Developed by Invader Studios, Daymare 1994 Sandcastle is the prequel to Daymare: 1998. Daymare: 1998 started life as a fan remake of Resident Evil 2 before developing into its own videogame universe. The developers set out to create a homage to the survival horror games of the era that they loved and now they’re back with a prequel that takes you into the depths of Area 51, an incident hinted at in the first game.
As H.A.D.E.S. operative, Reyes, you’re sent on a covert mission disguised as a rescue operation into the iconic and mysterious depths of the military base known as Area 51. It isn’t long before things go spectacularly wrong and you’re fighting for your life across one of the world’s most secretive military installations. What happened to the people that were there? Why is everyone trying to kill you? What are the things attacking you? And, most importantly, how do you make it out alive?
Daymare 1994 Sandcastle is the video game equivalent of an interactive, pulpy B-Grade movie. Its story plays out like a low budget SF horror from the 90’s, full of the requisite twists and turns, betrayals and oodles of ham-fisted, inconsistent dialogue. There are boneheaded decisions, industrial sets and plenty of gory creature horror to fill up your Saturday night. And it’s all quite fun. There may be a few too many F-bombs rolling around in the dialogue, but it’s all so cheesy that you can’t not enjoy it.
One area that Daymare 1994 Sandcastle succeeds in amazingly is its atmosphere. Between all the darkened hallways and corpse littered rooms, Daymare 1994 Sandcastle manages to create an unnerving atmosphere. The tension, as you continue deeper into the complex, is nearly palpable, filled with dread at what may be just around the next corner. It’s Daymare 1994 Sandcastle’s most stunning achievement, even when the gameplay stumbles.
Despite some shiny, new technology and camera perspective, Daymare 1994 Sandcastle is a throwback to survival horror games of yesteryear. Resident Evil’s DNA is very clearly woven into its fabric, but it also hints at other titles that came out during the same era. While most of the survival horror genre has made strides forward, Daymare, in its desire to pay tribute to the classics, has gone backwards. The tropes of the genre are all in play. Limited ammo, limited health, meagre inventory space, save points, light puzzling and enemies that are faster than you.
Most of it works quite well. Puzzles won’t be stopping you from making progress, in fact most of them are quite simple, whether you’re hacking doors and cupboards or trying to restart an elevator. It keeps the forward momentum going at a brisk pace especially since you’re rarely in need of running back and forth picking up items you may need to solve a puzzle or unlock a door. Even the limited inventory space rarely causes any issue.
The games linear design, with some small moments of backtracking or unlocking a short cut, keeps the games pace moving at a good clip. Scattered across the environment, along with plenty of dismembered body parts, are notes to read that fill in the backstory of what happened in the complex. It’s at these moments of exploration that Daymare 1994 Sandcastle is at its strongest.
Combat, unfortunately, is where Daymare 1994 Sandcastle falls down. You’ve got access to three weapons; a shotgun, a sub-machine gun and a Frost Grip, which is both used for fighting by freezing enemies and to solve puzzles. The shotgun is the best weapon of the bunch but ammo is incredibly scarce. Combat is a mixture of freezing enemies and then shattering them. In theory it makes for tactical play, but the execution is completely woeful due to how incredibly slow the protagonist is, how fast the enemies are and how limited your view is when aiming.
Swopping between weapons or even to use your frost grip is incredibly cumbersome and slow and by the time you can shoot out even a decent stream of ice, they’ll be on top of you. Getting caught by an enemy triggers a QTE, but they do massive damage before releasing you. Enemy placement is also an issue as they can be put in blind sections right around corners and the developers love spawning them in behind you. It’s difficult to deal with one enemy, let alone three, especially when one of those has grabbed you from behind.
Enemies can also teleport, which adds another layer of frustration as the ones that teleport also come with one hit kills and it’s not uncommon to be taking down one enemy only to have that teleporter pop-in behind you and one shot you.
You’re also slow in general movement. When something is trying to tear your head off your shoulders, you shouldn’t be running like you’re taking a Sunday jog after a visit to the proctologist. To be fair, this is a criticism that can be levelled at many games, especially in the horror genre, but I’ve always found it incredibly silly when highly trained agents get winded after twenty seconds. As such, Daymare 1994 Sandcastle becomes a case of live, die and repeat perhaps a few too many times through what is simply bad design.
There are other niggles, such as why ammo and weapons are so scarce when there’s so many weapons laying around and why, even with all the first-aid boxes on walls you can only pick up ones from the ground. You’d think on-site procurement in this kind of situation would be a necessity, especially with all the military grade hardware laying around. Small logic inconsistencies abound. It may add to that B-movie feel, but I’d be lying if, during combat encounters, that it didn’t occur to me a couple of times.
Visually Daymare 1994 Sandcastle is a mixed bag. Despite some low resolution textures and pop-in, the games environment design is quite stunning. The use of lighting, coupled with great screen space reflections makes for some great visuals. Character models and cinematics fare less well though as the character models, especially in cut scenes, look like a cross-between Thunderbirds and Team America, replete with strange facial expressions and lip-synching that doesn’t always match. That said, I found it added to the games charm more than detracted from it.
I wanted to love Daymare 1994 Sandcastle more than I do. There’s some great B-grade stuff here coupled with great environmental visuals but the poorly designed combat system and enemy placement sucks the joy out of each encounter. Daymare 1994 Sandcastle is a vast improvement over its predecessor, and if Invader Studios can improve on the formula and fix the issues, then I’d be highly inclined to visit the Daymare universe in future instalments.
Daymare 1994 Sandcastle Trailer
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