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I once had a job in a warehouse that was so big, I could never find the toilets. They seemed to move constantly, like they were being distorted by some space-time anomaly. I got sacked after two days.
The strangeness of that experience on that job fits perfectly with the themes and tones of GoolWorks’ first game, Under the Warehouse. This first-person adventure game takes you into a strange world of workers, cults, and magical spaces. It’s a weird Lynchian journey and I for one had a great time with it.
I like games that experiment. It’s something that appeals to me and my sensibilities rather than being handed a big gun or sword and then told to ‘go kill things’. Under the Warehouse is a game that is close to reality, but at the same time, a million miles away from it. You play a character with no name or history; no initial purpose. It could be you, the gamer sitting in your living room. You are in a darkened alleyway and a phone rings; hit by a spotlight. A boy in a mask appears and sets you on a quest to find a large colourful egg. Then you are off.
Your journey takes you into a mysterious warehouse that has rooms leading off it that lend their way to scientific experiments, lakes with giant frogs, and strange mythical portals next to a canteen with someone eating a birthday cake. The story and characters you meet are fascinating, strange, but – as you have probably guessed by now – very weird. Yet the writing is clever, funny, and Under the Warehouse is surprising, right the way through until the end of its three-hour running time.
At its very essence Under the Warehouse is a first-person point-and-click adventure with lots of exploration and some very low-key puzzle solving. The main part of the game focuses on finding items, combining them, or taking them to someone who will let you move forward with your quest. An easy example of this is when you arrive upon a dog guarding an exit, so you find a bone, the dog is distracted and you can go through. Some items and puzzles will be as easy as that one, but others become a little bit more abstract and it’s not easy to find the answer. But the good news is that the strange and wonderful characters you meet along the way will give you hints about what to do next.
But there is the odd puzzle – as it seems in all point-and-click adventures – where logic goes out of the window and you end up guessing or trying different combinations to work. Because the story is so strange as well, there are a few areas and moments in which nothing seems to make sense. This might put some people off. It also feels a bit rough in terms of gameplay at times, but nothing is broken and all is good for a small first-time developer.
The visuals of Under the Warehouse hark back to the PS1 retro scene. But I think that might be putting the game down as the look of the graphics work very well. The lighting is good, and the whole sense of wacky geography, locations, and level design is pretty amazing. The sense of visual storytelling is strong here, where you glimpse these strange places as you travel through and can only guess what is happening there. The soundscore throughout works well and carry’s on creating that strange uneasy feeling throughout.
Despite a short running time, Under the Warehouse is one that can be enjoyed. It delivers a strange surreal world and story, along with an ending that some might hate. But this is cheap in price, and so worth taking a punt on.
I think some of the puzzles can be a bit too obtuse at times, and you will be guessing or turning to online walkthroughs for success, but on the whole, it’s never as tricky as some other games in the genre. It comes with a solid soundtrack too so it may well be worth some time as you look to discover what hides Under the Warehouse.