At no point during my playthrough of Scorn did I ever consider it a “fun” game, and to its credit, developer Ebb Software has made no effort to disguise the game as such. Through all its grit and grime, Scorn‘s more of an experience than anything else. Completing only one playthrough may mean leaving some secrets and story threads likely left uncovered, but one playthrough is more than enough for the grotesqueness of Scorn to leave a lasting impression.
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Scorn has attracted comparisons to the works of H.R. Giger and others who specialize in fleshy, ominous constructs, and while those comparisons aren’t far off by any means, Scorn’s world is very much a creation of its own. The protagonist of Scorn is more a vessel than anything else and is as much part of the world as the world is a part of it. The environment is dense, bleak, and often claustrophobic, and it’s evident Ebb Software reveled in the ability to thrust players into a hostile and unfamiliar environment with little to no direction.
That immersion of Scorn granted by its horrific setting is one of its greatest strengths. I can’t recall any instance of text appearing on the screen to guide my hand in any way, and the HUD is as minimal as they come. And to understand Scorn – or at least its mechanics necessary for progression – you must also immerse yourself by paying close attention to environment and limited tools at hand. One of the few humorous moments in Scorn happened when I could finally access my inventory and was looking forward to getting some answers about the icky objects I’d been hauling about. That “inventory” turned out to the protagonist holding all his possessions out in front of them which made it look like both the poor soul and I were hoping the other would know what to do next. Scorn’s world is staunchly uncooperative and punishing to a commendable level.
All that said, what does one actually do in Scorn? Broadly, it’s a lot of walking, some sprinting which is more like a quick shuffle, and a whole lot of sticking your nasty, gnarled hands into things to see what happens. The slow speed at which you move is a bit annoying at times, but only when you think of that mechanic out of the context of the story and environment. Scorn’s protagonist is silent save for screams of pain, and though it’s fragile, it moves forward from objective to objective with a fatalistic and biological sense of determination.
When you’re not hustling around as fast as your beaten-up vessel can muster, you’re probably trying to solve a puzzle. Puzzles comprise the majority of Scorn’s gameplay and are surprisingly difficult, too. What’s funny is they probably aren’t all that more challenging than ones found in other games, but without an NPC or a monologue to offer ideas and solutions, they generate quite the sense of helplessness. Unraveling those puzzles makes for a more rewarding experience despite their difficulty, a reward which teeters just on the brink of being worth the hassle.
Shooting things is the final component of Scorn gameplay, though not to the degree that some are likely hoping for. After going into Scorn completely blind except for knowledge of its aesthetic and artistic comparisons, I was surprised to see how much of the conversations came back to gunplay with some descriptions and deliberations amongst fans referring to Scorn as a first-person shooter. Scorn is no more a shooter than Minecraft is a fighting game. If you’re in combat or are trying not to be, it’s always out of a sense of desperation, necessity, and urgency fueled by severely limited resources and a general sense of “what is going on” whenever something’s after you.
The minimal nature of the gunplay works in Scorn’s favor since there’s much more to be preoccupied with other than headshots and well-timed reloads, but the stakes and conditions surrounding failure and death are as relentless as Scorn’s world itself. That is to say that the respawn’s and checkpoints Scorn employs often feel extremely unfair to the point that returning to the game after taking a night off feels like quite the chore when you don’t know where you’ll start back, how much puzzle progress will be lost, and so on. With so much stacked against players in pretty much every other aspect of Scorn, one would hope that you wouldn’t have had to grapple with the core systems at work in addition to the hostile setting.
And of all the things I imagined Scorn to be before playing it, “erotic” was not among those descriptors, but boy if it isn’t erotic. It starts out subtly through things like the way the protagonist interacts with mechanisms to the shape of objects, walls, and so on, and as the game progresses, Scorn’s perversions are gradually made evident. It offers uncomfortable and unflinching analogies for sexual and biological situations that challenge players’ interpretations.
One playthrough of Scorn took between seven and eight hours to complete, and that seems like plenty of time to be immersed in the game’s world. I for sure have theories about the game’s story and its implications, but none that come close to allowing for any confident explanation of what transpired. I applaud Scorn for its ability to skirt around labels and explanations, but it’s as exhausting as it is memorable, so for the time being, one playthrough seems to suffice.
Rating: 4/5
Scorn releases on October 14th for the Xbox Series X|S and PC platforms. A PC review code was provided by the publisher.
