Red Limb
Studio
I
do like a bit of horror, in all its guises, so am always interested in a
game that promotes itself with that tag. Which is how I came to be
playing this.
The Red Limb website describes the game thus:
"As a doctor of psychology you will explore the darkest recesses
of the human mind. Overcome your fear to find the truth behind the
tragedy that has befallen your family in this disturbing game experience
inspired by the greatest psychological horror movies".
I have to say that I didn't find it disturbing, but it did provide a
few jump scares, and a creepy moment or two. The soundtrack helped, as
did the distorting visuals that pepper your exploration. And the mind is
a strange place, especially the one you are interested in.
The puzzling is best described as mild. There are minimal out and out
puzzles, and a few more inventory based ones. Having the inventory item
will be enough, and the puzzles are not at all difficult. You may have
to search a bit, even backtrack, for an item or a clue, but not to any
great extent, and I doubt the puzzling will hold up anyone for more than
a few moments. That is reflected in the playtime, which clocked in at
under two hours.
Unravelling the plot occurs as you go. You find notes, clippings and
audio recordings. Flashbacks (or are they visions) reveal more.
Everything may or may not be as it seems. I probably enjoyed the story
the most, but anything more you can find out for yourself.
You can die, although I didn't realise that is what had happened. I
assumed I had just wandered into a bit of the mind/dream world that was
pushing back. However a Steam achievement said I got murdered five
times, so I must have been. It didn't matter, you just end up back
before the key moment.
I didn't get the Steam achievement for finding all the ducks. I did
get the achievement for finding all of Teddy's drawings. The first
seemed like a treasure hunt that added nothing, whereas the drawings
added a little something. Or at least I thought so.
It looks good, in a spartan sought of way, and there are a number of
interesting details. Look out for the health warning posters late in the
game; defeating the Axis powers is a doozy.
You play with the WASD keys but like many games you can steer with
the mouse so the ASD keys are largely redundant. You point and click to
interact with the world. Hotspots show up as a tear drop icon when close
enough, and then the mouse is used to engage. It autosaves as you go,
and near as I can tell always picked up where I left off.
Rise of Insanity was a modest, enjoyable outing.
I played on:
OS: Windows 10, 64 Bit
Processor: Intel i7-6700 4GHz
