Kryopolis

Hello and welcome to Kryopolis.
Kryopolis is a Survival Horror game and... not another horror rpgmaker horror game, mind that! This game was developed by Darken in GameMaker Studio 2, and it's a futuristic survival horror adventure that takes place in a post-apocalyptic setting in which food and shelter are scarce.
See? Not the usual zombie survival horror plot. Also, this game was realized for the Indie Game Making Contest 2018, so do not expect a long, epic adventure, because it's a short scenario with a tense atmosphere and some peculiar and original design choices (that show a lot of potential and originality should be used in a bigger project).
But let's begin our story...


You got an axe, you got enemies. Apply the axe to the enemy!

First: the game has almost NO story and a total of zero cutscenes! Hey, we do not complain, you do not even need that! Ok, basically what happens in the game is this: we play as a survivor in a post-apocalyptic wasteland looking for shelter. She finds the shelter, and the place is already occupied by flesh eating monsters, anyway she finds a fireman axe and starts chopping, but the savage monsters seems to be controlled by a more intelligent entity...

Now, the gameplay. This is a survival horror, so expect no turn based battles or experience points, all happens in real time and this means looking for keys, avoiding spike traps and chopping flesh eating mutant creatures! Simple... well at least technically! The game uses a simple but restrictive inventory system, so inventory management is mandatory: basically we have just four slots and these can be occupied by keys, healing items and bear traps (that can be used to hold enemies that step on them). There's also a sort of life bar composed of five hit-points. That's all about interface and menu, and it's a pretty good choice since we had everything on the screen at once, no need for menus or other trappings.

And then we have the axe! Ok, this is the real protagonist of the game, the problem is that using it is a bit... clunky! Basically you have to hold the button to put the axe in attack position, meaning that you cannot change the direction you are facing. This means that while it's not too difficult to deal with a single opponent (the axe is powerful!), things will become more difficult when there are multiple enemies, but I did not mind since the game is a *survival game*, so it's expected to have difficult combat encounters that should make the player feel uncomfortable (ok, this maybe has not much to do with a clunky system, still having to press a single key, with no ammo required would have made the game an arcade, not very survival-like)

Graphically there's not much to do: the same is set in a dark shelter, so t's basically a hi-tech dungeon with some barrels scattered here and there, flickering broken screens and led lights, computers and other machinaries. Despite the simplicity of the structure, there is a good use of lights and darkness. The sound, lighting and visuals are good and enforce an atmosphere of dread that makes up for the lack of background music.


Ok, my friend, we got the review, we got a key, let's get outta here! But first...

The Final Verdict
Kryopolis is a sort of a tech demo, but as an entry for the Indie Game Making Contest is pretty good! It took me about 15 minutes from the beginning to the end, so it's a rather short experience, but still a pleasant one. While this is a bare bones game (there aren't different weapons or enemy types, anyway since it's possible to finish it in ten minutes this is not a problem!) it does almost everything perfectly, creating a mini-scenario with a minimalist system and a believable tense atmosphere that contribuited to an immersive dark setting (I liked the graphics and I also really liked the style of the menu). I can compared it to Huperternal-2005, an old Rm2k3 sci-fi russian action survival horror with a similar plot, setting and gameplay (that had more story, weapons and enemies, but sadly exists only as a demo!).

The only problem a player may have with this game (besides the lack of story and the shortness of it, but hey, it was an entry for a contest!) is probably the clunky controls concerning combat, but I think that the system is in line with the genre and setting of th game.

So yes, it's an interesting entry with lots of style and some good ideas!