Total Chaos review

Two things I learned surviving the brutality and madness of Total Chaos:

1. Sometimes a constant fear of death forces you to slow down and truly appreciate the detail and craft the developers put into their world.
2. I’m still a big chicken in scary games, but Total Chaos’s addictive loop of craft what you can, fight defensively and explore every dark corner kept me going until the very end.

Total Chaos started life as a Doom 2 mod, and it feels personal and well thought out. A few glaring issues come from moving from PC to console, and the final act feels rushed, but next to what turned out to be an awesome experience, those are small. Over roughly 12 hours on Xbox, it was a masterclass in building dread and intrigue.

A descent into madness on Fort Oasis

The game opens on a boat in a storm: crashing waves, lightning, a mining pickaxe hitting the window, and a flash of someone on the boat with you. Then you’re on the docks of Fort Oasis, a fictional abandoned mining island, with no direction at all.

You instinctively wander the shoreline until you find a way inland, into a decaying, monster-filled maze of paths, tunnels, towns and mines. Over nine chapters, surviving only on what you can find and craft, you experience a truly unique and terrifying descent into madness. I still had questions at the end, but I think I understand what it was about and why reality becomes so fractured. It deals with loss, abandonment, fragile mental health, disease and tragedy. The atmosphere isn’t the only heavy thing here.

The voice on the radio

In the first chapter you meet the game’s other main character: a mysterious voice on a radio who promises to help if you follow his directions deeper inland. When you’re constantly fighting to survive and never get to relax, he’s a great idea. He’s part guide, so you never feel completely lost, and part companion, so you never feel completely alone. I was genuinely relieved every time the radio crackled and he started talking.

You also piece together what happened on the island from letters, photos and cassette tapes. A few chapters in you meet a second character, Tyler, and start to wonder who you should actually believe. The game could have relied on notes alone, but the superb voice acting made me feel connected to the mystery and gave me the confidence to survive a little longer.

Madness

The deeper you go, toward the Fort Oasis center and down into the mines, the more twisted things get. Monsters are joined by visions of what feels like a living hell, and a madness mechanic drives home the game’s themes of mental health and fear:

• It distorts your view, warping the screen almost like tunnel vision.
• It physically changes the level, opening secret tunnels and shortcuts.
• It brings out new monsters, which you may want to avoid if you’re going for the true good ending.

The only way out of madness is to reach the next fresh save point, which returns the world to normal.

Unforgettable places

With great graphics, music and voice acting, there are some truly memorable areas: a half-submerged prison, a monster-filled police station, the scariest library I’ve ever experienced, and catacombs where you can only see by lighter, and then by flares underwater.

The monsters are terrifying and ruthless, and a few standout bosses are more about outwitting than fighting. I won’t spoil them, but my hands were sweating and my heart was pounding more than once.

The game knows how hard it is, too. If you decide right at the start of chapter one to just get back on your boat and leave, you trigger the end credits and an achievement for leaving early. After making it to the real ending, that honestly seems like a reasonable choice.

Combat: Doom’s engine, not Doom’s pace

You can feel the Doom 2 engine in the movement and combat, but the pacing makes it its own game. I expected a reskin of fast, chaotic gunfights. Instead you creep around with little health and few ways to heal, trying your best not to get hit. Carry too much and you slow down and get hungry faster.

My play style quickly became: land a few hits or a charged attack, back off and let stamina recover while avoiding aggressive attacks, then repeat. There’s a parry, but like in most first-person games, I found it rarely worked. Constantly moving and backing up was more reliable.

Add crafted weapons that break quickly, and you get a strangely addictive, almost strategic loop. I often used several save slots and replayed sections to come out with more inventory or better health for the next area. More than once I got stuck with almost no healing or weapons and had to load an older save. Simple puzzles break up the fighting: finding keys, or working your way around an area to approach from a different angle.

I honestly haven’t finished a Doom game since the early pre-3D days, probably because I got bored of constant running and shooting. Total Chaos avoids that by making you play defensively.

Where it stumbles

It’s not perfect:

• Crafting on console is clunky. The menu is clearly built for mouse and keyboard. On a controller you step through items one at a time, press a button to add each one to the bench, and another to build. If you make a mistake, it’s faster to back out and start over than to move items back.
• Difficulty spikes and save traps. I saved over an old save instead of using a spare slot and was stuck replaying a tough section until I got lucky. Tip: spread your saves across multiple slots.
• Bleeding is brutal. You lose health constantly, and without bandages you’ll die. Combine that with a bad save and you might not be able to finish. I can see a lot of players giving up here.
• The final act changes genre. Partway through chapter 8, inside the Fort Oasis center, while you’re hunting three parts of a hazard suit, you’re locked into gauntlet rooms fighting waves of the hardest enemies with whatever you had left. In the final chapter you lose every item you’ve collected and are handed guns and boxes of ammo for dodge-shoot-run wave fights. After an entire game of deliberate, slow pacing, it’s disorienting. It was the first time it felt like a Doom clone. There are still some creepy moments and a bit of awe at the end, but nothing as effective as the chapters before it.

Verdict: a dark, unforgettable indie horror

Despite those issues, the addictive loop, excellent level design and intriguing story kept me hooked and made the flaws easy to forgive. The difficulty forced me to slow down and rethink my approach, which made it a more personal experience I couldn’t put down. At its core, Total Chaos is a sad, dark story about people dealing with serious mental illness, disease and tragedy, wrapped in a nightmare unlike anything I’ve played.

I don’t know if my heart can take another run for the true good ending, even knowing what’s coming. But I’m very glad I stuck with it to the end. If you’re looking for an amazing indie game, Total Chaos is well worth your time.