Vitrum Demo

When Valve released Portal together with the Orange Box, no one really expected for it to become such a huge success. However, the ingenious mechanics made it an instant hit, with millions of fans around the world and hundred of clones released until today. Hence, many other developers have tried to emulate Valve’s success, although not many managed to get close over the years.

Vitrum is yet another attempt to borrow some of Portal’s success, while introducing a variety of other mechanics to expand on the original idea. In this case, however, the game seems to focus a lot more on the platforming aspect, because the puzzles are usually quite simple and they fade into the background by the end. Naturally, some may view this as a disadvantage, but it all depends on your preferences.

As such, the game allows you to play the role of an android of sorts, which possesses the ability to turn various crystals into energy and take advantage of their special properties. Your goal is to use these powers in order to pass the levels, although it’s not always as easy as it sounds. Sometimes, you need to combine these powers between them in order to get the desired effect, but that’s not always obvious.

The platforming elements are pretty refined, but the actual character movement can hinder your progress and cause a decent amount of stress. Hence, it’s not that the stages are challenging, but because the game doesn’t respond well to your commands. This is obviously a lot more annoying and it may cause a lot of players to quit, depending on their ability to withstand the stress.

Thankfully, the game looks pretty nice, although there’s nothing too memorable either. In fact, the levels look a tad too dull and unpolished, given the fact that there’s not an awful lot in them. However, the animations are pretty sleek and you can certainly enjoy the soundtrack in the background every now and again.

When it’s all said and done, Vitrum had the potential to turn into something memorable, especially since the underlying mechanics are pretty original and exciting. However, the developers lost their inspiration somewhere along the way and the end result is not something too great, unfortunately.