1/5 ★ – sirreldar's review of Scorn.

Like most games, Scorn had some aspects which I enjoyed and some which I did not. Unfortunately, the aspects which I did not particularly like vastly outnumbered the ones I did. Scorn is billed as a “body horror” homage to H. R. Giger, meant to be grotesque and repulsive, contrasted with sexually inspired imagery. In this regard, the game accomplished its goal admirably. Everything in the game was just gross. Even innocuous props like switches, walls, doors, levers, puzzles, and guns were all just slathered with gruesome, organic grossness. Beyond their visual aesthetic, the sound design was spot on. Every squish and squelch, every scrape and clank, all worked wonderfully with the visuals of the game and really built a phenomenal aesthetic that had me wincing and grimacing at every turn. The sexual imagery was subtly woven in (and in many cases, not so subtly) throughout most of the game, making for an overall very uncomfortable contrast that accentuated the horror. I really appreciated the aesthetic and enjoyed simply exploring and taking it all in. Unfortunately, this is where my praise for Scorn ends. Nearly every other aspect of the game was lacking and felt under-developed. The “story” was just a few esoteric cutscenes that felt disjointed from the rest of the game. Absolutely nothing was explained, revealed, or progressed. Things happened without any reason or resolution, ultimately leaving most of the game feeling void of purpose. The combat was frustrating and unexciting; ammo was scarce and weak. Combat never really evolved or progressed beyond finding new guns, which were aesthetically interesting, but otherwise boring. The puzzles were mediocre at best. Some of them were moderately enjoyable, but most felt unoriginal, poorly implemented, or arbitrary. It was rarely obvious what the purpose of a puzzle was, so often the motivation to solve it was simply “to see what happens”. Level design was frustrating in most regards. Areas were very twisty and confusing, and the lack of prominent landmarks made it difficult to tell if an area was one that I had already visited or just a similarly-themed area that was new. A simple minimap, compass, or the ability to drop some type of breadcrumb marker would have helped a lot. The aesthetic, while wonderfully executed, felt boring by the end. Everything looked similar to everything else, both making the world difficult to navigate, and quickly tiring the otherwise interesting visuals. The game lacked any real mechanical depth. There was virtually nothing to unlock, progress, experiment with, learn, parse, master, or decide. The game was quite short… only about 6 hours for me. Even still, by the time the end came, I was ready to be finished. All of this left the game feeling very meaningless and unexciting. The only motivation to play the game was to finish it. The VAST majority of the time was spent aimlessly wandering around similar-looking corridors looking for something to do or interact with. Puzzles were often completed because it felt like “what I’m meant to do” and were mostly uninteresting, awkwardly implemented, and unsatisfying to solve. Even the stellar aesthetic felt tired and repeated by the end, and it was never varied enough to feel like motivation in itself. All of this would be forgivable, leaving the art as its redeeming quality, except for its $40 price tag. I played this game for free (on Game Pass) and still felt somewhat cheated. Overall, I would find it very hard to recommend Scorn to most people. A small exception might be made for someone that REALLY liked the art style and would appreciate it for the aesthetic; but even then I would absolutely not recommend that they buy this game at full price, and I would be sure to emphasize that the game’s value is found almost entirely in its artistic experience.