Dollhouse: Behind the Broken Mirror Steam Charts & Stats

[h3]TL;DR[/h3] [b]Completion time:[/b] around 1 to 2 hours with a guide, or 3 to 6 hours if playing blind [b]Difficulty:[/b] 2 out of 10 [b]Verdict:[/b] 4 out of 10. A sluggish and poorly balanced experience with little substance beneath the style [h3]Review[/h3] Disclaimer: As an achievement huntress, I always keep achievement hunting in mind when reviewing a game. [b]Dollhouse: Behind the Broken Mirror[/b] is slow, awkward, and not worth the 19.99€ it asks for. There are many cheaper and even free games out there that manage to do what this one tries to do, but better. From start to finish it feels like you are stuck in slow motion. The main character moves at a snail’s pace. Sprinting barely helps and combat feels soft and weightless. Firing and reloading are far too slow, and some weapons cannot even be reloaded at all. Reload animations cannot be cancelled, so if enemies start surrounding you, your character just stands there calmly reloading while getting smacked from all sides. Enemy encounters are chaotic in the worst way. You are constantly punished for the sluggish mechanics. The puzzles are barely even puzzles. Most of the time you just grab an item and place it somewhere, with a lot of backtracking to stretch the experience. The ambiance has some promise and a few moments that try to be stylish, but they get lost in the poor execution. [h3]What I liked[/h3] ✔️ Some effort in creating atmosphere ✔️ No glitched achievements ✔️ Quick 100 percent for trophy hunters [h3]What I didn’t like[/h3] ❌ Extremely slow movement and clunky controls ❌ Unskippable reloads during fights ❌ Shallow puzzles and repetitive backtracking ❌ Definitely not worth the asking price [b]Missable achievements:[/b] 4 (Nevermore, Forgotten by Time, Honoris Causa Carny, Sharp as a Needle) [b]Glitched achievements:[/b] None [b]Number of playthroughs:[/b] 1 Please note that English is not my main language. I used ChatGPT to rephrase my gibberish into readable form.

Very bad and boring, and not the good kind of bad and boring

If you are looking for true horror (not just ‘creepy’), great combat, and super difficult or crazy clever puzzles… move along. This game is not for you. If you like atmosphere, story, and light puzzles… stick around for this review. [b] NOTE - my review has changed since originally posting... I put my original, unedited review at the very end [/b] [h2] Overall Thoughts [/h2] [b] The story was AMAZING. I personally loved it, and if this game is worth playing at all, it is for the story. However, there are enough issues with the game that I can't just recommend it globally. However it is important for me to say that I do NOT regret playing it. I had fun, despite the issues. You might, too, especially if you are a more patient and forgiving player like me. So don't write the game off completely.... just... maybe... get it at a deep discount, and maybe only after you see at least one 'bug fix' update. [/b] Now let's get into the details. I will start below by saying what I LOVED about the game, and why I really thought about recommending it. Then, I'll follow up with some issues that could be fixed if the devs want to improve the experience, as well as some comments regarding other reviews. [h2] What I LOVED [/h2] 1. The environments themselves are beautiful, creepy, and interesting to explore. 2. The puzzles were pretty simple, but still took SOME thought to complete. I personally prefer this kind. You know, the ones that make you FEEL smart without actually being all that complicated. 3. One section has some mini-games, and they are... special... IF you pay attention. 4. Level design was pretty decent. Anywhere that you had to go through more than once seemed to change its state enough to make it interesting. Also, you usually tend to end up where you need to be to progress... whether that is back at a central hub or near the next location entrance, the game was pretty good about guiding you to the right places. 5. My favorite part about this? The one that made the WHOLE GAME worth it to me? The STORY! [list] Starts with a really interesting premise. Story unfolds nicely as you play, revealing more and more layers. EVERYTHING is explained by the end. There are no big holes that leave you questioning when the game is over. The story even explains all of the game mechanics, enemies, etc. Very well thought-out. You will likely ‘predict’ some parts of the story, but looking back, it was not MY prediction. The game planted the seeds and I discovered the truth when I was supposed to. Even then, there were so many deeper layers to the truth, and I ‘predicted’ them exactly when the devs wanted me to. You will even remember things from the early game that felt inert, but by the end make so much sense. [/list] [h2] What was BAD (and some fix recommendations) [/h2] 1. [b] Combat is difficult and slow without being interesting. [/b] -- The current combat system is difficult for all the wrong reasons, and is not at all satisfying. Fixing this could simply involve making the guns shoot a little faster. The enemies just kinda... walk toward you.. which is fine if we can shoot them faster. It's even fine that the early guns aren't as strong, just let me shoot a lot of bullets and then just worry about resource management. 2. [b] Environments are hazy/fuzzy. [/b] -- They have just enough fog to make it look like I have the brightness too high. This may not be as easy of a fix, but it is also not a HUGE deal, you DO get used to it. 3. [b] Mechanics are not explained well at the beginning. [/b] -- For example, the statues (I won't say more here) aren't explained when you encounter them for the first time. The item outline doesn't look enough like what is in your inventory, so it is not at all clear what to do here. It seemed like you were supposed to go find another item. By the time I learned the truth, it was too late to do. 4. [b] Unnecessary location [/b] -- The environment in one section does feel a little forced, and was not necessary to the overall story. That location could have been replaced with any other location and the story would not change. Weird choice, but hey, that environment was still cool, so, I can forgive it. Not sure this needs a fix at this point, but if the enemies become a little more fun to deal with (which would shorten the game) then this 'extra' map wouldn't feel so 'extra'. 5. [b] Bug fixes [/b] -- Floating icons near some doorways; item that has an interaction icon, but cannot be interacted with; encountered some enemy bugs where they just stop moving and can't be killed; the 'G' equip button stopped working at some point, leading me to believe that I couldn't use a gun in that section. [h3] Notes about my experience vs other reviews [/h3] [list] I was able to interrupt the reload animation. I would just shoot again, and that worked for me. ALL guns are re-loadable, however two of them must be EMPTY before you can reload. One is reloaded by full magazine, and the other only holds 2 bullets, and you reload them both at the same time. I didn’t experience much backtracking UNLESS I missed something. Small exception at the beginning, since one location is off by itself, with only one road leading to it, but it didn't feel like 'backtracking' as the experience on that road is different. [/list] ****************************************** Previous Review *************************************************** (I originally recommended this game) So, I'm a couple hours into this game, and so far it is really cool! So first, the bad: The combat is a little weird, the enemies super frustrating at times, and some of the items/mechanics are not explained in as timely a manner as I would prefer, which led me to not only accidentally use a health drink when I didn't mean to, but I also missed a chance to get a new health drink, and somehow the game locked me out of trying again, even though the option appeared to be there. Also, just note, your antivirus software might freak out a bit when opening this game for the first time lol. But it eventually 'approved' it. Now, the good: The atmosphere is incredible. The voice acting is great. The story is interesting (so far). There is quite a bit of 'delightfully weird' in this game, which is pretty well-represented by the trailers on the store page. It is very cool, and I look forward to finishing the game.. especially now that I understand the mechanics a bit more.

The game is super boring and not scary in the slightest. Every tiny jumpscare, like when a window breaks, or when something moves the camera would snap to that thing. Which made me think it was a cutscene, and I would just wait for the next thing to happen, but it wasn't and that's just annoying. Also you can easily clip the camera by looking down on a wall of anykind. It doesn't help that SOEDESCO is just a bad company in general, exactly why most of their games if not all do horribly. They did Orange Season very dirty. I just wouldn't recommend any game published by SOEDESCO.

In the current state this game is, it's a waste of time and money. It's a typical asset flip first person "survival horror game." If you're looking for scary, this isn't it. It's mostly just walk to the next objective while dealing with annoying and boring enemies. First of all it's SUPER buggy. I got softlocked which made me have to reload an old save. Also got stuck in objects a lot. Issues with interactive icons, too. Horrible enemy design/ai. They're constantly on your a**. All they do is walk at you. Guns suck and have zero knockback. You can't outrun the enemies so it's not possible to space yourself. Enemies die quickly and you're usually not swarmed by them too much so it's not impossible to deal with them. it's just such a drag to encounter enemies. The puzzles are pretty lame. Mostly just find/shoot an object to unlock a door. The story is kind of interesting but the narrative has so many nonsensical holes that makes me think AI wrote it. Some of the translations seem off, too, so maybe it's just that. One positive is that it has a Harmonica gun which I've personally never seen in a game lol.