If you’re a long-time reader of Epic Brew, you’ll have picked up by now that I really enjoy first-person, narrative-driven adventure games. From The Vanishing of Ethan Carter to A Story About My Uncle, I really enjoy exploring worlds that developers have constructed to be played through the eyes of a particular character.
Kholat is one such game. Sending me deep into Russia’s Ural Mountains, Kholat had me investigating the mysterious disappearance of a group of hikers. Paranormal activities are said to regularly occur in that same region, so I was more than ready for anything but the ordinary as I first set out on the journey.
The game takes place in the mid 20th Century, so navigating the mountains is done via old-school paper maps and compasses. Equipped with only the map, compass, and a flashlight, players must set out and see what they can discover of the missing hikers. The map has a number of coordinates written onto it that gave me a rough idea of where I should check out first. The game doesn’t prompt you as to what you should start with, it’s very much a free-roaming experience.
Because the game is based on the Dyatlov Pass incident, an event that actually occurred, there is just enough truth to Kholat to give it an X-Files-y vibe. There are notes scattered throughout the mountains, presumably left by the hikers, that propel the game’s narrative onward. Also, Sean Bean does the main narration for the game, though I wasn’t ever quite sure if Bean was my conscious or a completely different character.
I never found out because I never finished Kholat.
As much as I wanted to be sucked into the spooky mountains of the game, I just found myself more and more disinterested in the game the more I played it.
While Kholat is a beautiful game, one glaring visual flaw was nearly always present throughout my time with the game. For some reason, the designers decided to add snow animations around the player in a close proximity. This give the illusion that it is snowing wherever the player is looking, without the game having to generate snow way off in the distance. In most games it works. In Kholat it does not because the snow will move with you as you move.
If you keep an eye on a snow flake, and start sprinting, the snowflake will stay in front of you as it falls, even as you run. Realistically, you would run through the flake. It took me a bit to notice that graphical flaw while playing, but once I noticed the effect it was impossible to not always see that wherever I looked.
I also experienced some audio issues where sounds would continue playing longer than they should have. The game, when the audio is playing properly, sounds amazing, but when I’m out on a treeless mountainside and I can still hear trees creaking in the wind when there are absolutely none around me…that really breaks the immersion.
As far as the game being scary goes (it is considered partly a horror game)…it was more tense and creepy than thrilling or scary. There were a few chase sequences, but I simply just had to be careful not to sprint too much and accidentally fatigue my character. I made it through the chase events just fine. There were also some sketchy shadow creatures lurking about, but just don’t shine your light on them and keep your distance and they’re not an issue.
Beyond the relative minor graphical and audio issues I mentioned, there wasn’t anything wrong with Kholat, I just didn’t feel like the story it was giving me was worth my time. It was so vague that I didn’t really understand what I was even doing, and the paranormal happenings just kind of existed with no real cohesion. Granted, I didn’t finish the game so I didn’t see how (or even if) the events connect. But still, I didn’t find myself enjoying my time with the game, so I ended the journey a bit early.
A review copy of Kholat was given to Epic Brew from the developer for the purpose of this review.
