Out of Sight Review

Horror is one of the genres that has benefited the most from the rise of indie gaming. While bigger, risk-averse developers have largely played it safe or stayed away from the genre entirely, indie devs have been producing some of the most creative horror experiences the industry has seen. Out of Sight, a new horror game developed by The Gang and published by Starbreeze Entertainment, is yet another fascinating indie horror project with a clever core idea that helps it stand out. There is a lot to like about Out of Sight, but the problem is it's too short and doesn't take full advantage of its concept.

Out of Sight is the harrowing tale of Sophie, a blind girl who has been kidnapped and taken to a creepy, haunted mansion. Through some kind of magic, Sophie is suddenly able to see through the eyes of her teddy bear, and she uses this newfound ability to try making her escape. This set-up essentially makes Out of Sight a second-person game, with the developers finding some genius uses for the gimmick throughout the title's brief runtime.

Sophie is able to carry her teddy bear around, but the rooms of the mansion are filled with puzzles and obstacles that often require both of her hands. In these situations, Sophie has to find a place to put her teddy bear down. Vision is limited to whatever the teddy bear can see from his current location, which creates a unique challenge for puzzles.

Out of Sight's puzzles tend to be the "push and pull" variety. For example, there may be a lever that players need to pull to open a door and continue to the next room, but it's out of Sophie's reach. Players then need to find something to drag over to help Sophie reach the lever and ultimately escape. Puzzles in the game become increasingly complicated as it goes on, and there are a few rooms that provide a challenge, but I felt most of them were a little too easy. I appreciated how the second-person gimmick was utilized in a handful of them, but most of the puzzles are straightforward and uninspired.

Out of Sight Stealth Sections Are Intense

Out of Sight is primarily a puzzle game, but there are also stealth elements sprinkled throughout. It doesn't take long for Sophie's captors to discover that she's on the run, and so they stalk her throughout the house. Out of Sight's stealth isn't as overbearing as it can be in other horror games, and in fact, these moments are the highlight of the experience. Out of Sight does a good job of building tension, so the stealth sequences are often scary and effective. What's even scarier are the chase sequences, which have a twist to them that I don't want to spoil here.

Avoiding Out of Sight's kidnappers and solving simple puzzles is all there is to the gameplay, but the game is elevated by its presentation. Instead of going for grim and grimey graphics, Out of Sight's visuals are more akin to an animated kids movie. This, combined with its creepy soundtrack and the taunting threats from the antagonists, give the game an almost Monster House vibe. It also calls to mind Little Nightmares' art style, minus the grislier elements. It's the kind of horror game that can be safely enjoyed by those that typically can't handle these types of games, while still creating an eerie-enough atmosphere to be satisfying for horror fans.

Out of Sight does a lot of things right, but it stumbles in a couple of key areas. Unfortunately, Out of Sight has some bugs that seriously derail the game. In some instances, Sophie became trapped between objects and forced a checkpoint restart. In another, Sophie simply wouldn't grab an object that I knew I needed to interact with to continue, but even a checkpoint restart wasn't enough to resolve the problem.

Out of Sight is Over Before It Really Gets Going

If Out of Sight wasn't so short, losing these chunks of progress would be far more annoying, though that also leads to the game's other big issue. Out of Sight can easily be completed in less than 3 hours, and once it's done, there is little reason to replay beyond going for its achievements and trophies. There are some collectibles strewn about the levels as well, but they aren't interesting and don't add anything to the experience.

I beat Out of Sight in about 2 hours and 45 minutes, but that was with going out of my way to look for collectibles.

Out of Sight's extremely short runtime keeps it from reaching its full potential. The second-person gimmick is used to great effect, but there isn't enough time to fully explore its possibilities. There are certainly great moments in Out of Sight, and it would be a perfect entry point for someone that has typically shied away from the horror genre, but it desperately needs more meat on its bones to be elevated to something that genre fans must go out of their way to play.

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