Alawar Distrust Survival Game Review

By Olin Coles

Developer: Cheerdealers
Publisher: Alawar Entertainment
Product Name: Distrust
Price As Tested: $11.99 (Steam)

Full Disclosure: The product sample used in this article has been provided by GOPublix Media Relations.

It was supposed to be a rescue mission, but an explosion caused the chopper to crash-land near an abandoned Artic base, akin to John Carpenter’s classic The Thing. Although only one other team member has survived the wreck, you’re hardly alone. Fall asleep, and you might not wake up. Stay awake long enough, and you’ll experience a dream state of distorted reality. This is a survival game, and almost everything is against you… especially the odds. In this article for Benchmark Reviews we play DISTRUST, built on the Unity 3D game engine.

Sold in the Indie Games section of Steam, Distrust appears to offer a challenging survival adventure. I’ve spent far too many hours playing PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds lately, but my potato aim makes for limited chance of late game survival. In Distrust, you’ll rely on wits and timing, as opposed to aim and reaction time. This should be fun…

DISTRUST Synopsis

Courtesy distrust.info

They were on a routine rescue mission when a helicopter crash left the two survivors stranded near an abandoned Arctic base. To find a way back, they must explore the base, moving from sector to sector, fighting the severe cold and searching for food and equipment.

There’s something else, out there. Something that should not exist. It, which enters sleep and feeds on them. Stalking in the shadows, waiting for the survivors to lower their guard and drift into slumber.

Staying awake seems like a safe option, but the lack of sleep is exhausting and leads to hallucinations. Eventually, the survivors will close their eyes and fall prey to the unknown, terrifying force – unless you can somehow strike a balance between exhaustion and falling into a sleep from which one might never awake.

Experience Distorted Reality

The longer the survivors stay awake, the more twisted their perceptions of reality will become. The manifestations of their madness can range from harmless sounds to dangerous hallucinations. Eventually, you won’t be able to tell reality from twisted fantasy. To your advantage, you can swap between survivors to see their surroundings, to observe, compare and analyze, and to determine what is and is not real.

Randomly generated levels

The levels are randomly generated. Each time you start a new game, you’ll encounter a new set of quests and tasks. Randomly appearing psychoses adds replay value to Distrust.

A variety of characters

Before setting out, you will choose two survivors out of a cast of 15 characters. Each team member has their own skills, which allow you to develop a survival plan and map out your strategy accordingly.

Multiple endings

Apart from the countless deaths you’ll experience, the game offers four endings. Some can be achieved by reaching certain checkpoints while you play. Others can be the result of a split-second decision.

DISTRUST Gameplay Experience

Before you begin, Distrust offers a tutorial to get you acquainted with the basic survival skills needed to navigate the game. After completing a few basic tasks, you’ll be ready to move on to the full game. Choose “Adventure” for the beginner experience, or “Trial” for the more advanced player seeking to unlock all playable characters, receive Steam achievements, and earn a secret ending – none of which are available is Adventure mode.

When you first begin, it’s imperative to understand the basic tools of the game: pause, map, inventory, and character selection. You’ll want to master multitasking between characters, as well as eating and sleeping in alternating shifts.

Each character has a core set of skills and inventory, and you’ll begin with only a few options to choose from. As you progress in Trial mode, you’ll unlock characters with specialized talents that help you in other aspects of Distrust. Irma is a well-rounded character that seems well suited, while the other two starting characters are short on starting inventory but long on weaknesses. As you play, it’s best to identify a favored survivor in your group, because it’s unlikely everybody will thrive in Arctic conditions.

As supplies dwindle, your characters suffer a range of penalties. It begins with hunger, fatigue, and cold. Some side-effects occur, adding to the challenge. Then it gets much worse: coma, and eventually death. Knowing these risks, it’s critical to choose your course of action wisely, and only heat or sleep in choice locations. Once you’ve stabilized your characters and looted all the buildings in that zone, it’s time to look at the map and move to the next zone.

While playing, I found that it’s good to have characters share the same living space, but occupy different areas of the map so to optimize productivity between them. Of course, if you obtain the ability to add a third character, clearing buildings becomes easier at the cost of food and rest.

DISTRUST Conclusion

To be fair, it takes a particular kind of person to choose strategy over shooting skills. You’ve got to be a thinker, and spend more time on crafting a plan than hatching a scheme to get the kill. I like that about Distrust, which I will admit, shut down my hopes and aspirations far too often. I managed to get through a few zones, but once things really go downhill, there’s no coming back. There’s also no way of quick-saving, which puts certainty to the end.

Distrust is a lot of things, but it’s certainly not forgiving. You can save and exit games, but once you die, there’s no going back. That would be my single biggest complaint: this is a single-player game, and restoring from save points makes a lot of sense. Until then, you’re faced with a real-world experience of challenge and peril. Do you trust yourself to survive this zone, or push ahead to the next? Perhaps that is where the title comes from.

I gave Distrust a few hours of my day, and I don’t regret it. Once I formulate a better plan, I’ll go at it again. I can comfortably recommend Distrust to the apocalypse-driven crowd who want to survive on wits and planning. -OC