Detached

Detached is extremely satisfied with being in space. In the figurative sense, it provides simple-to-complex control options that allow the player to comfortably navigate all three axes of direction in virtual reality. You’re also literally always in space, the colossal vacuum of irradiated poison. Instant immersion, feeling like you’re there, is a priority and novelty for virtual reality. It outlined the medium’s wave of exciting innovation and turned skeptics into believers. Transitioning into a game, as Detached is apt to demonstrate, requires a different approach. Being in space is fun, but what I’m I going to do while I’m out there?

Becoming half of a two-person salvage squad is a good start. Detached opens with the player character making their way out into a chaotic pocket of wrecked space. Modules of a destroyed space station are scattered between small asteroids and space junk, and it’s up to you to locate, enter, and bring them all back online. Tools on board your spacesuit include a turbo boost, a shield, and three missiles, all of which are bound to individual cool-down timers. Fuel and oxygen, both of which are generously supplied in the default arcade mode, need to be restored with pick-ups floating out in space.

Zero-gravity control is Detached’s most important asset. Cramming 360 degrees of movement into a DualShock 4 is a herculean task. Dead Space 3 and, more recently, Prey have provided satisfying takes, but mild to heavy disorientation is inevitable. Human beings aren’t especially well suited to weightless, momentum-based movement, especially when it’s expressed in virtual reality. Detached places vertical control on L2 and R2, left and right roll on R1 and L1, and acceleration (and deceleration) on the left analog stick. Direction is a mixture of right-stick camera swinging and head-tracking. The emerging product is bewildering at first, but second nature by the time the tutorial has concluded.

Four levels compose Detached’s two hour campaign. The first feels like a rudimentary test to make sure the player is comfortable with basic movement. Prepare the shield before you’re hit with a concussive blast. Use accelerated movement to make it through a swiftly closing door. Race around outer space and blast five satellites with missiles under the duress of time. Detached uses its first level to make the player comfortable with its rules, presumably in favor of deeper tests down the line. Simple, basic objectives are qualified by acting as a primer. It’s basic, but it’s also a lesson in proficiency.

The second level is a five to twenty second snuff film that repeats until you get it right. Unstoppable acceleration forces the player to eject out of an escape pod and into and through a busted ship corridor. Basic movement—push left here, ascend a bit there—plows the player through an obstacle course of steel beams and collapsed interior pieces. Collision brings instant, painful, bone-crunching death, at which point you’re treated to a loading screen as long as the sequence. I kept thinking of Tom Cruise’s endless grisly deaths in Edge of Tomorrow or Live. Die. Repeat. or whatever they’re calling it now. It’s tough to place the location of your head and how effective your shield is at protecting your mortality from the ping-pong effect it induces. This was a miserable sequence and I hated every moment of it. It’s a cheap trick.

As bad as the second level was, it suggested that Detached was eager to switch its structure. The third level proceeded regresses to a wider version of the first. A large amount of space is spread over nebulous objectives, almost all of which demand the player acquire small energy cells, nands, from tiny cubes floating out in space. These cells will power an escort mission, provide power to satellites, and toss out another timed obstacle course. In addition to a larger amount of space, an enemy drone constantly patrols the perimeter. The drone can kill you, but it can be temporarily neutralized by blasting it with missiles.

The amplification of a tutorial level creates an unsatisfying game experience. I understand that the costs of virtual reality development are high and experiences usually must be short, but Detached’s objectives feel like closer to a technology demo than game. Questionable save points (when I leave a door? when I complete only some objectives?), an uncertain sense of place (missiles are aimed from my head sometimes? why did I run into that steel beam?), and general listlessness doom Detached’s sense of identity. You can tell it tries to be something other than a zero-g simulation, but there’s not enough of a coherent design in place to keep the player on the hook. Sometimes I wondered if the hostility and threat of death could be removed in favor of a zen-inducing floating escape from reality, but that’s probably a different game.

There’s also a paradox found between control and comfort. In a perfect world the player should have a full range of view when they spiral out of control after a particularly costly mistake, or when they just want to look to the left very quickly. Detached reduces the aperture and narrows the field of view when fast movements are made, essentially reducing the available real estate to a pin hole. This renders basic navigation frustrating and inefficient. This effect is adjustable, but the second the slider is reduced or removed, nausea sets in. After two years of virtual reality immersion, I rarely feel sick anymore, but an uninhibited Detached with zero safeguards felt dangerous. I wish people (or the hardware) were more capable of processing this stuff without the need to compromise the experience.

The only risk of Detached that pays of is its refusal to provide an objective marker. Both the first and third levels feel huge and no explicit direction is provided. Videogame-y clues like flashing lights and pristine structures can draw the player’s attention, but familiarity with the available space is the only way to make efficient progress. The drain on oxygen and fuel add valuable stress to the process and task the player to think about where they are in the three-dimensional space. I found it all to be a refreshing break from games that are afraid of losing the player.

The fourth level, billed as an epilogue, is another retreat into the familiar. Detached has already explained every idea that it has and no amount of compact turret-avoidance is going to say anything new. An opaque antagonist, a sometimes conscious co-scavenger, and the absence of motivation remove any chance at interest or complication. Pieces of a story are there but there’s nothing to grab ahold of. Like a particularly poor attempt at flying in outer space, you’re left hurdling toward oblivion.

Detached’s marketing copy values the inclusion of player-versus-player multiplayer. It’s a Capture the Flag style content where two opposing players must tug-of-war a package to an extraction point. I didn’t play multiplayer because I don’t have PlayStation Plus because I don’t like getting yelled at by teenagers. This is admittedly a disservice to Detached, but not one that I am going out-of-pocket to correct. Consider this review to only rate the single-player portion of the game.

Iterations of Detached have been floating around on other virtual reality platforms since 2016. This clarifies its position as groundwork instead of structure. It was a step that needed to be taken in search of higher ground. Virtual reality’s second and third generation of software, with games like Moss and Tetris Effect, are better aware of the platform’s strengths and limitations. Detached can impress newcomers right away. More practiced enthusiasts will quickly look in other directions.