If you were forced to be in a room locked in with at the time appears to be no escape, would your mind rumble with fear or would it have the determination to allow you to use whatever you could find and try to get out? Imagine surrounded by four walls that seem to have a life of its own or maybe the life you start to fear is in the room with you the whole time. But does Developer SKONEC bring something new or will you be left wondering how to escape? Let’s find out with The Door for the PlayStation VR.
The Door is about a person named Dr. Jacob that loves his wife Julia and loves his daughter Amy. He is also one that his work is a big priority in his life. He had everything, the life, the family, the work…he was living the dream. But then as in life, the dramatic fork in the road hits, Amy is diagnosed with this disease. So what does any father do who is a Doctor who’s main focus was genetics do? You focus everything to find the cure to save your daughter, but at what costs?
When Dr. Jacob wakes up from whatever happened, this is where the immersion starts. Being in this room almost feels like what a jail cell would feel like and at first glimpse, you see no way out and thus you must investigate the room and find whatever you can to help you solve the puzzles that will allow you to escape.
One thing that I thought was different was when you can combine certain items together. This makes it really handy when you need to get something off a higher shelf or maybe when you need to break open a block of ice. The first room was detailed and what appears to be bloody tendons holding the door closed and the room felt dirty was both were a nice touch.
But with The Door, you will need some composure as you try to figure out the puzzles. Not all are too difficult, but there are somewhere the answers are right there waiting for you to discover them only to get the feeling that the life that is in whatever place you are stuck in is laughing at you as you missed one or two details before you are able to solve the next puzzle. So keep this in mind, anything you examine and pick up with the DualShock 4 controller, rotate it in every possible way as the answer may have been within your fingers grasp the whole time. But if you can have a balance of determination and patience, the answers will be solved…eventually.
The Door not only allows you to be the pawn in its game and decides that thinking about trying to escape and challenges of trying to solve the puzzles will not be enough…oh, no…that would be too easy. What it does is also throw some jump scares at you while telling a story. This way when you think you have a puzzle solved you turn one way and well, I will just let you experience it for yourself.
And let’s talk about the puzzles shall we. They are some of the best and discouraging thought out puzzles. There will be times when no matter what you try will not work only to need to unscrew a light bulb to keep on progressing. So do not give up and don’t cheat yourself out of the satisfaction of solving the puzzles yourself…you will thank yourself later on.
Sound-wise fits with the atmosphere. Creepy groans, screams, the sounds of metal on puzzles are all here. The voice acting is fine as it’s not over the top and it doesn’t need to. Hearing Doctor Jacob and his determination of trying to find the cure for his daughter works. Now add that with a detailed immersive environment along with the month of October and you are going to have some fun. Also, you don’t have to play in VR, but The Door screams to be played in Virtual Reality. In fact, it welcomes you into its escape room of Virtual Reality immersion.
Being in Virtual Reality the key is immersion and The Door does not disappoint. It adds the jump scares where it needs to while not trying to overdo it at other times all while trying to balance itself and that is something I can appreciate. Sometimes we escape our reality and sometimes the virtual escape only entraps us to try harder than we would normally try and do and couldn’t we all try a little harder at everything we do?
The Door is out now on PlayStation VR. A review code was provided.
To learn more about SKONEC please visit their site, like them on Facebook, follow them on Instagram, and subscribe to their YouTube channel.
In case you missed the trailer, please enjoy. Until next time, I feel I need to escape a little more.
Mr. PSVR, October 3, 2018, theplaystationbrahs.com
