Game itself is fun as long as you don't mind some repetition. Your job is to exorcise one of your fellow friends and cult members possessed by the demon Azazel, because they thought that playing with the devil is a good idea. Now you have to clean up the mess, and survive while doing it. Sounds simple on paper, but in practice is not as simple.
This game can be pretty challenging especially when you are the only one taking the role of an exorcist. It requires quick reaction time, strategy and knowledge about Azazel's pathing, item spawns, key spawns etc. to have a chance at winning and sending the demon back to hell. Time management is also important, so scavenging items like gas can's or bottles with bleach(?) is a really good idea, but it's not a necessity. You can do a full RNG run and win. Whatever float's your boat.
Every map has a specific sacrifice that has to be made to complete the ritual. With every burned egg or dumped pig Azazel enters the hunting mode and will try to hunt you down to prevent you from banishing him. And every sacrifice makes them even more aggressive, faster and more resilient to the UV Light - the only "weapon" that you can defend yourself with, so you need to stagger the demon more to calm them down.
Time to mention the good and the bad aspects of the game:
THE GOOD:
- Variety of skin's: It's a small plus and it costs money, but i like the abillity to customise you'r characters look as well as the look of the UV, instead of just generic robes. BUT...
...youll get certain robes as a gift for completing various "challenges". You can make a collection and they are free so you can still pick something else for your characters without opening your wallet.
- Game is unpredictable: Anything can happen. Of course you have to gather specific items every time you're playing the map, but you will never know when a good run will go to hell in matter of seconds. It's a good mix - you have moment's of peace and repetition just to get slapped in the face later. Also, if you enjoy being chased in horror games you will probably enjoy the thrill of the chase in this game. Especially in the late game, when the ritual is close to being completed.
- The devs don't treat their game too seriously: It may not be a plus to some, but it is a plus for me. You can buy some silly skins and emojis just to goof around a little bit and have some fun. It can be a good way of bonding with others without taking away the fearful aspects of the game. It's a party game after all.
- The creativity of the devs: Every possessed has their own "aesthetics" if i can call it like that, which fit their specific map as well as their background. Sam is a demonic sheriff patrolling abondoned western town called Mercy, Molly is a demonic patient wandering around Mental Facillity and Nathan is a murderous butcher... who looks like he was skinned alive. Different Azazels, different maps with their specific moods. Theres an attention to detail too.
- Updates and small amount of bugs: Developers are not lazy. They make sure to give us a quality product. However the team is small, so the game itself will be updated less often.
- It's a full fledged game in general. Feels complete and it's ready to be played.
THE BAD:
- Scaling the difficulty to Single Player: It's the biggest weakness of this game. Solo runs can be done - not to brag, but i've managed to complete every map on every difficulty, including the Nightmare mode.
BUT
Since you have to do everything alone, you don't have the same kind of flexibility to explore the whole map without risking something bad happening. Gather items, ritual items, sacrifice, run from Azazel and DON'T DIE. On multi every person can have a specific role and if someone ends up being caught by the possessed they can be revived. The game goes on. On single being caught is a game over. Makes sense, this is the consequence of your failure, however since you don't have a team of 4 people or at least one additional person to help you, this becomes a problem on higher difficulties.
RNG in this game matters. Getting an egg that has to be burned upstairs due to the symbol matching the one on the altar in room 8, in the late game with millions of spiders, webs and with angry Zara running around sucks even on Normal mode. You will most likely drain your UV to kill spiders and get rid of webs and you STILL need to have enough to stun the Spider Lady. If not then you're basically dead, until some miracle happens. On multiplayer you have other people that can protect you or take a hit for you, on solo you have to be constantly on guard, because one, tiny mistake can fuck you over.
And NIGHTMARE difficulty is the best example of that.
In this case game turns from moderately strategic, quick reaction time horror game to luck based Slender The Eight Pages. It's almost pure RNG. Get unlucky with battery spawn, with minion spawn, Azazel's pathing etc. and its over. You have nothing to defend yourself with unless you found and used a battery to get temporary UV that will give you the abillity to stun the demon once, with good timing. On multiplayer it can be solved by taking simply hits, then reviving downed teammates with medkits and leaving the UV for special situations only. This makes it more manageable but it still goes into unnecessarily hard, luck based range. On solo its just luck, because even the best strat in the world won't save you from enraged Molly running right at you while you were trying to find the darn Duracells.
Single player needs a few adjustments. Personally, i would nerf the minions: make them spawn later, make less of them or make them slower, especially the ones on The Town. Ghosts are more dangerous than Sam himself, and hes the main antagonist of this map. Its ridiculous. Maybe more batteries on Nightmare for solo plays or the abillity to pick yourself up once during the run. I think that adding an item like a crucifix which will allow you to free yourself from Azazel's grasp once per run for solo players, to give them a second chance would be pretty nice. Those are of course my suggestions. In my opinion devs should think about making some changes to the Single Player mode, without making it "too easy".
It's a really good and fun game. Despite the big bad that i've mentioned before i still love it as a solo player. I want to see more content in the future and to see it grow. I recommend to buy Devour.