Routine Reviews
Scary monsters, beautiful locations, and a story that's sadly lost in space.
Sci-fi horror game Routine has been a very long time coming, but unfortunately, it wasn't worth the 13-year wait.
There's a wonderful creepiness to the robots. They're superbly designed.
ROUTINE is an excellent puzzle-focused first-person horror game that, despite its slow pacing, is able to keep you at the edge of your seat for 10 hours straight, with a tense, rich atmosphere created by wonderful execution of its retro futuristic aesthetic and stunning soundscape that immerses you in its world and gets you listening for the sound of a pin drop to avoid getting caught. Its narrative may be unable to shine through, but at the end of the day it is altogether an interesting game, a game worth playing again, and the game that Alien: Isolation fans should play while we all wait for Alien: Isolation 2.
What Routine lacks in quantity, it makes up for in staggering quality. It's cassette futurism at its most tactile, with an aesthetic direction that's only matched by the novelty of its CAT tool. Lunar Software raises the bar in sound design to deliver a singular experience for sci-fi horror fans.
ROUTINE is a frightful time on the lunar surface. While the narrative doesn’t entirely hit due to a lack of memorable characters, the sense of immersion and beautiful visuals carry the scares. ROUTINE is a game for horror aficionados who don’t mind basic gameplay and the occasional puzzle, even if some clues might be hidden slightly too well.
ROUTINE combines a retro-futuristic aesthetic with an unnerving sense of dread to create an incredibly engaging and highly atmospheric horror experience.
Then there are the long walks where silence slowly builds, as the lack of UI and thoughtfully envisioned setting come together to create an alarmingly thin separation between the player and their beleaguered avatar. It’s in these too fleeting moments where the unease of isolation gives way to a particularly terrifying thought: what if we’re not alone?
Tasking you with exploring an abandoned lunar base and investigating what happened to it, Routine is a first-person horror game that will have you captivated from beginning to end thanks to its tense atmosphere and engaging puzzles.
Routine is an essential game for fans of sci-fi horror! With strong inspirations from Alien Isolation, mechanics such as the use of the C.A.T. tool can become a major differentiator. Beyond the new features and gameplay mechanics, the game struggles with clunky combat, but it encourages and rewards players through exploration.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
Routine isn’t trying to be a loud, cinematic horror game, but slow, cerebral, and far more interested in tension than spectacle. It definitely has some rough patches – its stealth sections can be repetitive and the game sometimes hides important clues a little too well – but these issues don’t outweigh what it gets right: atmospheric environments, clever puzzling, and a palpable sense of tension that’ll constantly keep you on the edge of your seat. If you’re into more thoughtful horror games that rely more on atmosphere than constant jump-scares, Routine is well worth checking out – I just wish that I wasn’t in a constant game of cat-and-mouse with easily outsmarted enemies when trying to solve puzzles.
Usually when a game is in development for as long as Routine was, the result is at worst abandonware and at best a highly dated experience. Not only does Routine exist, but it’s one of the best games of the year. Routine is gorgeous, extremely original, highly immersive with impeccable atmosphere, incredible environments and a narrative that was captivating from beginning to end. For some people, Routine will be too slow and archaic, but for those who can appreciate the analog nature of the experience, the intricacies and the slow burn, Routine is unforgettable.
Routine grounds the player within this lunar base, and trusts them to get out alive with a fantastic diegetic presentation, compelling narrative and setting, and genuine creeps and tense atmosphere.
I was excited about “Routine” and prepared myself for the usual space horror experience. The somber atmosphere is unfortunately the only positive aspect of the game. The immersive handling of the terminals and my C.A.T. assistance tool quickly loses its appeal. What remains is an environment that I have to traverse dozens of times before I find the right detail to move forward. If the interaction options were better highlighted and the game were more intuitive to control, “Routine” would be a nice little horror treat. As it is, it’s thoroughly undercooked.
Review in German | Read full review