Eleusis

About

"Eleusis" is a single-player 3D adventure game that utilizes the Unreal Engine for Windows. The player seeks refuge in a seemingly abandoned Greek village, only to find themselves in the midst of a cult's dark plans to revive a powerful force through an ancient ritual. The game features an interesting plot, ingenious graphics, and a splendid atmosphere, with a focus on exploration, information gathering, and puzzle-solving based on actual history, mythology, and technology.

Genres & Tags

Play Modes

Single-Player Play through the game's story or campaign solo

42%

Audience ScoreBased on 298 reviews

story36 positive mentions

stability12 negative mentions

The graphics are decent and create a spooky atmosphere, enhancing the overall experience.
The premise of the story, involving ancient Greek mythology and a mysterious village, is intriguing.
The game offers a unique exploration experience, allowing players to uncover the story at their own pace.

The gameplay is slow and tedious, with excessive backtracking and a lack of clear direction, leading to frustration.
The puzzles are often illogical and poorly designed, making progression feel more like a chore than an engaging challenge.
The horror elements are minimal, with enemies being more annoying than threatening, detracting from the intended suspense.

story
176 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
20%
73%
7%
The story of the game is centered around a character who finds himself in a mysterious village in modern Greece, uncovering a cult linked to ancient Greek mythology. While some players appreciate the atmospheric and spooky elements, many criticize the narrative for being predictable, thin, and overly reliant on familiar tropes, with significant portions of the story conveyed through text rather than gameplay. Overall, the story is seen as a decent concept that suffers from execution issues, leading to a mixed reception among players.
- “On top of that, I did like the premise of the story and its connections to ancient Greek mythology - you play a character who finds himself stuck on a lonely road in modern Greece after his car breaks down, and discovers a strange village close by where everyone seems to be missing.”
- “Its story about cults and the occult is interesting and feels great to unfold it little by little.”
- “Great story with an even better atmosphere.”
- “The puzzles are pretty lame, the story is cliche and boring, every inch of the map looks identical so navigating it with no good inventory map (no map at all for 60% of the game) is miserable.”
- “The story is predictable and the gameplay is not smooth at all and it is overall a pretty boring experience.”
- “The storyline is nothing special - some mysterious cult trying to raise an evil god - and the twists and turns can be seen from a mile away.”
graphics
90 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
58%
38%
4%
The graphics of Eleusis are generally praised for their decent quality, especially considering the game's age and development scale, with many reviewers noting the effective use of lighting and atmosphere to create a spooky environment. While some players appreciate the realistic textures and overall visual design, others feel that the graphics alone cannot compensate for the game's lack of engaging gameplay and story. Overall, the visuals are a highlight, but they are often overshadowed by the game's other shortcomings.
- “Graphics are quite amazing for a two-man job, with nice and crisp textures, while shadows and ambient occlusion are excellent and provide a decent spooky atmosphere.”
- “Fantastic game with great graphics, full of atmosphere and well worth a try especially if it's on sale.”
- “The spooky ambient noises are fitting and the great graphics in general work well to establish a creepy atmosphere.”
- “The size of the map might also be connected to the horrendous performance I received on a PC that is more than capable of running the game, which graphically consists of little more than bland textures, pop-in prone foliage, and embarrassing particle effects.”
- “Uninspiring visuals, few puzzles with lots of walking, didn't really feel a story hook that would make me want to continue the game.”
- “The graphics also found a way to annoy me though, so it didn't save my experience.”
atmosphere
88 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
55%
36%
9%
The atmosphere in the game is frequently praised for its spooky and immersive qualities, enhanced by impressive graphics and sound design that create a tense and unsettling mood. While many players appreciate the dark and mysterious environment, some note that the atmosphere can feel superficial or wear off quickly, and that it doesn't compensate for shortcomings in gameplay or story depth. Overall, the game successfully establishes a creepy ambiance that appeals to fans of atmospheric horror, despite some criticisms regarding content and execution.
- “Spooky, atmospheric game, with an interesting story, albeit a bit too short.”
- “The spooky ambient noises are fitting and the great graphics in general work well to establish a creepy atmosphere.”
- “It certainly has its flaws, but it stands above mediocrity with a well thought story and excellent atmosphere.”
- “While failing to capture the atmosphere of similar games of this genre, it also manages to be painfully uninteresting.”
- “The game just didn't feel very adventurous; it was more or less a boring experience, although it did succeed in creating a creepy atmosphere.”
- “Also, the dark atmosphere is not something to be proud of since it makes no sense either.”
gameplay
54 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
15%
78%
7%
The gameplay of the game has received mixed reviews, with many players finding it tedious and simplistic, primarily revolving around slow exploration, item scavenging, and backtracking. While some appreciate the immersive environment and atmospheric design, others criticize the lack of engaging mechanics and a coherent story, leading to a generally underwhelming experience. Overall, the gameplay is seen as a significant drawback, with many players expressing frustration over its execution and repetitive nature.
- “The gameplay, while short (it took me about 4 hours to finish the entire game), is rather good and works well with the environment to immerse you.”
- “Overall, I think this is a good little game made by a small team that doesn't try to punch above its weight but instead focuses on good gameplay and an immersive environment with great sound design.”
- “The entire gameplay is structured around finding items and constantly backtracking to use them in places you visited several times already.”
- “The worst part about the game is the gameplay itself, which is nothing but walking around in a large but empty world at a very slow pace.”
- “Gameplay (up to half an hour in) consists largely of scavenging for tools in a needlessly large and dismally lit environment, which grew tedious even in the brief time I spent on it.”
stability
12 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100%
The game's stability is marred by numerous bugs, including clipping issues, NPC spawning problems, and sound glitches, which detract from the overall experience. While it is optimized to avoid noticeable freezes or lags, players report frequent freezing and a lack of clarity in gameplay objectives. Overall, the game struggles with stability, making it less enjoyable despite its potential.
- “This game had the potential but it failed in many aspects. The description of the game is all wrong; this is not even mild horror, it is a walking simulator with bugs and a bunch of locked houses and key collecting. The whole game is confusing, and you do not even know what to do or where to go. They did this to prolong this very short game. If you enable NPCs, they spawn in some buggy locations that can get you killed instantly. Overall, it's a mild walking simulator that could be worth a try since it is short, but I would advise you not to unless you get it for free or really cheap.”
- “Physics system works, but there's a lot of clipping. You can push objects through walls, and the sound glitches when you drop items.”
- “The other flaw is that the game is buggy (at least for me); it freezes too often.”
grinding
12 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100%
Players find the grinding aspect of the game to be tedious and unengaging, with repetitive enemy encounters and excessive backtracking contributing to a lack of depth and excitement. The puzzles are often described as easy yet frustratingly obtuse, leading to a gameplay experience that feels more like a series of monotonous fetch quests rather than an immersive adventure. Overall, the combination of these elements detracts from the game's potential for suspense and enjoyment.
- “The backtracking felt tedious and boring.”
- “Trite puzzle design; tedious backtracking; threadbare and predictable story drain the tension fairly quickly; short length.”
- “Gameplay (up to half an hour in) consists largely of scavenging for tools in a needlessly large and dismally lit environment, which grew tedious even in the brief time I spent on it.”
optimization
12 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
67%
16%
17%
The game's optimization is generally praised, especially considering its age, with no noticeable freezes or lags reported. However, some players experienced significant performance issues on lower-end hardware, requiring them to reduce graphical settings drastically. Overall, while the game performs well for its price point, its graphical quality does not always align with the performance expectations, particularly on less capable systems.
- “On a bright side, the game is old and seems to be nicely optimized; there are no noticeable freezes or lags.”
- “Performance was great, but given the graphical quality, I am not shocked.”
- “Extremely good for only 3 euros; the world is non-open and fairly linear, but it does not feel like it's on rails. Graphics are very pretty and performance is good. If this was a big studio game, I would have demanded a higher poly count and a more open world, but as it is not, I'm fine with this. Unreal Engine does a good job, and the game does not perform better or worse than the competition graphically.”
- “First off, Eleusis has much worse performance than the quality of the graphics might lead you to expect.”
- “The size of the map might also be connected to the horrendous performance I received on a PC that is more than capable of running the game, which graphically consists of little more than bland textures, pop-in prone foliage, and embarrassing particle effects.”
music
6 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
17%
33%
50%
The music in the game is described as minimal and fitting, enhancing the creepy atmosphere without being distracting. However, overall impressions suggest that the game's audio elements, like its graphics and lighting, feel underdeveloped and untested.
- “The sound and music are well-balanced; there's not too much distracting music playing, and on the few occasions it does, it is very fitting.”
- “Conclusion: this game, even with good graphics, lighting, and creepy ambient music, seemed untested and underdeveloped. I would advise not to waste your time with it!”
- “The sound and music are not too distracting; on the few occasions it does play, it is very fitting.”
- “The sound and music are not too distracting; on the few occasions it does play, it is very fitting.”
humor
2 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100%
Players find humor in the game's repetitive loading screens that occur after dying, highlighting the absurdity of having to navigate multiple loading sequences just to restart. This quirky design choice adds a comedic element to the gameplay experience.
- “The fact that if you die, you enter a loading screen to the beginning, so you can click continue and enter another loading screen, is hilarious.”
replayability
2 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100%
Players find "Eleusis" to be too short, with a typical playtime of under two hours, and lacking significant replayability, offering little incentive to revisit the game beyond a single decision at the end. Many feel that the price point does not justify the limited content available for multiple playthroughs.
- “Overall, I enjoyed much of Eleusis, but to put it bluntly, fifteen dollars is too much to ask, because it is not only too short (I beat my first run in less than two hours), it lacks replay value, save for one small decision at the end.”

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4h Median play time

4h Average play time

4-4h Spent by most gamers

*Based on 4 analyzed playthroughs

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