, it can be frustrating in many ways because of the number of deaths you will have or how demanding it is in terms of the order you must follow to finish it.
It’s clear that these flaws have to do with the fact that it’s an AA game, and therefore it’s a matter of budget and not talent. In fact, for fans of the horror genre, Oxide: Room 104 is an easy recommendation. as long as you don’t approach the game thinking about bigger budget games. What this title has to offer you is an original, fun, and well-thought-out experience in terms of gameplay and level and puzzle design.
The Good
Original and well thought out puzzles.
truly frightening environment.
+Good replayability
+Fair length for the genre and proposal.
The Bad
-Animations are basic.
Combat is complicated by its limitations.
-Poor voice acting