Reviews

• gamedeal user

  Aug 19, 2023

  Retchid will sadly most likely go unnoticed by many I fear in this busy month, it's a really fun moody methodical shooter with a sprinkle of survival horror mechanics mixed in, & it has a lot of attention to detail by a small (credits had 4 devs listed + 1 voice actor) independent team who are trying to do something a bit more rare & ambitious in the indie FPS space currently. If you like the recent System Shock remake, Dead Space & Resident Evil, & you like Doom 3 but wouldn't have minded a bit less linear levels with save rooms that you loop back to and open up shortcuts to as you navigate the dimly lit corridors, well then by all accounts you should love this. (Don't want to oversell the survival horror aspects though, it's mainly save rooms & more complicated looping levels + upgrades for suit & weapons with other systems & pace of idtech4 games) I played a lot of the demo when it was available in the Next Fest, and the Early Access release has seen some really cool improvements in performance and subtle juicy touches to gunplay, enemies & animations that make the moment-to-moment combat loop on top of the exploration all feel pretty fleshed out, where now, in early access so far it feels like 90+% of systems are there or on paper (like in the PDA you can see some upgrade stuff that hasn't yet been implemented into the world but given to the player at the start for now) and most of the rest of the work will probably be making levels, fleshing out some story fluff, maybe if resources, time permits, scripting some stuff, and maybe some minor polishing up (a handful of rooms could use a tiny bit more decoration, but like 1 out of 100 rooms you'll visit, you'll only notice it because of how rare it is and it stands out to the otherwise detailed environments) What I've played of it so far, has been rock solid every moment. Atmosphere is on point, if you loved the atmosphere in idtech4 games (Alien Isolation too, also heavy Black Mesa/HL influences) then this should feel almost just as great, as you have those submarine esque cramped dimly lit corridors with flickering dynamic fluorescent lights & dark shadows cast across the scenery of a facility on a harsh alien planet now fallen into chaos with bodies littering the corridors, machinery breaking and sparking everywhere, and the accompanying soundscape complements it with moody ambient tracks & the sound of machinery, vents, pipes, humming & hissing as you crawl through it all. Also the devs understand proper pacing, not filling every room and corridor with enemies, but making sure you have a good amount of quiet tense exploration as you can't predict when you'll run into your next encounter. The save rooms add a lot to exploration and tickle a good part of the metroidvania brain in me, where finding them, opening up shortcuts to them and other areas becomes a vital part of navigation and rewarding your travels, on top of loot and upgrades you might find. I do kind of feel that maybe the game could use a map? I wasn't really lost but a part of me says it's only fitting for the mechanics and feel, that & a flashlight, though it hasn't been essential either. At least infinite ammo pistol muzzleflash can help light the way in the darker areas. Enemy AI seems pretty robust from what I've experienced, I know it might seem like it should be the bare minimum, but when bigger budget teams like Nightdive mess up AI & combat feedback in System Shock, it's worth pointing out these 4 devs also working with UE4 making AI that doesn't run into walls but takes cover, opens fire only when they have line-of sight of you, spread out, can navigate to the player, & have sensible fields of view. They might be a bit too inaccurate at the moment, but I'm sure that is only early game enemies & also normal difficulty, harder difficulty & later enemies no doubt can hit you more reliably. If not then that's still a much easier fix than if something was more fundamentally broken. Combat feedback is solid & tickles all my right spots in my lizard brain, weapons move on the screen in a satisfying fashion as you shoot & move, the animated recoil does a lot of heavy lifting to make a weapon feel powerful alongside sounds & effects, there's also really surprisingly decent enemy hit stun reaction animations now, they stop dead in their tracks on occasion from being hit & you can really get a sense of the punch of a bullet, on top of all the gore & dismemberment. As you're exchanging fire with enemies across dimly lit corridors the muzzleflashes satisfyingly light up the areas and sparks fly from missed shots and enemies stumble from hits, it's all the essentials to make shooting feel pretty much on par with AAA games even, to some degree even better than in Doom 3. Your starting pistol is really solid, doing the Quake 2-4-Doom 2016 thing where it's a fallback pistol with infinite ammo, it has some nice electrocution effects & stun animations on enemies, with a powerful slow charged shot that can chain zap multiple enemies in close proximity, exploding their heads. SMG is heavily inspired by the Doom 3 SMG, doesn't really feel inferior to it at all, does decent damage with nice animations and reloads. Shotgun too is really powerful, causing massive pain states if it isn't an instant kill at point blank on most normal enemies, a bit more usable at range than the obvious comparison. Very classic grenade launcher with a good mine alternative fire for baiting enemies. Minigun mining laser for ripping & tearing. I know there are more in the game from the demo and videos, energy weapons and all kinds of fun scifi stuff. Performance is really solid, haven't seen a single dip so far from my locked 60fps with settings at very high (there's ultra, but I don't think ultra probably adds much more if it's at all like UE4 "cinematic"/4 setting which usually just ups shadow resolution and some other minor things to be really expensive, very high seems to correspond to the typical "epic"/3 setting in UE4), haven't ran into usual UE4 bugs either in settings resetting, & you might be able to tweak stuff further in the engine ini, maybe enable TAAU gen 4/TSR if you need to squeeze more performance. (laptop, win11, i5-11400H, 16GBRAM, 3050RTX 4GBVRAM) The look of the game nails the idtech4 engine vibes where it deserves special mention for managing to relatively successfully escape looking like an Unreal Engine 4 game, where shading, particles, shadowing, all have so many modifications that it looks like a game plucked from the era of FEAR, Chronicles of Riddick & Quake 4 instead of from stock UE4 shaders, particles & post processing, that's a compliment, I kind of feel many graphical things were almost preferable back in 2003-6. (Screen space reflections get a bit too aggressive though in e1m6 and parts of e1m5, you'll see a lot of SSR artifacting there, and UE4 ambient lighting can at times be strongish) It might not have the budget of Nightdive & id to pump in a lot of money for fancy scripting & voice acting for audiologs, but it's got the heart, effort & also competence (yes that's a cheeky dig at System Shock, which I still loved despite the flaws) to make a really solid fun survival/action horror shooter that has a lot of potential to grow over early access. If you're at all on the fence, support small indies, the price isn't bad if you understand the scope/ambition at play here, not just being another retro FPS clone, but making a hybrid survival horror/mid 2000's shooter. BTW, Episode 1 in EA is rather long, complex levels that can last you hours, For me all 7 missions lasted 9hours, yours might be 6-8.
• Radu Ionescu

  Aug 20, 2023

  Fantastic atmosphere, level design, resource management and combat, which is based a lot on placement, visibility, keeping distance and general clever use of the environment, this is the part where it mostly resembles Doom 3. It seems that the game is obscure at the moment, I hope that changes soon, it's unfair that mediocre products like Boltgun get the spotlight instead.
• gamedeal user

  Aug 20, 2023

  This game is trying to be Doom 3:2 and so far it's succeeding. Dark base on a hostile planet, angry enemies and good feeling guns. While I am not done with episode 1 yet, I am guessing I'll be at about hour 3 when I'm done, and for 25$ that could be a deal breaker. However if you enjoy slower combat and criss crossy level design, please support the devs and give it a shot.
• gamedeal user

  Aug 21, 2023

  Overall an interesting take on Doom 3 with some Dead Space and other horror games thrown in. I'm enjoying it so far and looking forward to seeing what the devs do next!
• Dalewren

  Aug 21, 2023

  I feel like I have been wanting to play a game like this for 15 years without realising it. I dont normally like saying game is like x since its generally pretty reductive, but there is a strong vibe that depending on the moment reminds me of things like Doom 3, or Deadspace if it was first person, amongst other things, in the best way possible. The atmosphere is really on point, it has decent pacing for both the gameplay and difficulty. The level design is done really well. Complex enough to feel fun exploring, but not so complex that it feels overwhelming. Very importantly, it feels like a real place. As in it makes sense, it doesnt feel like a level made for a video game it feels like a place that has a purpose that happens to be in a video game, if that makes sense. Obviouly the game inst perfect, nothing is, there are some minor issues with the feeling of some of the guns. Namely the SMG, I dont know if its a sound thing, or projectile velocity, but this really is a nit pick, it is also something you get used to. TLDR; Game good, go buy game, me like very much.
• Ineptus Astartes

  Aug 22, 2023

  If you enjoy slower paced atmospheric shooters along the likes of Doom 3/Quake 4 then you owe it to yourself to get hold of Retchid.
• BobsRevenge

  Aug 22, 2023

  This is a great retro-shooter aiming to recreate the early 2000s era of fps gameplay. For a three-person team, this is mighty impressive, and you get a good bang for your buck already even at the $25 price point. The graphics are brilliantly executed - it feels like an Id Tech 4 game but has the visual punch more like the recent System Shock remake. The gameplay does still feel a bit unpolished, so you could say it has a little bit of that looseness of early 2000s eurojank FPS games as well, which imo isn't a bad thing. The weapons could feel more punchy, but the enemies react well to being hit. I especially love the electrocution deaths. I do wish the AI was more dynamic, but they act like Doom 3 AI generally, so it's appropriate as it is too. It does have that slow buildup of Doom 3 though, so you won't be getting too intense until a couple hours in. There is a good amount of exploration and problem solving to do with minimal handholding, which is generally good but could use some work to improve a bit. For instance, locations are very well labeled, but objective descriptions don't include those labels when they could. Sometimes the backtracking needed for some objectives led to confusion because you really weren't sure you should be backtracking at all. This isn't just a Doom 3 copy though, and it has its own identity despite the clear inspiration. The progression is almost like Dead Space meets Dark Souls in how things loop up down and around and how the save rooms fit into that. For fans of those early-to-mid 2000s shooters looking for a game to relive that era with, this is what you're looking for. It's the first game that really scratches that Doom 3 itch I've seen come out.
• gamedeal user

  Aug 23, 2023

  It's OK so far. Like others have said, it has a Doom 3 vibe. Although It doesn't quite capture the gloominess and dread that Doom 3 exuded, some of the graphics do look similar. The enemy AI is not too smart right now and either they can't shoot straight from a distance or the spread of the gun makes them miss. This is making the game quite easy, unless you get mobbed close up. Perhaps it gets tougher further on though. The levels so far, do look quite samey and I've got lost a few times. A map would be a bonus and adding more interactivity in places would be nice, as some rooms feel quite lifeless but I understand it's early access, so a lot can change . I'll update once finished.
• Mr. The Jew

  Aug 23, 2023

  Finally, after all these years... I've lived long enough to see a damn good Doom 3-like.
• Brendan

  Aug 24, 2023

  Heavily inspired by Doom 3. Great level design with shortcuts and looping back into areas you've already been to. Limited saving access via the rec centers vs quicksaving is awesome. Game has some survival horror vibes but moreso resembles Quake4 (in terms of arsenal) and Doom 3(in terms of visual language, mechanics, and overall vibe). Support indie devs!