Varney Lake | Steam Deck Review
Cryptozoology has fascinated me for years. There’s something incredibly intriguing about the possibility of creatures existing in the wild that scientists haven’t catalogued yet. Cryptids don’t really appear in games much, though. LCB Game Studio is here to remedy that. Varney Lake is the second installment in their planned trilogy of anthology games called “Pixel Pulps.” I was captivated by my short time with this title, and fellow cryptid fans will probably enjoy Varney Lake as well.
A Bat Out of Hell
Varney Lake takes place in two different years: 1954 and 1981. We see a group of three friends converge in both time periods, but in vastly different circumstances. In 1954, Jimmy, Doug, and Christine are enjoying a lazy summer in the Varney Lake area. They’ve founded their own club called “The Only Childs Club” (you can probably guess why it’s named that) and are trying to raise enough money to buy the local drive-in movie theater. They’re horror film aficionados and desperately want to reopen the abandoned area and share their passion with the other residents.
Their plans are derailed when they find a helpless old man in a barn, though. After covering the windows due to the strange man’s pleas to shut out the sunlight, they discover they just helped a vampire come back to life. Their lives will never be the same after this encounter. Jumping forward to 1981, the group are now adults being interviewed for a book about vampires. They’ve all been traumatized by the events that occurred, but the true horrors of what they went through aren’t revealed immediately. When they are, though, it’s genuinely spine-chilling to find out what happened. There are also Easter eggs and nods to the previous game in the series, Mothmen 1966. You don’t need to have played that title to enjoy Varney Lake, but it’s a nice touch that connects these entries into a shared universe.
Grab Your Silver Crosses
The visual style of Varney Lake feels refreshingly retro. I adored the pixel art, and the color palette mostly consists of shades of yellow, blue, and green. The sounds are also appropriately old-school and added an extra layer to the overall experience. This may not be an appealing factor for some players, but it does evoke the sense of playing this on an older console.
Varney Lake’s story unfolds gradually, despite being a very short experience. I thoroughly enjoyed the pacing and felt like it kept the suspense taut. I was desperate to find out what would happen next, and couldn’t put my Steam Deck down at all. I devoured this game in one sitting. It only took me an hour to complete, but this runtime is mostly due to my reading speed.
One aspect that I wasn’t a fan of were the minigames. At certain points in the story, you’re required to engage in activities such as fishing and a unique spin on solitaire. They are folded naturally into the narrative and are a crucial part of the story; they just weren’t my cup of tea. You can play these minigames as much as you want during your playthrough, but I found them to be tedious and could only stomach playing through them once to completion. Having to continuously click on text to move my cursor didn’t help in my enjoyment of these experiences. This is just a personal take, and I do think some players will genuinely enjoy these games and will play through them multiple times.
The Final Bite
Varney Lake is a short but sweet narrative experience that holds you in its thrall. The story shifts between being joyful and horrifying, and I enjoyed LCB Game Studios’ take on vampires. The visual style and sound design are delightfully retro, and while the minigames weren’t my cup of tea, they do fit naturally into the plot. Anyone looking for a bite-sized visual novel that’ll send chills up their spine are in for a treat with Varney Lake.
To hear me talk more about Varney Lake, be sure to listen to the May 3, 2023 episode of The Gaming Outsider podcast around the 1:27:17 time stamp.
This review is based on a Steam copy of Varney Lake provided by Stride PR for coverage purposes. It is also available on PlayStation, Xbox, and Nintendo Switch.
Varney Lake
$9.99
Pros
- Cryptid Representation
- Delightful Retro-Inspired Graphics and Sounds
- A Brilliantly Constructed Narrative
- Stands Alone but Has Ties to the Previous Game in the Series
Cons
- Extremely Short
