illum

"illum" is one of literally thousands of student projects infesting Steam. It's from University of Southern California. While student projects tend to be better quality than most "amateur" made games, we must still question what value such projects have for gamers. As with all student projects, this isn't really a fully fleshed out game, it's just the result of an academic exercise, and as such it has much more limited value as a game than a professionally developed game would have. Educational institutions should not be using Steam as a dumping ground for homework assignments (especially if the students didn't even pass the course). Sure, it helps their marketing and helps the students feel good about themselves, but this is another case of a business putting themselves before the needs of gamers. The students phoned in the graphics when making this short third person narrative adventure game. All you do in this "experience" is journey with a light friend to connect light gems and awaken a dormant kingdom by hooking up all the lights. In terms of visuals, this features fairly low quality low poly 3D graphics which will deter a lot of gamers, understandably. Gaming is a vi…

The game has really cool looks and musics playing, but the puzzles barely have a visible solution to them, and even if you see them, the controls (especially the jump) make it TERRIBLE to complete.

Very cute and simple, but way too short. The game is basically only just in the "about to get good" phase at the time it ends. It's basically just a short tutorial and then one less handheld puzzle, and then you get a cool cinematic that feels like "woah we gonna get more world" and nope that's the ending actually. If this game was longer, and did more with it's concepts, I'm sure this would be an absolute delight - but as it is, it just feels like a tech demo at best.

Wished there was more. illum is a short 3D puzzle/adventure game about lighting the world. The level design, puzzles, and animations are nice. I didn't expect myself wanting to play more of it since it was short and has a really good concept. My only complaints are the camera and controls. They are rough, not customizable, and sometimes nauseating.

Beating the game is faster than light

High praise to the music/sound design - it was simple yet effective in creating a mystical and thoughtful atmosphere. Really lovely.