“Phantom Abyss” lands on October 20, 2022, in the Xbox Game Pass. There, you must navigate deadly temples full of traps – and use the missteps of your fellow players.
What kind of game is this? “Phantom Abyss” is developed by Team WIBY and published by Devolver Digital. It launched on June 22, 2021, on Steam and has been in Early Access since then.
The 1.0 update on Steam, which is the official launch, is currently still announced for 2022 according to the roadmap. However, the game is already coming to Xbox Series X|S and also in the Xbox Game Pass – starting October 20. This was announced by Devolver Digital in a new trailer.
What is it about? “Phantom Abyss” resembles a kind of Indiana Jones game, where you, as a temple explorer, must survive deadly traps and solve tricky puzzles to steal holy relics from the depths of the temple.
It depends on your skill how you survive spikes, flames, and all sorts of other obstacles in the procedurally generated temples.
The deeper you go into the temples, the more difficult they become – however, you can also get upgrades that grant you more abilities. Additionally, you can use different whips, for example, for swinging. Important: You can only attempt each temple once.
If players die, the attempt is over, and you have to head to another temple. However, death is important for the game – this is where the “asynchronous multiplayer” comes into play.
This is how you “play together”: The runs of deceased players remain in the form of a “phantom” in the temple, which can be seen by players attempting the temple anew.
This allows you to track exactly where traps are lurking or difficulties lie – at least up to the point where the phantom player died. Moreover, you can collect the whips of deceased players, which may grant you new abilities.
These ghosts are supposed to be visible across platforms after the launch on Xbox due to crossplay. The temple runs remind of a similar title recently introduced by the makers of Dead by Daylight:
How does Phantom Abyss perform on Steam?
Here is the situation on Steam: “Phantom Abyss” is still in Early Access and can currently be described as a “hidden gem”: It is rated “very positive,” with 87% positive reviews out of a total of 1,671 ratings.
Positives include:
- The design of the temples
- The fast and fluid movement in the game
- Overall, the gameplay is considered fun
- The challenge aspect of the individual temples
However, there are also criticisms. On one hand, the game can be very difficult, especially for newcomers, and on the other hand, one shouldn’t hope for much story – the gameplay is likely the main point of the game. But there is another problem: the currently vanishingly small player base.
When the game launched in June 2021, the peak number of players was 1,584 concurrent players, but it dropped sharply afterward. In July ’21, there were still 206 players on average, with a peak of 651, but afterward, the player numbers dropped to double digits. In September 2022, the average stood at 10.8 and the peak at 36 players.
While you play a run alone, the phantoms of other players play an important role. This is problematic when there are only a few temple runners around.
It is to be hoped that the Game Pass release with the crossplay component can perhaps help here. Also, the “full” release of the game might generate interest again – as the 1.0 update is expected to bring new content in the form of whips, relics, traps, and the conclusion of the story to the game.
Publisher Devolver Digital has more unusual games planned, by the way. In 2022, for example, “Wizard with a Gun” is also set to be released.
