The Haunted Hoard: Cayne (PC)

Cayne is a computer game released for free that is set in the same universe as the developer THE BROTHERHOOD’s previously released game Stasis to help generate interest in it and their upcoming title Devastation. Immediately, a set up like that sets off alarm bells, as these could quite easily be the ingredients of a threadbare title that is more advertisement or demo than a proper game, but Cayne, while it is a short experience, is surprisingly complete little experience that generates interest for Stasis by giving a preview of the style and substance you could expect from the larger game.

 

Cayne begins with a jarring transition from a futuristic and clinical hospital to a dark and gritty facility, the game immediately throwing the player into the thick of things as the hero Hadley is nine months pregnant, strapped to a table, and a hulking armored man is calling down a horrific looking device to extract the child from inside her. Hadley’s immediate focus is on escaping safely and with her unborn child intact, but the strange new place she’s found herself in is incredibly dangerous and hides the secret of why they were performing such an act on her in the first place, a truth she must uncover on her path to finding the way out. Hadley is an interesting protagonist in that she seems to have two extremes, one being how utterly terrified she is by her situation. Some spot on voice acting backs up her utter shock at the unusual and unbelievable events of the game, helping to root her as a regular woman who is caught up in a situation far beyond what she ever thought could happen to her. Oddly enough though, Hadley is also a bit of a wisecracker, often letting out snide comments on things she finds or attempting to tell a joke in the midst of what had once seemed a harrowing situation. While the game certainly could do with lightening the mood at times to prevent a facility that is mostly steeped in the horrific from being overbearing, her character becomes a little less consistent due to this choice. Perhaps a better case of lightening the mood involves Hadley being very conscious of her baby when she feels compelled to curse at less serious moments, often switching to a silly swear like “fudgesickles” as if to preserve the unborn child’s innocence despite the terrifying sights their mother sees as she searches for freedom.

The facility Hadley is in has a dark purpose lurking under its already overtly horrific appearance, and by the end of the game, you are given the information you need to have a full understanding of Cayne’s self-contained plot while the game also suggests a grander connection to the events outside this singular game’s context. Most of the story unfolds as Hadley moves about the facility, finding the PDAs of employees and important figures who worked there. Hadley plumbs these diaries, notices, and logs for information she needs to find her way out, these records happening to also contain the gradual unveiling of the situation’s true nature. Hadley isn’t entirely alone on her quest though, as early on she hears the voice of another man trapped in the facility who she talks to as a rock amidst the chaos, for almost everyone else she comes across is either hostile or a monster, be that figuratively or literally. The dialogues between Hadley and the captive man help flesh out both their characters while helping to give Hadley more reason to talk besides exclamations and jokes, balancing her out a bit to make a more fleshed out protagonist.

 

One thing that should be noted about Cayne though is the way it achieves horror is an unabashed embrace of blood and gore. Cayne aims to make the player’s skin crawl with its depictions of violence and viscera, not shying away from disturbing comments on fluids and degeneracy. Surprisingly, the visuals don’t push it too far, or at least not outside the realm of where a gory horror game might go. The game does use a lot of birthing imagery that gives its images more punch than what the graphics actually depict, but while it definitely aims to seem revolting to squeamish players, it never crosses any major lines into scenes or images that are hard to look at. It can definitely be a bit gratuitous, but it fits in line with the plot for the most part and definitely sells just how wrong the facility you find yourself in is while still making sense in the context of the place’s purpose.

A lot of what is interesting and impressive about Cayne is in the establishment of a disturbing atmosphere and a mystery that you feel compelled to unravel, so it’s a bit of a shame that Cayne’s gameplay has a few things holding it back from letting those elements stand out more. Cayne is a point and click adventure presented through an isometric view, Hadley traversing a small set of rooms that gradually open up as you solve puzzles and use items with each other or on things in the environment to make progress. Despite being set across only a small chunk of the facility, one thing that holds Cayne back from being a quick and captivating story is Hadley’s movement speed. With a couple large rooms and many cases of needing to move back and forth between them, Hadley’s slow pace begins to drag as you’re left just staring at the screen waiting for her to get where you need her to be. I realize that telling a pregnant woman to pick up her pace can seem harsh, but the game seems to ignore Hadley’s pregnancy when its convenient to the narrative. At first, the vulnerability of your baby will amplify any fall or bit of danger you encounter on your journey, but after the second or third time Hadley lands on her belly or survives an explosion without the baby being impacted, you quickly realize that Hadley’s iron gut is probably the safest place on the planet it could be. If it will make the allowance there, there’s little reason for it to be stringent about how the pregnancy affects Hadley’s slow animations and movement speed since that directly impacts gameplay, although preferably the situation would be inverted to maintain the mother’s horror of a baby in jeopardy to make things even more unsettling in the facility while also picking up the general pace of play.

 

Cayne’s puzzles can be a bit strange at times too. Many of them are actually pretty good uses of reincorporation, the player finding a device or bit of info that isn’t useful until later, and many of the logs the people write serve the purpose of fleshing out their role and laying down small details relevant to progression.  It’s somewhat impressive how often an old bit of information will suddenly become relevant, but the game has other kinds of puzzles like locating items and discovering where they can be useful. Here, things get a bit hazy, in part because the game has some unusual ideas about puzzle solutions but also because you’re finding sci-fi tools that aren’t fully explained. If you were asked the functions that come to mind when you hear the name “omnitool”, it’s not likely you completely encapsulated the uses it has in this title, and with other unknown and unusual devices and objects, Cayne sometimes doesn’t have a route to puzzle completion that feels wholly natural. There are some nice touches to help the player along if things aren’t coming together though. Hadley herself will make comments on strange things in the environment on return visits to a room, sometimes almost outright saying what needs to be done there as a sort of hint system that can’t be tapped at will. Perhaps the most interesting touch and one many adventure games could adapt is that if you hover your mouse over an object, a quick description appears in the bottom right corner of what the object is and if it has any pertinent details worth mentioning. While not every object is relevant or has much to talk about, the writing for these small blurbs is surprisingly well done and even evocative at points, sounding more like someone writing a small segment for a novel that has no visuals to rely on. Things can be difficult to figure out at times despite these small areas of assistance, but some of the harder ones to figure out are also the ones with the least available options, so it’s possible to push through and get to the better designed challenges later on.

THE VERDICT: While being a free game to generate interest in paid titles may raise some warning flags, Cayne justifies its existence with how much effort went into constructing a small but solid narrative helped along by gory imagery that does a good job of creating a disturbing atmosphere. Playability holds things back a bit thanks to slow movement and some obtuse puzzle solutions, but there are some more cleverly designed puzzles to carry the game forward as well as the gradual reveal of the horrific facility’s history and purpose to motivate the player to press on. Cayne’s visual polish for its disturbing sights and puzzles that utilize reincorporation well makes it feel like a complete title that supplements Stasis rather than simply advertises it.

 

And so, I give Cayne for PC…

A GOOD rating. An excellent example of the kind of game a developer can put out for free to drum up interest in a larger title, Cayne uses the assets and design ideas from a larger title to make something standalone, a brief but full narrative with obstacles to overcome and a character to become invested in. Hadley certainly could have used a speed boost and some puzzles should be better telegraphed to avoid the stretches of the imagination needed, but most of the game is a mix of visuals and story that sell the situation well with activities that are reasonably linked to the gradual push to escape the quickly deteriorating facility. Its horror aims to make the player uneasy and it certainly has the tools to do so, so while some players may not pick it up because they might not be able to stomach it, others will have an experience that mostly handles its dark atmosphere quite well despite its sometimes misplaced moments of humor.

 

Cayne shows that a free game’s quality doesn’t need to come from the lack of a price tag. It’s a well built horror point-and-click that does falter some, but for the most part what works could mean that the developers could have charged a bit and still earned some praise and interest in the title. It may be short, but Cayne feels complete, leaving a good taste in the player’s mouth so that the idea of playing Stasis is one born from wanting something similar in feel rather than needing a conclusion to a disguised demo.