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Deadlight - XBLA Game Review

Game Review | March 23, 2013 1:31 am

By AJ

Mmm, Tequila.

I haven't written a game review in a while, mainly because I have not played anything I thought worthy of one... Until now. This quick review is about the XBLA game Deadlight. I'll give you a quick synopsis of the game's story before I get into the technical details. I didn't know what to expect from the title of the game, but it's basically about a zombie apocalypse. You play as one character working his way through towns, sewers, buildings and other little puzzles trying to find his group of friends. I'll try not to give anything away in this review, but I apologize if I do.

The gameplay would resemble Limbo, almost exactly. You can move left and right, jump and interact with certain objects throughout the different settings. It's not very hard, but there are certain parts that require some perfect timing and quick movements. Some of the controls are weird, but nothing an average gamer couldn't pick up within 10 to 15 minutes. Although, if you're very familiar with a certain game's controller layout, in tense moments you may find yourself hitting buttons that do almost the opposite of what you wanted and that's a bad thing when zombies are around...

Be prepared to die. A lot.

This game isn't about killing zombies, like most zombie related games - it's about surviving. If you find yourself up against more than one zombie, you're probably going to die. You have to be smart and lure them off ledges, trap them in certain ways or pick them off one at time from a distance. There are a variety of weapons as well (only 4 I believe, if I'm remembering correctly). I'll let you discover these for yourself, some are more fun than others.

The game's art style is also very Limbo-esque. When it's dark, it's very 2D. You can hardly see anything in the background or foreground as you can see in the picture below. Most of the game is set in darker environments, this makes the game a little more challenging (unless you change the brightness/gamma). When it's very dark it's hard to see certain enemies or find objects you need to interact with to move on, but it's a lot of fun!

The gloomy, zombie-ridden environment.

When you do get outside and it's day, the game completely changes. The 2D environment turns 3D, but you're still limited to the exact same movements as stated previously. There's great detail all over and it's just fantastic to be in a bright setting after being in the dark for so long, check out the shot below to see what I'm talking about. There's a few different spots in the game that have an excellent reoccurring theme completely different from day or night, play it to find out!

We're outside, yay! Let's explore a bit.

There are a bunch of collectibles, but with the guide in the next paragraph they are no problem at all. Even if you do happen to miss one, you should be able to reload the last checkpoint and get whatever it was with no problem. If for some reason you miss one so badly a simple checkpoint restart won't allow you to get it you can always get it from the main menu. The game is 3 Acts and then within the Acts it's broken down into chapters, so from the chapter select you'll be able to get anything without a problem.

The collectibles range from I.D.'s from people that were either killed or turned in to zombies, diary pages written by the character you play as (these provide an interesting backstory if you're into that sort of thing, character upgrades, or fun little mini-games you can play (most of the mini-games are tied to achievements). Check out the picture below for one of the handhelds found in the game.

One of the bonus mini-games! Some are pretty fun.

This game is strictly single player, however, there are leaderboards for playtime and percentage completed, but they're completed fucked over by cheating assholes. The game takes about 4 hours to collect everything and finish completely and all the achievements can be obtained very easily by following this guide. It's an excellent guide made by Tyger7 over at x360a.

Overall I'd give this game an 8 out of 10.

The good: The atmosphere of the game is incredible, the puzzles are fun and not too aggravating, and the achievements are very simple (with the guide). Throughout the entire game I only got stuck once. I was overanalyzing a certain part to progress, it was much simpler than what I thought had to be done. Also, it's got 400 gamerscore and 30 achievements.

The bad: There's almost 0 replay value, unless you're into glitched leaderboards, speedrunning games and collecting everything and it's priced a little high. I'd suggest waiting until it's at least 800 msp. But, it's a must buy for any completionist. I was lucky enough to get it for 800 msp, but I would've been much more satisfied with only spending 400 msp.

Thanks for reading and if you're still unsure on whether or not you'd enjoy the game, give the demo a try!

(Source: Guide - x360a. Screenshots - Google.)

Rating: 8.0 of 10

Reviewed: Deadlight

Keywords: Deadlight, Deadlight XBLA, Game Review, Review; review

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Re: Deadlight - XBLA Game Review

03/23/13 1:57 am | #2

This sounds way better than I was thinking. I grabbed the demo when it first came out but forgot about it.

The visual style is great and the handheld minigames look awesome! Going to try ASAP.

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Re: Deadlight - XBLA Game Review

03/23/13 2:18 am | #3

Wow. That gas station scene looks straight out of Alan Wake.

I salute you, sir. That was an excellent review and I am sold. I will promptly be purchasing this game as soon as my Internet service resumes. And I might even do it before then, I just really hate offline achievements.

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Re: Deadlight - XBLA Game Review

03/23/13 2:21 am | #4

It really is a well put together, fun game. The story was even pretty decent to go along with it.

I picked it up for 600 points (way back when) and definitely don't regret it. Nice review AJ.

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Re: Deadlight - XBLA Game Review

03/23/13 2:48 am | #5

Reminds me that I need to go back and finish it

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Re: Deadlight - XBLA Game Review

04/02/13 9:00 pm | #6

Thread necro.....

Deadlight is on sale until April 8 for 600 MSP. In case anyone was interested. To me definitely worth that price (I already have it).

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Re: Deadlight - XBLA Game Review

04/03/13 1:41 am | #7

Wow, 600 is a steal!

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Deadlight - XBLA Game Review

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