Dreamcore Xbox Series X Review 7/10 "Feeling….Lonely?" 😶‍🌫️ @DreamcoreGame @TlonIndustries #IndieGame #GameDev

Dreamcore is a very unique experience as a game, with it’s use of liminal spaces and an incredible sense of isolation in its quietly nightmare-ish locations. The use of life-like body-cam style visuals and crisp graphics heighten the sense of agency, but the design and gameplay itself can very much oscillate between irritation and boredom dependent on your personal standing with the unspoken horror of isolation and liminal places. For some, this will be an intense experience whilst others may see Dreamcore as an interesting piece of art that has a novelty factor that wears off relatively quickly.Presented in an FPS style, Dreamcore opens by presenting you with two maps (more are coming soon), Dreampools and Eternal Suburbia, each of which will take several hours to complete. Dreampools begins with your unseen character (although the camera doesn’t show your feet, and there are no reflective surfaces in the game, which does create an incredible sense of presence, as opposed to just feeling like a floating camera) standing in front of a door that requires a flash-light to enter - and so begins your journey as you weave your way through literally hundreds of (mostly) silent corridors, indoor expanses, and Escher-like spaces. With little audio but the whoosh of the wind against your body-cam microphone – a great little touch – you explore and try to find your way through this labyrinthine puzzle, and I implore you to turn auto-run on, as you will be doing a lot of walking.

For a while, I was quite blown away by the presentation and design, the echoing footsteps and discovery of seemingly infinite areas, each unique in design is quite overwhelming and intriguing, but the sheer scale of them is almost in itself quite divisive. After a while – and an interesting conversation with my partner that was directly caused by the game – my interest dipped as it dawned on me that I was essentially playing an extremely complex maze game with a sole focus. It’s this factor that I think will be an issue for some, but be extremely inviting to others. It’s a setup that invites conversation, and will appeal to streamers, but as a solo experience, it entirely relies on how comfortable – or uncomfortable – liminal spaces make you feel, and your level of interest in them.

SUMMARY
Dreamcore is a very unique and memorable game, but I can’t say that it resonated with me personally. An interesting experience that I can imagine will connect with some folks, but in the long-term,, it feels it needs a little more going on to truly capture the imagination and unlock the true level of horror and discomfort that can be taken from this quite exciting sub-genre.

7/10

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