Creating a first-person experience game where players are pretty much walking through an environment, keeping things interesting can sometimes be a challenge. It’s a good thing that developers Creative Bytes Studios have experience working with in-game character limitations from their creation of The Vale because they have done well holding the attention of players in Return to Grace. Let’s jump right into the details of what makes up this game.

Story

After a rough landing on one of Jupiter’s moons, a brave space archaeologist follows her equipment in hopes of finding a long-lost massively powerful AI known as Grace. Luckily, her intel was good as she managed to find the structure and makes her way in to explore the inner workings of the building that once held the AI that was the caretaker of the solar system.

Once inside, she quickly finds that Grace is not online and there are a few pieces of maintenance that need to take place before the AI will be up and running again. However, aspects of Grace’s AI are still functioning and she is quickly greeted by Logic. Through the guidance of Logic, she will begin making her way through the facility where she will meet multiple aspects of Grace’s AI and even learn more details about what took place in the events that led up to Grace being shut down.

Gameplay

Given this game is a walking simulator, there isn’t a whole lot of gameplay in the experience. You do get to walk around anywhere you want and can interact with a lot of different aspects of the building. Interactions typically lead to you learning a bit more about the lore or the building itself.

There will be times that you do light puzzle work, such as fidgeting with the watch gadget you wear that lets you hack into things with the aid of the AI aspects, find the code for a passcode-locked door, and even moving some large items with in-building machinery. This game offers a lot of little ways to keep the player busy and when you aren’t actively looking for something or working on a puzzle, lore is being shared through the AI’s.

This experience does come with choice-based moments which will either be to let you get more information or get the job done. This will lead to multiple different endings as well, which does not always lead to a happy ending. The more informed you are, the more likely you are to make the right choices, so don’t feel rushed as this game goes at your pace no matter what is going on.

Audio and Visual

The music is pretty much completely in the background, if not completely absent. They let the ambiance fill the air more than anything, but when it is time to bring out a moment they do have music to bring a tone or atmosphere to the moment. The most impressive part of the sound work in this game is the voice work that was done for the canisters and different AI aspects. Each AI had a different voice, including a change in personality, gender, age, and accent. Giving a mix of voices to tell an overarching story makes it more interesting naturally as you feel that a group is informing you rather than one know-it-all character. It was a nice touch that made this game feel full through the whole journey.

Graphically speaking, this game was pretty decent. While it doesn’t have realism, it does have a high-quality art style to it. The whole facility looked and felt amazing, giving an awe-struck moment upon the arrival of each room. Sometimes you really didn’t know what to expect next and when looking around, I often found that I was underestimating the size of the area I was in. They really gave this game a massive scale which definitely brought out the concept that this facility held an AI powerful enough to watch over the solar system.

Replayability

Thanks to there being more information to gather as you go through the game and explore further while maintaining the exploration being optional gives this game replayability. If you are curious and just want to know the story from start to end, you can do just the main storyline and go straight for it. If you want the full expanse of the lore, you can search around and listen to every recording you can find. Then there are the choice-based moments that change a few key moments and even different endings.

What It Could Have Done Better

There were a few graphical issues in some of the areas of the game. Given this is a walking simulator, all you are doing as the player is looking around and listening to the dialogue in the game. With that in mind, the developers should really take the time to make sure nothing is obviously graphically incongruent. Sure, these can be fixed with patches, but it feels like a bigger aspect to a game in this genre and should have been given a much closer look during testing.

Once you beat the game, you may want to experience just one particular section of the game over again. Unfortunately, there is no chapter selection or anything to jump to any part of the game, so you have to play through the whole game again. Also, you can’t manually save the game which means you can save the game on a separate file to make sure you can check out a certain section again without playing through the game again. Being able to pick a future part of the game to start at should always be an option after a game has been beaten, but it isn’t available in this game.

Verdict

Return to Grace is an enjoyable exploration through sci-fi’s AI god’s holding facility! The idea of a space archaeologist position isn’t something I have thought of before and gives reason for someone to be exploring the different parts of space. The lore for this game is pretty good and easy to follow, plus it is told through a cast of characters that are easy to love. Walking sims are a genre that is full of games that are either enjoyable or boring and I am happy to say that this one is definitely enjoyable!

Return to Grace is available now on PC via Steam and Epic Games Store.