Top-down scare’em’up Darkwood caught my attention back in March for looking like a cross between Teleglitch and Project Zomboid. It dumps you in a dark forest filled with evil beasties and leaves you to survive with what you can find and what weapons you can knock together.
The latest footage shows how you can bait your bear traps and douse them with fuel to add that much needed flaming kick that’s lacking in two sets of serrated metal teeth.
There’s still only been a smidgen of footage released of the game in action so it’s difficult to know quite how deep the game’s systems go but it seems like most objects can be mixed with each other to create potent traps and defences. For instance, the way the player baits the trap with meat is a pretty straightforward interaction but then pouring fuel over it and leaving a trail up to the door? That was more complex.
Would the fire have spread if the player started a fire in the house? If so, we could be looking at a pretty ace monsters-in-the-woods simulator.
Also, that line of sight mechanic, with the way so many objects can occlude your vision, looks excellent. Despite being in a top-down view, showing so much of the world around you, the sense of vulnerability created by the limited vision cone is palpable.
As Matt covered earlier this month, developer Acid Wizard Studio have taken to Indiegogo to get the rest of the game’s development funded. You can learn more about and back the project here.