Abtos Covert is a surveillance horror game. The genre, known to a much wider audience through the success of Five Nights at Freddy’s, has been kept eternally alive by smaller indie gems. This one is no exception.
It doesn’t reinvent the wheel, nor does it attempt to do so. It is a product priced appropriately, which respects your time and lasts long enough to make sure you won’t forget the stress and tension anytime soon, despite its short runtime.
Mount Abtos Is Fitting Setting
Abtos Covert takes place in Mount Abtos, during what seems like the twentieth-century, likely post World War II. You are a soldier tasked with keeping an eye out for intruders at a military outpost, placed in the middle of nowhere. From the little you can see through the near pitch-black darkness, you are surrounded by trees.
The objective is simple: keep the place safe during the night, for five nights in a row. Your shift begins at midnight and finishes at 8AM. Good luck.
A Great Tutorial
Short games often go overboard with their tutorials. Having a bit of a lengthy, explanatory tutorial in a massive RPG that will last you hundreds of hours, or even a 20 hour-long game, isn’t ideal, but it is fine. Doing so in an experience that is meant to last as long as a movie though, absolutely isn’t.
Abtos Covert nails this expertly, with a tutorial that works well in-universe, and starts immediately setting the stage for the tense five nights that lay ahead of you. Everything is explained to both you, the player, and the soldier, your character, by Captain Panos Karagiannis.
He communicates with you through the radio, and you can hear him throughout the entire playable area. He will tell you how the game works, while also telling the soldier how to handle his first night on the job.
The tools he presents you with are simple:
- You have fourteen cameras to keep track of. One of them doesn’t work, don’t worry about it.
- There are three motion sensors that warn you that something is coming. This will let you know which camera you’ll have to pay attention to.
- There are spotlights on the top floor, these will come in handy soon.
- There are lockers spread throughout the outpost big enough to fit a person (spoiler: you),
- The ventilation system needs to be turned on manually in each vent, this will matter later.
- Sometimes the fuse box malfunctions and turns your cameras off, just run out and quickly fix it.
Following the initial tutorial night, the Captain will give you new information as you need it. He never spells it out, and always says it in a way that would make sense in a conversation between a superior and someone who’s new at their job. These teachings are also intertwined with the game’s discreet lore, which is a great touch.
The Dangers That Lurk
Without spoiling too much, there are a few different entities lurking in Mount Abtos. Each of these enemies has to be handled differently, always by using brain, not brawn. Despite being a soldier, you’re never given a gun and have no real way to fight your enemies.
They approach in different ways, force you to interact with different areas of the game and, crucially, all need to be handled in a specific manner. This means that it is easy to defeat one of them, alone, but when they hunt you simultaneously, your heart rate will quickly elevate.
The extremely simple blueprint laid-out by Abtos Covert never becomes complicated or convoluted, but remains engaging and stressful for the game’s short runtime.
Handling all systems at once in the final two nights, while strange noises are heard throughout the house, is truly terrifying. The game expertly uses distraction and unexpected obstacles (like the fuse box) to make you second guess your memory, and that’s when Abtos Covert truly feels like a terrifying psychological horror.
The jumpscares are few and far between, the sound never becomes unnecessarily loud, but the sense of unease brought on by feeling like you’re completely alone is elevated to a whole other level when you start doubting your own actions. The fuse box will go out and you’ll forget which camera one of the enemies was last seen in because, when you were getting back to your post, the alarm started ringing and the kettle started whistling by itself.
Might the enemy have gone past already? Are you just waiting patiently for your inevitable doom?
Visuals And Sound- The Horror Game’s Secret
Built in the Unity engine, Abtos Covert is a humble project. With that being said, the very short scope— the game literally takes place entirely in the same military outpost— and the clever use of lighting make it look great.
The enemies can sometimes look a bit goofy, depending on how much time you spend looking at them, but, for the most part, the game looks quite good.
The visuals do add to the tension, but the soundscape is what really sells Abtos Covert. The sounds are varied enough to not become repetitive, so they always remain nerve-wracking. The game also cleverly uses sounds as important information cues, forcing you to pay attention to them.
The ambience and overall vibe of the game is excellent, and it is in a large part due to a great implementation of sound design.
Abtos Covert Is Scarier Than Most Horror Movies
For the price of a movie ticket, and with a runtime similar to a lot of movies, Abtos Covert is an excellent choice for someone looking for a couple of scares.
If you’re a fan of horror in general and haven’t given surveillance games a shot, this is also a great place to start. It is simple and does not overstay its welcome. It is available to purchase on Steam for 8,79€.
