Eleusis

About

Eleusis is a single player action game. It was developed by Nocturnal works and was released on October 16, 2013. It received neutral reviews from players.

Eleusis is a 3d first-person adventure game for Windows developed by Nocturnal Works using the technology of the unreal engine. It takes place in a seemingly abandoned village in Greece where the player character, while trying to seek refuge, finds himself in the center of a whirlwind of mysterious events.As the plot unfolds he finds clues that indicate that the village is a nest of a cult which p…

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Play Modes

Single-Player

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42%

Audience ScoreBased on 154 reviews

story18 positive mentions

grinding7 negative mentions

Atmospheric and spooky environment with good visuals and sound design that creates an immersive experience.
Interesting premise and story inspired by Greek mythology with multiple endings, providing a narrative appeal.
Decent gameplay for fans of walking simulators and puzzle-solving adventure games, especially when played with hostile NPCs enabled.

Excessive backtracking and slow movement speed make exploration tedious and frustrating.
Puzzles often lack clear direction or logic, leading to confusion and over-reliance on trial and error or walkthroughs.
Hostile NPCs and enemies are poorly designed, leading to instant deaths and annoyance rather than suspense or challenge.

story
90 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
20%
73%
7%
The story of the game is generally seen as simple, thin, and predictable, revolving around uncovering a cult and ancient Greek mythology within a mysterious village. While some find the premise and atmosphere intriguing, many criticize the narrative for being shallow, loosely connected, and heavily delivered through text rather than gameplay. Overall, it offers an interesting concept but lacks depth, emotional engagement, and satisfying plot development.
- “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.”
- “It certainly has its flaws, but it stands above mediocrity with a well thought story and excellent atmosphere.”
- “The puzzles are pretty lame, the story is cliché 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.”
- “Your character's motivations are never explained, the plot is paper thin, and the ending notable only for the reprieve it gives you from such a horrendous experience.”
- “The story, and its two endings, were tacked together like arse hair knotted with dingleberries.”
atmosphere
45 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
56%
35%
9%
The game is widely praised for its dark, spooky, and immersive atmosphere, enhanced by impressive graphics and ambient sounds that create a tense and unsettling mood. However, some find the atmosphere wears off quickly or is undermined by clunky gameplay, excessive walking, or poor writing, though it remains appealing to fans of atmospheric, story-driven walking simulators. Overall, the atmosphere is seen as the game’s strongest aspect, often comparable to well-known horror titles.
- “Fantastic game with great graphics, full of atmosphere and well worth a try especially if it's on sale.”
- “The atmosphere around the map is awesome especially with a good headset to fully enjoy the sounds of the game.”
- “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.”
- “While failing to capture the atmosphere of similar games of this genre, it also manages to be painfully uninteresting.”
- “Very poor writing ruins atmosphere.”
- “Also the dark atmosphere is not something to be proud of since it makes no sense either.”
graphics
45 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
58%
35%
7%
The graphics of Eleusis are generally praised for their realism, atmospheric lighting, and detailed visuals, especially given the small development team and use of Unreal Engine 3. While they contribute strongly to the eerie and immersive mood, some users note occasional performance issues and bland textures. Despite decent or good graphics, many feel the visual quality alone cannot compensate for the game's limited gameplay and narrative.
- “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.”
- “Extremely good for only 3 euro, 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. Unreal Engine does a good job, and the game does not do better or worse than the competition graphically.”
- “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.”
- “The graphics also found a way to annoy me though, so it didn't save my experience.”
- “First off, Eleusis has much worse performance than the quality of the graphics might lead you to expect.”
gameplay
28 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
14%
75%
11%
The gameplay centers on slow-paced exploration, simple puzzles, and item scavenging with frequent backtracking, which some find immersive but others consider tedious and lacking depth. Technical issues and inconsistent mechanics detract from the experience, resulting in mixed opinions where the gameplay is seen as simplistic, flawed, or even minimal by various players. Overall, it offers a modest, atmosphere-driven experience that may not appeal to those seeking more engaging or polished gameplay.
- “The gameplay includes exploration, some simple puzzles, and optional hostile NPCs that you have to avoid.”
- “The gameplay: the entirety of the game is spent exploring the map at a bit of a walking pace, finding various clues, figuring out what they're telling you to do, locating items you need, sometimes accidentally picking up items before you've found the clue that tells you what you need them for, then trying to figure out why you need them and where they go.”
- “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.”
- “The entire gameplay is structured around finding items and constantly backtracking to use them in places you visited several times already.”
- “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.”
- “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.”
grinding
7 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100%
Grinding in the game is widely criticized for being tedious and boring, characterized by excessive backtracking, confusing objectives, and dull scavenging in poorly designed, large environments. The repetitive enemy encounters and lack of engaging challenges contribute to a frustrating and uninteresting experience.
- “The backtracking felt tedious and boring.”
- “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.”
- “It's essentially an adventure game, but the puzzles are so obtuse and confusing that it feels like little more than one tedious fetch quest.”
stability
6 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100%
The game exhibits multiple stability issues, including frequent bugs, clipping problems, sound glitches, and occasional freezes. While it is generally optimized without noticeable lags, buggy NPC spawns and movement glitches detract from the overall experience, making it unstable and frustrating for some players.
- “This game had the potential but it failed in many aspects. The description is all wrong; this is not even mild horror but a walking simulator with bugs and a bunch of locked houses and key collecting the whole game. You do not even know what to do or where to go. If you enable NPCs, they spawn in buggy locations that can get you killed instantly. Overall, a buggy walking simulator.”
- “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 game is buggy and freezes too often.”
optimization
6 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
67%
33%
The game's optimization is generally decent, running smoothly without noticeable freezes or lags on mid-range systems, though performance can struggle on lower-end hardware, requiring significant settings reductions. Despite modest graphics quality and occasional pop-in issues, the game maintains stable performance, especially considering its low price and indie scale.
- “On a bright side, the game is old and seems to be nicely optimized; there are no noticeable freezes or lags.”
- “Extremely good for only 3 euros; the world is non-open and fairly linear but does not feel like it's on rails. The graphics are very pretty and performance is good. Unreal Engine does a good job, and the game performs on par with similar competition.”
- “I tried playing it on a laptop around minimum specs (2.53 GHz Core 2 Duo, Nvidia G210m, 4 GB RAM), had to turn all effects off and set resolution to 800x600 to get it to run smoothly, though it still caused my hardware to overheat.”
- “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
3 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100%
33%
The music in the game is minimal and unobtrusive, with fitting ambient tracks that contribute to the creepy atmosphere. However, some users feel the overall audio, including music, feels underdeveloped and lacks polish.
- “Same goes for the sound and music, there's not too much distracting music playing, and on the few occasions it does, it is very fitting.”
- “There's not too much distracting music playing, and when it does play, it fits very well with the game atmosphere.”
- “The ambient music is creepy and adds to the overall mood of the game, complementing the graphics and lighting effectively.”
- “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!”
humor
1 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100%
Users find the game's humor stems from its ironic death mechanic, where dying leads to repeated loading screens, creating an amusing and unintentionally funny experience.
replayability
1 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100%
The game Eleusis offers a short experience, typically completed in under two hours, with limited replay value beyond a minor choice at the end. As a result, many feel its price is not justified by its replayability.
- “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.”