AI can assist with many things. Humanity takes a chance in an alternate future in The Signifier, enlisting its help in dream walking.
Dreams are an important part of human life. They hold many secrets that even those with them may not know. The Signifier delves into what dream walking would look like using special technology. Because we don’t always remember dreams, there’s never any guarantee that our deepest thoughts will see the light of day. What happens when technology can access those secrets? Alluding to the possibility of negative outcomes using AI, there’s no telling where humans and their desire to create life will take us.
Based in Santiago Chile, the small team of developers known as Playmestudio is responsible for The Signifier. It certainly seems a daunting task as their website appears to imply that this is their first title. They do have public raw fury at their side, a name known for publishing many blockbuster hits. They are responsible for publishing quite a few titles I’ve had the pleasure of playing. Many mystery noir games exist, but this is my first experience with one that is VR.
When thinking of The Signifier what comes to mind is a mind-bending thriller. Become an agent for an agency only ever imagined in books, movies, and 3D video games. Take on the role of Russel, a member of the Technology Safeguard Bureau. Acting as an oversight board for the Dream Walker technology, they are meant to maintain the neutrality of the tech itself. Events out of Russel’s control, however, necessitate his skills and expertise in an investigation. Without this extra job, he and his friends at the TSB are out of work.
The pioneer of the technology, Joanna, has turned up dead. No witnesses are to be found. Despite the evidence, many believe there are other forces at play. Russel’s investigation may stir up a hornet’s nest or it may simply be a wild good chase. His morality and his perceptions of reality will be tested. EVEE, the AI assistant for the Dream Walker device, will accompany you throughout this dangerous investigation.
Virtual Reality affords The Signifier a lot of freedom when it comes to gameplay nuances. Documents can be picked up and examined. Objects can be put together and characters can be far more expressive. Basic controls in The Signifier, like most games currently, utilize trigger 1 on each respective controller to grab objects. Some interactive objects may include things like letters, books, or scientific journals. While grabbing a science journal, for example, one can press down on the analog stick, and it will bring up text. Simply pulling the analog stick down will scroll through the text if possible.
One of the weirdest parts of The Signifier is coming to accept the ability to dream walk. To begin with, this is a concept that has only been spoken of in the metaphysical sense. After loading a tape containing Joanna’s memories into the Dream Walker device, it is necessary to strap oneself into the odd-looking device.
Dream walking itself is an out-of-the-box concept. So, to see it visually represented in The Signifier is extremely odd, and takes some time getting used to. Once a dream is formed, Russell must travel through the dream gathering clues and anything classified as raw data.
In the world of The Signifier, one can enter 2 dream states: the objective and the subjective. Objective states will populate a dream with details that can be gathered through concrete facts and what is known for certain. In the subjective state, the dream will always look distorted. This is because, in the subject of state, all dreams are heavily influenced by a person’s feelings. It can create some of the weirdest-looking things your imagination has ever come up with. One could say these things are just part of the weird dream and others might label these things nightmare fuel.
Inside the dreams in The Signifier, one is granted 2 specific wrist menus. When observing the menu on the left wrist one can either change from objective dream state to subjective and back. It is also possible, thank the stars, to summon EVEE for aid when an investigation has reached a brick wall.
During one part of the investigation, it is possible to physically pick up raw data within the dream state. At first, this detail doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. Though, it becomes clear that this helps change certain parts of a dream state. When placed in the right spot, in either the objective or subjective dream state, the raw data will transform adding missing details to past events. It is nothing short of fascinating to observe the same set of events play out completely differently because of minor details. The Signifier makes this sight a treat to behold.
My favorite part of the Dream Walker device must be the dashboard EVEE eventually grants access to. Reminiscent of the bat computer, this dashboard arranges events in Joanna’s life in chronological order without any input from the user. One might be able to go to the final moments of a specific life event and find clues that belong at the beginning moments of that life event. It is trippy, metaphorically time-traveling to a person’s future events to find something that wasn’t visible beforehand.
What appear to be spider creatures begin to plague the dream states in The Signifier. It is enough to make a person’s skin crawl, but something tells me that is completely intentional. Creatures, one might describe as spiders, look like fingers all protruding from a single palm. Now, there’s no telling where these are real or they’re simply pulling details from Joanna’s memories and Russell’s active brain waves. For some reason,
As the journey through memories in The Signifier continues, these little buggers begin to integrate themselves into the fabric of the dream state. For some reason, they affect one’s ability to travel to certain parts of the dream. It is as if they are actively pulling on the strings that makeup what Russell perceives the dream to be, even in the dream Walker device.
Getting past one of these at one point becomes a bit of a daunting task. It will stand between me and details that will help further my investigation. The only way to get past this massive creature with an equally massive eyeball is to transform into a dog. Now, I’m not sure why there’s a fully realized dog even in the dream state. But for some reason, this hand creature ignores the dog.
This part has to be one of the most difficult sections in The Signifier. It becomes necessary to transform into this dog because it is the only thing allowed into a black spot within the dream. Transforming rustle into this dog will allow him to enter this black room. Take care not to transform Russell back into a human while the dog is in the black room. This creates an odd glitch within the game itself.
If one transforms back into Russel before going past the giant hand monster, it will prevent him from being able to even get past this thing. The dog transformation then becomes completely unavailable and one must essentially start The Signifier completely over. One can attempt to retrace their steps but after repeatedly doing so the efforts were fruitless.
One might think the dream investigation is all there is to the Signifier, but that is not true. In addition to the complicated Dream Walker device and its features, it is doubly important to navigate social interactions with others who have an interest in the answers one may find inside Joanna’s dreams and memories.
Experiencing the world of The Signifier will more than likely change anyone’s understanding of dreams in general. At the beginning of this experience, my mind was dead set on the idea that I would be experiencing a murder mystery in VR form. What the game shows me as I travel through the dream state is our dream states may be more than simply figments of our imagination. My brain told me, my brain told me, that even without mouths, they would still take a bite out of me.
This game is fantastic when it comes to the visuals. It feels like most of the work went into the visual aspects of the game, which is completely fine. I love the trippy feel of the objective and subjective dream states. Never in my wildest dreams did I think I would be able to experience something I’ve only ever seen in movies and television. As active as my imagination is, I do not think that this is a world I could have come up with on my own. Here, there’s no need to alter one’s mind with an external substance. The weird factor is likely to just get worse and you might end up needing to call somebody you didn’t want to have come over.
I’m also quite fascinated with the sounds of The Signifier. All the voice acting was fantastic. Each character is believable in their personality. No one who spoke fell flat when they were trying to convey a specific emotion through words. Quality voice acting is always welcome in games. Even the creepy little hand monsters made noise whenever they scurried around. It is very easy to make a person’s skin crawl when these sounds are crystal clear.
Without the sounds, the objective and subjective dream states are nothing more than distorted visuals. It is the sound that accompanies these sites that truly brings things together. One can hear the steps of Russell’s feet through the dreams. But it is also possible to hear faint memories and conversations that have already come to pass. I hope more VR mystery games can take a page from this title when it comes to the quality of sound.
As content-rich as the game is, objectively speaking, it has quite a host of problems. One of the biggest issues I found, personally, is when one presses down on the right thumb stick. Pressing down without holding anything will change Russell’s perspective. This sometimes results in the player sitting above a building or completely suspended in the air. I am unsure why this happens, but it feels like a bit of an oversight. At one point, I thought pressing this button would relieve my issue. Much to my disappointment, pressing the button resulted in Russell falling straight through the floor while I looked up and reached for an apartment building I could not touch.
At the very beginning of The Signifier, there is also a chance to run into a major glitch. After tasking the AI assistant to find Joanna’s password, one is tasked with returning to Russell’s home. Summoning the cell phone and setting the destination to home can result in a perpetual loading screen. As far as I am aware, there seems to be a patch that has fixed this issue. Like with all glitches, however, there is always the chance that this issue will arise again.
Overall, the game is a genuinely fun experience. And like with most VR games today, it still has its share of glitches. There’s certainly frustrating but they aren’t so major that I will avoid coming back to The Signifier. As much as I gripe about the glitches, it is a genuinely good time playing. If you’re going to get into this game, you might want to dedicate a whole afternoon to playing.
