Volume

Whether you’re looking for a story that might shed some light about where society could go horribly wrong over the next few decades, or if you just want to recapture the magic of Metal Gear Solid: VR Missions, Volume is one of those games that demonstrates how cool independently developed games can be.

It’s not the deepest or the most challenging stealth game out there and there are times when it can feel like an additional mode for a larger, more elaborate video game, but for the most part, Volume is a highly entertaining stealth game that puts immediacy and accessibility above elaborate gadgets or mechanics.

The story, characters, level editor, and overall aesthetic are just really cool bonuses to an excellent stealth game.

Volume is not perfect, but it is a relentlessly fun, interesting and engrossing stealth game that looks to have legs thanks to an excellently simple level creator.

Volume offers us a game that combines interesting classic stealth game mechanics with fresh elements on one hundred levels with very good puzzles and brilliant design. Even it has some problems with the community generated contents, the new game from Mike Bithell is a full recommendation.

Mike Bithell's long-awaited Thomas Was Alone follow-up is a bigger, fancier puzzle game, but one in which the levels don't quite come together as much as the Robin Hood plot. [Nov 2015, p.109]

Volume gives you a good range of interesting means to sneak through a hundred quite creative levels filled with sneaky puzzles. A hundred is a bit too many, but on the other hand, the game does get more interesting the further you get into it. To me, Volume is essentially a puzzle game with a stealth theme. It is a quite good puzzle game, but for a stealth game, the room for creativity and impulse is too limited to my taste.

Volume is a bit of a mixed bag. Underutilised voice performances and some really nasty technical issues stand in the way of the title getting top marks. However, it's difficult for us to deny that the actual minute-to-minute gameplay is damn fun.

Mike Bithell once again unleashes another creative title onto the indie scene, but Volume's addictive sneaking and fantastic cast can't distract from the lacking story.

An enjoyable homage to old school Metal Gear Solid, but a lack of challenge and an overbearing story means it isn’t quite a stealth classic in its own right.

An interesting take on stealth action with a flawed checkpoint system and a serious lack of challenge.

Volume’s strengths are primal but simple, at times feeling like a Crossy Road-style time-passer with a cyberpunk sheen. It tries but ultimately doesn’t say much of modern society or governments beyond the elementary. Indeed, it is the modern videogame incarnate, warts and all.

Volume deserves credit for being fresh and accessible, but after a couple of dozen levels or so, it starts to grow repetitive. It was easy to pick up the controller and play, but without a lot of new innovations and a middling storyline, it was also entirely too easy to take breaks and move onto something else.