Golden Light
Review
Welcome to the Meat Zone
by Samuel Corey
reviewed on PC
Welcome to the Meat Zone
It is impossible to understate how weird Golden Light is. It's a game where you play an alcoholic writer descending into the depths/heights (I am genuinely confused about whether I was going up or down most of the time) of a mysterious, sentient dungeon called The Gut which serves as both the game's primary setting as well as its primary antagonist. The gut is populated by all manner of grotesque monstrosities that resemble the most disturbing monsters of a PSX game as recalled during an acid flashback. The story, what there is of it, is told in fragmented flashbacks that could just as easily be delusions as they could be genuine memories of the protagonist.
Indeed, the only standard thing about Golden Light might be its initial plot hook. The player character's girlfriend, identified only as “She” has been kidnapped, and it's up to you to rescue her. It's the same old rescue the princess plot that games have been using since Super Mario Brothers. Sure, it's a little odd that this rescue involves recovering each individual piece of her desiccated body, but it's still recognizable nonetheless. Making the player's motivation such a familiar trope helps to ground the player and at least give them a goal to work towards even if they are utterly bewildered by the rest of the game's events and locations. If the player character's motivation was as incomprehensible as the rest of this world I doubt that anyone could get anywhere.
Nothing Makes Any Sense
The first impression you'll get upon diving into The Gut is one of complete bewilderment. You'll take damage from traps that you assumed were just normal patches of floor and walls (well as normal as anything gets in this game). Items that you first assume are just scenery will suddenly spring to life, transform into twisted abominations, and start attacking you. Your weapons will sometimes inflict contradictory status effects, like a knife that causes people stabbed by it to regain health. The consumable items you pick up are an assortment of strange and grotesque items that give no visual indication as to their nature. All items can be consumed or thrown as a projectile, but you'll often have no idea of knowing what they do until you try to use them. So, you'd better hope that the snail's eyeball you just ate doesn't turn out to be a grenade. None of the game's systems beyond basic movement and combat are clearly tutorialized. You will have to work everything on the fly as you make your way through the various biomes of The Gut.
Although this sounds like a complaint, it's actually the farthest thing from it. Indeed, this pervasive feeling of confusion and disorientation is one of the game's strongest aspects. This is a surreal horror game, and the feeling of constant confusion only adds to the overall atmosphere of unease and dread. Genuinely not knowing what is and is not a threat or what your items will do makes for some tense situations, especially at the start when you're still trying to figure out the rules of this insane place.
It also helps that though most of the mechanics are deliberately confusing the core gameplay loop is quite straightforward. You traverse each floor of the gut and locate the keys that will unlock the next floor of the gut until you can recover one of She's missing body parts. Just as the straightforward plot helps ease the confusion of the story, the straightforward goal eases the confusion of the gameplay.
Though, I would have preferred if the game's hub-world where you access the different layers of the gut was a bit more intuitive. After completing a level I had to wander around the hub for a few minutes looking for the entrance to the next section. The hub lacks the moment-to-moment intensity of navigating the gut, so here the confusion just makes things tedious.
Shortcomings and Minor Gripes
Although Golden Light does a lot of things right in its overall execution, there are still quite a few things that bother me. Some of the game's attempts at creating an atmosphere of surreal dread fall short of the mark. The worst was when I found a level where a distorted audio clip from Night of the Living Dead played on repeat. The effect was less disturbing and more annoying. Sure, when I heard it the first time it was unsettling. When I had listened to it for five minutes straight though I wanted to put a foot through my computer monitor. To make matter worse this was a level where it took me longer than usual to find the keys to the next stage.
A more pervasive issue is the fact that while each biome of the gut has a distinct look and feel, they are all composed primarily of darkened corridors, and have a bad habit of blending together. Each stage may have unique threats and decorations but they are all laid out in a way that is practically interchangeable thanks to the procedurally generated levels. A greater variation of layouts (having some cavernous chambers as well as the usual narrow corridors) would have made the levels more compelling.
Still, these complaints are relatively tame, especially given how striking Golden Light is otherwise. I doubt that it will be most people's cup of tea but for those out there that crave some disturbing, surreal horror, Golden Light is well worth its modest price.
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8.2
fun score
Pros
Nightmarish atmosphere and visuals. Lack of explanation, exposition, and tutorials makes for some great tension. Gorgeous lo-fi monstrosities.
Cons
Level design is repetitive. Can be hard to know where to go or what to do next. Some surreal elements are more annoying than unsettling. Might be too weird... Even for me.
