izigame.me

My Initial Impressions of the Game
I would like to briefly address the inconsistencies that came with the release of the game:
The game cost €28.99 as a preorder in my country. The moment the game was released, the price suddenly increased to €38.99. This was not communicated, and the developers have not commented on it yet. I was lucky enough to buy the game 4 hours before release and thought, "Okay, if it's bad, I'll just refund it." I'm glad I got it at the cheaper price, but I can understand the frustration of other users who wanted to wait for reviews before purchasing.
The game is only part 1 of 2. This means the story is unfinished. This, too, was not communicated. Also, as far as I know, the campaign is supposed to be only about 6-8 hours long. When considering the new price of €38.99, it's quite a lot of money for less content than expected and announced.
So, the developers have already made a misstep with these two points... still, I want to review the game itself, not the circumstances surrounding its development and release:
Quest 3 and Virtual Desktop / Airlink
I have now played for about 1.5 to 2 hours on my Quest 3. At first, I used Virtual Desktop, but the performance with VD was quite poor on my RTX 4080 with ultra settings and 1.2x resolution. Also, I couldn't open the in-game menu using the Oculus Touch controller's system button. The developers have apparently announced that VD is not supported (a negative point, as VD is a key tool for many headsets to stream PCVR). I then switched to Airlink and used the Oculus Runtime. With this setup, the menu buttons worked again, and the performance was much better.
Graphics
The graphics are quite impressive. The textures are a bit lacking in detail, but the fog and shadow effects are great. The assets fit perfectly with the Alien franchise. It brings to mind Aliens, which is a good thing.
Sound
The sound effects are actually excellent. Typical Alien sounds, tense nerve-wracking sirens, beeping, pipe sounds, etc. The motion tracker beeps, metal creaks, you hear footsteps, and the Pulse Rifle sounds absolutely awesome.
Gameplay and Controls
This is a typical VR horror shooter. Most actions need to be done manually: pulling levers to open doors, climbing ladders, changing magazines and bullets, solving small circuit puzzles, etc. Many objects lying around can be picked up, examined, or thrown away: crumpled paper, cans, photos, tools, helmets, etc. The interactivity with the environment is there.
The hands and arms feel a bit sluggish, like in Skydance's Behemoth, but this gives a nice feeling of weight.
The weapon handling is good, but I would recommend turning off the weapon attachment to the shoulder. It’s annoying, but fortunately, it can be disabled in the settings.
Otherwise, the controls are typical for VR. The hands interact with the environment, just like in Half-Life Alyx. I find this very immersive, but it occasionally leads to glitches when the hands get stuck.
I also want to highlight the interaction with terminals. You control them with a joystick, and it’s very well implemented and fun.
Bugs and Glitches
Occasionally occur, mainly glitches, but I haven't encountered any game-breaking bugs so far.
Conclusion
If I were to rate the behavior of the developers, I would give them a thumbs down, as they’ve done a few things that aren't ideal. However, I am reviewing the game itself, and it’s been very good so far. The price of nearly €40 for the relatively small amount of content is a bit much now. €28.99 would have been more appropriate. I would recommend waiting for a sale or buying it at a discount from a key store – the developers haven’t been nice to us either. :)
That said, the game itself deserves a thumbs up. It’s fun and captures the Alien feeling well. Definitely a must have for Alien fans.