It’s that time of year again: the Northern hemisphere is getting colder, people are spending more time indoors, and Halloween is prompting all manner of horror-themed activities and media releases—something we see manifest in recent games like Hellraiser: Revival. But if you’re interested in something a bit more unique for this spooky season, especially if you do most of your gaming on the Nintendo Switch or Switch 2, you owe it to yourself to check out Signalis.
Originally released in 2022 for the eighth generation of consoles (e.g. Switch, PS4), Signalis took the indie horror scene by storm. It takes clear cues from the likes of Silent Hill and old-school Resident Evil, but with plenty of powerful, original ideas and a heaping dose of X-factor. Put plainly, Signalis is a prime example of video games as high art, and while it’s easy to overlook it in favor of shiny AAA horror games like Resident Evil Requiem and Hellraiser, it simply cannot be missed by fans of the genre. And considering that it’s one of the best games to play on Nintendo Switch 2, it’s perhaps the best choice for horror fans looking for a quick, high-quality fix.
Signalis Is a Short and Sweet Horror Masterpiece on Nintendo Switch 2
- How long to beat Signalis: 9-10 hours
- How long to 100% Signalis: 14-15 hours
Signalis follows Elster, a highly advanced biosynthetic clone (known in-universe as a Replika) whose scouting spacecraft has crash-landed on an alien planet. Elster seems to be the only surviving member of the scouting ship, and as she leaves the ship and enters a seemingly derelict mining outpost, things only get stranger. With gaps in her memory and no true allies to help her, Elster must attempt to find other survivors while fighting off grotesque creatures strongly influenced by the monsters of Silent Hill.
Find the odd one out before the timer hits zero.
The game’s influences extend beyond the gaming medium, with deliberate, heavy-handed parallels and explicit references made to the works of H.P. Lovecraft and Robert W. Chambers, two early pioneers of the cosmic horror subgenre. Adopting a fixed-camera perspective, Signalis manages to be not just “retro,” but persistently unsettling, with Elster appearing quite small on-screen, and dangers often lurking just out of plain sight. The game will also pivot to different presentation styles and control schemes, but I won’t spoil those moments. In short, Signalis‘ presentation is among the most meaningful and distinct I’ve seen in a lifetime of gaming.
Admittedly, Signalis‘ mechanics might let some players down. It’s rather rudimentary compared to, say, the expressive and dynamic combat of Resident Evil 4‘s remake, and archaic “tank controls” can take some getting used to for modern audiences. For my part, I can find myself a bit frustrated by Signalis‘ stringent inventory management systems, which lacks the ease-of-use and quality-of-life considerations often seen in modern survival-horror games. Signalis has all the charm, ingenuity, and style of a 90s survival horror title, but it also has the jankiness.
That’s far from a good reason to avoid Signalis, though. Despite occasional rough edges, Signalis comes together as something decidedly special and unpredictable, to the point where you will likely forget whatever problems you had with the game by the time credits roll. Clever puzzles, rewarding exploration, surprisingly beefy combat, and some of the most mind-bending cutscenes and setpieces ever combine to make Signalis one-of-a-kind. And with the game being so short, you won’t be ruminating on its weaknesses for long.
Signalis Is the Exact Kind of Horror Experience We Need More Of
Something I haven’t mentioned yet is that, not only is Signalis the debut release of indie studio rose-engine, but it’s also only made by two people: rose-engine is more of a duo than a full studio, founded and operated by Barbara Wittmann and Yuri Stern. It’s always astonishing when solo devs or small teams make high-quality games, and the case of Signalis is no different; it’s more effective, affecting, and moving than the overwhelming majority of expensive, AAA horror games, with far greater resources and personnel at their disposal.
The game’s greatness, rather than occurring in spite of rose-engine’s limited staff and resources, may have actually been a direct result of such factors. The smaller the team, the more finely tuned and curated the final product—this is why auteur game devs like Hideo Kojima are so widely lauded. Too many cooks spoil the pot, as the saying goes, and you can tell when a game has been pulled in too many directions. Even horror games I love, such as the modern Resident Evil games, sometimes play things a bit too safe in this respect, almost like they’re worried about taking things too far. Of course, such a philosophy is a bane for horror. If you’re looking for something on the other end of the spectrum, then Signalis is your kind of game.
- Released
-
October 27, 2022
- ESRB
-
m
- Engine
-
unity
