The first shock with Shock is that you start the game injured, and a herb isn’t going to make you any better, nor will your legs get better as you’re wheelchair bound. What a great concept! Awaking in an underground car park, so wrapped in bandages that you look like a museum exhibit, you’re literally working from the ground up, sprawled across the floor.
Playing as a veteran, you’ve seemingly left the hospital, one would assume with all the bandages, but you have no recollection of anything. Crawling across the oil-infused tarmac, you locate your wheelchair and realise that you need to get out of Dodge.
This wasn’t just a clever little introduction to the game by having you fumbling on the floor, then wheeling about with finesse, as crawling presents itself as a game mechanic. Unable to reach what an able-bodied person would take for granted, you need to think outside the box and crawl under areas to reach new ones, or simply go all gung-ho and lob bricks at stuff.
Alas, as a veteran, your character is experiencing numerous hallucinations of headless beings and the like. It isn’t pleasant, but Shock is the name of the game. That said, the graphic stuff, and it is, took a little getting used to as the antagonist is a giant cybernetic head. It was tricky to take seriously and looked somewhat out of place in an eerily good setup. The head twigged on this and proceeded to bite mine off. Christ!
So, Shock is pretty much a stealth game. Like Hitman without the guns, you look for opportunities to avoid your nightmarish pursuer, and yet again, the concept is a really good one, as the crawling is natural, but sneaking about in a wheelchair encourages you to think. Don’t be fooled into thinking Shock is an absolute masterpiece that’ll change your life, but the ideas behind it and the mechanics that Hero’s Punch have devised are truly unique and make it an interesting talking point.
“You remember that time I was being chased by that oversized cybernetic head in the car park?”. Ok, not that kind of talking point, but it’s probably unlikely you’ve played anything before like it. Perhaps similar, though you’ll soon forget all that as survival is key, and thinking about other irrelevant stuff will have you losing your head quite literally. Hopefully, the outside of the car park will offer some normality. Think again.
Shock is due for release in 2026, with a playable demo available during the Steam Next Fest.
