Shattered [Meta Quest 3] | REVIEW

I’m a sucker for mixed reality and love playing puzzlers on the Meta Quest, so there’s no doubting that Shattered has been one of my most anticipated titles on the platform. It managed to surpass all of my expectations too, and whilst there are one or two small issues, it offers a genuinely brilliant puzzling experience that’ll keep players hooked in from start to end.

Check out some screenshots down below:

Shattered puts players in the shoes of Jessica, who finds herself investigating the Greyvale Asylum as she tries to unravel a dark conspiracy… or is she? The game plays with the player’s mind with its storytelling, blending together Jessica’s memories into playable sequences as you try to unravel what’s real and what’s fake in the eerie world. With flashbacks of interactions with a variety of characters and objects in the environment filling in the lore, there’s plenty to uncover as you get to the bottom of the mystery. It can be really clever, though I’d be lying if I said there weren’t a couple of moments when playing where the fragmented setup of the storytelling couldn’t get a little bit confusing – it all comes together neatly by the end, though.

The big hook of Shattered are its mixed reality features, which sees the players bringing the puzzling of Jessica’s world into their own living room. This means setting up special portals on your wall that allow you to peer into a variety of different locales, with each bringing with them characters to interact with, puzzles to solve, and objects to collect as you piece everything together. There’ll also be objects that you’re able to physically bring into your living space, allowing players to further interact with them in order to find additional clues. It might be a case of bringing in an adjustable light that you can use to highlight objects in the environment, a tool that can be used to smash a glass window, a painting that needs to be removed to unveil a hidden secret, or even a doorway that you’re able to open to further explore your surroundings, just to list a few early examples. There are lots of different things to interact with, with each of the game’s ten levels bringing with them an abundance of little surprises that play into the puzzle-solving in an immersive and creative manner.

“I’ve never played anything quite like it before, with Shattered a brilliant demonstration of the magic of mixed reality.”

It all works really, really well, with it always satisfying to pull something into your living space and use it to solve a puzzle. Each level continually opens up additional areas to explore too, with the first level alone seeing you scour through two patient rooms in Greyvale Asylum, a hallway, a ventilation shaft, and a maintenance room – each of which is made accessible through portals that have come with some of the objects that you’ve set up within your own living space. It’s one of those things that’s better to experience yourself just to appreciate how cool it is, but believe me, it’s some of the most effective and clever use of mixed reality that I’ve seen on the platform.

This does bring with it a couple of small issues though. For one, you need a decent space to play in, with players expected to move a lot of objects around their room as they solve each of the game’s puzzles. I was playing in a pretty sizable living room, but because of the layout of my furniture, I did find myself awkwardly shuffling things around just to make enough space on a few occasions. There were a couple of instances where placing the items could be a little bit awkward too, though again, that was probably due to just requiring a bit more space. Don’t get me wrong: you can make it work within a smaller space, but you might feel a little bit cramped and find yourself shuffling the objects you pull into your living space around a lot more regularly.

Check out some screenshots down below:

These are small issues in what is otherwise a captivating experience though, with Shattered’s puzzling keeping me fully engaged from start to end. There are some genuinely clever puzzles here that are each satisfying to unravel, with some requiring a bit of logic, some requiring you to carefully study your surroundings, some requiring you to use your handy torch to find hidden secrets, and some requiring you to use the objects you find in a creative manner. I found myself stumped on plenty of occasions, but never in a frustrating way, with the solution ALWAYS in front of you – you’ve just got to find it. Here’s a tip: if you pull an object into your living space, study it from ALL angles… you never know what it might be hiding. And if you do get stuck? The handy hint system will give you three clues per puzzle, with each pointing you in the right direction without giving too much away.

Developer: PlaySide Studios
Publisher: Oculus Publishing
Platform(s): Meta Quest 3 (Reviewed)
Website: https://www.meta.com/en-gb/experiences/shattered/5816339365118691/