The mystery genre is one of the most popular genres of fiction, as is science fiction. Yet, strangely, those two don’t cross paths anywhere near enough in the video game space. CONSORTIUM VR aims to address that issue in the virtual space.
CONSORTIUM VR places you in the position of a Peacekeeper, in the not too distant future, on a special plane that monitors events around the globe. Before you know it, there’s a murder on board, a potential international incident, and you are left to solve the problems by exploring the plane and investigating the crew around you. Standard mystery stuff really.
The actual core mystery and narrative in CONSORTIUM VR is genuinely intriguing with enough interest breadcrumbs sprinkled to keep you engaged throughout the 6-10 hour playthrough. To say anymore about the story itself would be firm spoiler territory as it is the primary gameplay of CONSORTIUM VR. It does feel like you are there solving the mystery in front of you.
One particularly impressive implementaion is the V.O.I.C.E. system. The rather forced acronym just means that you can speak out dialogue options instead of choosing them from the list – though you can choose to do that instead if you wish. Being able to speak out the choice I wanted to use did trick me into thinking I was having a live conversation more than once. It is a very engaging system and I hope more VR titles implement similar mechanics – it really leans into the magic of VR.
It certainly helps that the environment of CONSORTIUM VR is also fun to explore. The plane itselfs feels sufficiently futuristic without becoming unrecognisable. You can quickly learn the layout too with a little walkabout. I found a constant joy in crawling through the venting and popping out where I needed to get to.
This did highlight possibly the biggest issue I had with CONSORTIUM VR though. The other characters barely react to what you are doing. They respond appropriately to conversation and set cues, but they hardly noticed me crouch walking out of crawlspaces. Any time a character didn’t respond to me dancing around the control room was one of those grounding moments which reminded me I wasn’t actually there. This certainly isn’t a sole criticism of CONSORTIUM VR but is really a compliment to how engaging the other systems were. I just want a response if I start doing squats while chatting with somebody.
Something I definitely responded to, though, was the use of lighting. The dev team deserve huge credit for this in VR. Flickering lights, shadowed areas, and managed darkness have such a visceral effect in VR, even with the slightly cartoonish graphical style. I definitely had instances where I could feel myself tensing up about walking down a dark corridor or into an unlit room. In opposition, the of neon lighting creates a wonderful sci-fi glow to the whole space.
CONSORTIUM VR offers you multiple paths to work your way towards the narrative conclusion. You can be diplomatic, rude and brash, through to just violent. The investigation and conversation focused branches are definitely the more satisfying as they feel like the game was designed for that level of interaction. It’s nice to have the options there for how to respond to the barriers in your way but it definitely feels like one side was preferred over the other in design.
For those who aren’t interested in gunning, there are very few moments that force you take that path. Should you want to get your weapons on, the aiming and shooting is perfectly functional though lacks any real feeling of weight or impact. It feels like an area that could be developed further in a sequel, though personally I’d prefer if they focused more on developing the detective elements; the gunplay feel like a distraction from the world of CONSORTIUM VR.
What CONSORTIUM VR needs more of is the world it sets itself in. There is an incredibly deep amount of lore within the game, and it is genuinely interesting, though almost all of it is locked away in what is effectively an in-game encyclopedia. If you take the time to read it, you can really dive deep into this future Earth. If you don’t, you will probably miss out on it all. There is very little work elsewhere in actually educating you on the world you find yourself in outside of the moment-to-moment absolute necessities.
CONSORTIUM VR is definitely an experience I would recommend to anybody looking for an engaging mystery and who wants to experience something that traditional consoles and PC games can’t offer. Being able to speak your responses does make a tangible difference in the illusion of VR albeit with some other elements of the game working in opposition to that. Perhaps the criticism come from this being a VR port of a non-VR game. CONSORTIUM VR leaves me very interested, and excited, in what a purely VR focused sequel could achieve.
You can check out CONSORTIUM VR on Meta Quest and Steam VR.
CONSORTIUM VR is definitely an experience I would recommend to anybody looking for an engaging mystery
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