IndieGo #35: Reporting for Overseer Duty!
Five Nights at Freddy’s animatronic characters are undoubtedly unnerving. But at least some of the game’s unsettling mood stems from having players monitor staticky surveillance cameras. Intermittently, one of the four creatures would interrupt the tedium of staring at a feed, resulting in an effective jump scare.
The success of Freddy’s spawned an entire sub-genre of games where players monitor locations and report on any anomalies. With The Overseer and The Overseer: Field Trials, indie developer Mars offers a pair of worthwhile implementations of the anomaly game.
The Overseer, $4.99
The Overseer tasks players with monitoring three different locations: a modern house, a bowling alley, and an office. The first two settings have four cameras positioned around their interiors, while the business office has five rooms that need to be monitored. You can freely swap between the camera feeds, ideally absorbing every detail about the location. After an indeterminable length of time, anomalies appear. Depending on which of the four difficulty settings you’ve selected, these can range from unmistakable events like strangers walking about to more minor occurrences like a misplaced object. For those uninterested in frightening glitches in the system, there’s even a ‘kindergarten’ option with kid-friendly incidents.
When an anomaly occurs, you have one minute to report it from a list of different incidents. These range from camera malfunctions, object variations, lighting changes, or even the presence of an intruder. Expectedly, categorizing these peculiarities can feel frantic in the heat of the moment, especially since the game ends if you don’t correctly report anomalies in sixty seconds. Occasionally, classification is a bit obtuse, with Overseer recommending players to use the “Other” category when reporting. Since multiple anomalies can occur simultaneously, things can feel a bit overwhelming.
Using a text-based checklist to report irregularities is appropriately nerve-wracking. Confirmations or rejections take several seconds to occur, ratcheting up the tension. But I wish using the mouse to click on the abnormalities was possible. That might reduce some of the frustration associated with finicky reporting. That said, some of the fun stems from oversights. I was certain that sectioned-off bowling ally lanes and a wayward ball weren’t part of the original feed. But during a replay, I realized I was gaslighting myself.
The Overseer: Field Trials, $3.99
With Overseer: Field Trials, developer Mars abandons the fixed perspective of security camera feeds, allowing players to freely walk around two spooky settings. Like Kotake Create’s The Exit 8, advancement only occurs when you spot inaccuracies. Fail to identify the anomalies and you’ll loop back to the starting point. As such, Field Trials’ liminal spaces can feel like an urban purgatory. But on the upside, there are progress indictors, so you won’t feel completely helpless.
Initially, you’re let loose in an outdoor storage facility before moving onto a moonlit harbor. Like Overseer, Field Trials is built with Unreal Engine 5. But where the first game exhibited movement only from exceptional features like ceiling fans and the intermittent intruder, there’s a bit more visual variation in these environments. Your trusty flashlight peers into each murky recess, illuminating features and generating reflections. This time out, you won’t feel quite as isolated, as they’re a stray cat walking about.
After studying all the details for the reference facility, you’ll turn a corner and be tasked with spotting any differences. Expectedly, some are startling, with one abnormal anomaly accompanied by a succession of thunderous crashes. After encountering that, settling down to pinpoint smaller differences was expectedly difficult. With over fifty anomalies scattered across the two settings and a tablet that can be used to perceive overlooked incongruities, Overseer: Field Trials justifies its four-dollar price. If you’re unconvinced, there’s a demo on Steam that provides a solid taste of the paid experience.
