Blind
Top Critic Average
Critics Recommend
Critic Reviews for Blind
Blind is so keen to out-think the player that it too often leaves you, for lack of a better term, completely in the dark. It's got some fascinating ideas on how to present blindness in VR that give you just the slightest bit of understanding of what life can be like for people that have no sight. But the infuriating puzzles that often carry solutions far too specific to be truly enjoyed keep it from reaching any deeper meaning.
Whilst the story is good, and the mansion creates an uneasy atmosphere that begs to be explored, the puzzles are far too specific, and the lighting and design within the environment is hard to process in VR.
While the premise of using sound to traverse a mansion is great on paper in practice it eventually wears thin. The puzzles themselves aren't too difficult, which could be a positive or negative depending on your view, and while the art style is great the story is far from interesting despite a set up that could have been used for a unique feeling thriller. If you are looking to play a puzzler for a few hours in VR then Blind could be worth a look at, but it's far from an essential purchase.
With environmental puzzle mysteries like Blind, one of the biggest hurdles is motivation. Sure, arbitrary puzzles rooms can be inherently fun, but if you're fighting an uphill battle, such as wrestling with not being able to see, there's a bit more needed to keep you going. Blind attempts this with a mystery narrative, along with giving you the stick to lean on, but the latter makes it all seem arbitrary, and the former isn't strong enough to make uncovering answers the true motivator. Blind banks a lot on, well, the blindness being the big draw, but I don't think using it as simply an extra hurdle on top of familiar puzzle-solving elements does much to elevate the experience as a whole.
Blind takes a novel VR concept and does nothing interesting with it. There is little here that you won't be able to find in better alternatives of the genre, even if we're only talking about other VR titles. If Blind was shorter and had less aggravating puzzles, it may be worth a try out of curiosity alone. But when a game is this testing of a player's patience, it's very hard to recommend.
Blind is a wildly uneven, generally disappointing trip into virtual reality. Its main sticking point, echolocation, shines when used to its fullest, but more often than not, it doesn't get put to any real use. In between each of the game's good puzzles, you'll encounter large stretches of walking, and probably a smattering of technical problems as well. But hey, at least it won't take too much of your time. The ending impression with Blind that we were left with was largely one of disappointment. We hoped for, and expected, more.
Blind is basically a room escape game that does an excellent job of taking a fairly common type of game and making it extraordinarily uncommon. It uses an innovative simulation of blindness to add a large measure of personal discomfort and stress to truly make the player feel as if they MUST get out of that building, but doing so is going to be next to impossible with their unexpected and frightening affliction.
Some puzzles could've done with being a little less obtuse and some players might have an issue with the length versus the price. I however really enjoyed my time with Blind and recommend it to anyone looking for a dark story and some fun puzzle solving.
