Tunnels is a rather unique take on survivor horror. A claustrophobic nightmare of an experience that promises to put you, the player, in the very imminent threat of traveling through the earth with limited visibility, mobility, and fear of being stuck in a tight space. Is this tunnel a hole best left alone, or is it the provincial rabbit hole we all wish to fall into when discovering something new? Find out as we review Tunnels on Meta Quest 3!
Tunnels
Developer: Nomad Monkey Yazılım Oyun Ticaret
Publisher: Mastiff LLC
Platforms: Meta Quest, Meta Quest 3S, Meta Quest Pro, Meta Quest 2, Meta Quest 3 (reviewed)
Release Date: September 15, 2023
Price: $14.99
The VR controls to Tunnels are an interesting take on VR gaming. During my experiences, I often found myself enjoying how much of my body was being worked on just through the simple means of exploring the environment. Climbing and scaling through crevices involves a lot of swinging your arms far in order to grab ahead where you wish to travel.
At times it felt rather tedious as particular directions would go on for quite a bit of time, however. This interest in working the player out is taken even further when needing to sprint. In order to sprint, it involves having to circle the two VR controllers in an almost cartoony circular cycle instead of holding down any buttons. I rather enjoyed this take, however, because it helped me burn some calories and get some additional exercise in for the day.
The single player adventure itself doesn’t change much after about an hour in. The experience, as most VR simulator games seem to have a repetitive nature of keeping the game’s module design the same pretty much the entire time, with mostly the dialogue and story interactions to keep it somewhat less homogeneous.
While tunnels do excel at making you feel claustrophobic every step of the way, your eyes, on the other hand, begin to suffer from sensory deprivation as you continue to see the same things over and over again. One particular thing I kept seeing was what I call “loading rooms”.
These rooms always seem to have a spinning red wheel in front of you while your headset relays to you story and dialogue between the hero and his people. I must have seen this room countless times, especially in the earlier parts of the story. The visuals themselves are mostly hidden in the darkness as you travel through the tunnels and crevices of the game.
The darkness sometimes felt more frustrating than scary, as it was kinda hard to know where to place your hand when climbing and crawling. Even with the use of the flashlight, sometimes even that doesn’t give you an idea where to grab. There was one case where I thought I was soft locked because I couldn’t grab anything to move forward. But it was actually due to not knowing where to grab, as it was pure darkness around me.
Tunnels is a curious concept that deserves a look from immersive environment enjoyers. Though the presentation is overall in need of some much better refinement, the game certainly succeeds at making you feel claustrophobic and in need to find your way forward.
Claustrophobia is something I particularly never want to wish on anyone in real life. Experiencing it in the safety of a video game, where you know you will be ok in the actual practice of climbing through tight spaces, avoiding danger, and making your way through, is novel say the least.
Tunnels was reviewed on Nintendo Switch 2 using a code provided by Mastiff. Additional information about Niche Gamer’s review/ethics policy is here. Tunnels is now available for Meta Quest, Meta Quest 3S, Meta Quest 3, Meta Quest Pro, and Meta Quest 2.
