RecommendedSteam player
There are a fair number of horror games out there. Many of them, to be candid, are fairly bad if not downright awful. The issue being that a lot of the time games in this genre seem to want to follow a set list. There is somewhat a rigid rulebook on how horror games are meant to be, but these rules aren’t supposed to be one hundred percent abided by. Developers can and should, for the most part, make up the rules and experiment as much as they want. At the end of the day I find that it’s the somewhat unique games that capture people’s attention. Now I’m not saying Detention is unique, I mean let’s face it what is unique nowadays? However it does like to throw in its own little rulebook. The summary of the plot is; you start off the game as a male student named Wei who falls asleep in class. Hours later he wakes up alone in a dark and obviously quite spooky school. After sometime exploring he comes across a girl sitting asleep on the school stage. He wakes her up and things start really kicking off. A lot of weird stuff starts happening around the school and creatures called Lingered start appearing. These seem to be undead students and teachers and are the first enemies you come across. They’re slow creatures which, like the rest of the enemies in the game, seem to have a hunger for anything that breathes. Luckily there’s a useful mechanic that can help with that. By clicking the right mouse button, or whichever button it’s been mapped to, Wei or Ray will hold their breath. This allows for you to scamper on past the Lingered without them attacking, however you will have to catch your breath if you hold for too long. Detention plays out as a point and click horror game where you will need to solve puzzles in order to progress. Some of the puzzles can be fairly straight forward, for example using an umbrella to fetch a key from a ventilation shaft. But others require a bit of thought to them. One example was where I had to look at three clock faces. Two had hands and the one in the middle didn’t. There was then three pictures, each with a bloody symbol on them. These symbols represented the clock hands and once I’d adjusted the clocks to the correct times the door that was previously locked opened. Some puzzles do require certain items to complete them. These items aren’t too difficult to come across, you just need to be a little bit observant. The puzzles themselves don’t feel too tedious or pointless. There’s always a valid reason to complete them and most of the time it’s to move the story forward. Graphics wise I’d say detention has an unusual but very well done art style. It’s clear the artist took a lot of time to add in as much detail as possible to give the game a sense of reality. Each area is well drawn, with clear distinctions from the odd dark world, with it’s grainy overly, to the creepy school at night. The characters and enemies are defined too. With Wei and Ray wearing very white school uniforms and the enemies seemingly very dark and shadowy. In conclusion I think Detention is a horror game that tries to break the mold of the genres standards. But does it? Yes and no. There are a few things that really shine for me in Detention. The story is pretty complex but welcome, as I know of many horror games that have little to no story at all. Also I like the various stealth mechanics that are introduced for the number of enemies you have to face. It does throw in the odd jumpscare here and there, but I mean what horror games doesn’t. It’s got puzzles of varying difficulties and an eerie soundtrack that fits the game’s quite chilling atmosphere. All in all if you love horror games and want something a little different than the norm then I’d suggest giving Detention a go. And even if you don’t want it for the horror aspect, it’s full of puzzles to test your wits too. Good Day!Show moreShow less
1.4 hours at review640 people found this helpful