Little Nightmares VR: Altered Echoes review — Experience the world of Little Nightmares from the eyes of the children

Since its debut in 2017, the Little Nightmares series has been lauded for its mixture of tension, grotesque set pieces, light puzzles, and mysterious narrative all told via a unique 2.5D “dollhouse” perspective. This perspective is what made the series stand out, and helped the player feel as if they were just a small cog in a much-larger world. Pushing the series into VR runs the risk of sacrificing that uniqueness by forcing players to navigate the world in first-person, but thankfully, much of the series' charm remains intact.

Like previous entries in the series, Little Nightmare’s setup is purposefully mysterious. The game begins by placing the player into the body of Dark Six, a mysterious shadow figure donning the series' iconic raincoat, after their human form is caught by the Thin Man, a terrifying enemy who was last seen in Little Nightmares II. From there, it is up to the player to piece together the story as they navigate the world's twists and turns to make Dark Six whole again.

Little Nightmares VR: Altered Echoes throws you into the action quickly, though it took 15 or so minutes of my stumbling around confused and disoriented before I became accustomed to the game. This was not due to the switch to VR, but rather a slow beginning that involved backtracking and portals. This did cause me to worry about what was to come, but thankfully, my fears were unfounded as the series’ trademark tension and play style made the transfer from console to VR brilliantly. Some moments, such as running away from the disturbingly long arms of the Thin Man, being chased by The Teacher up a mountain a books, and hiding from an unfriendly train conductor, stand out and showcase why this story being told via VR was the right decision.

While I miss the 2.5D perspective, and would have been perfectly happy with a VR Little Nightmares title that functioned like Moss, the VR does a great job of showcasing just how vast the world around Dark Six is. Everything from chairs to the various evil entities you’ll encounter towers over you, leading to an overwhelming feeling of helplessness. Utilizing the environment to your advantage and being sneaky are the only ways to survive, as going toe to toe with any of the enemies you’ll encounter will almost certainly lead to death.

Little Nightmares has never been combat focused, despite some basic fighting found in Little Nightmares 3, and Altered Echoes is no different. The core gameplay loop comprises exploring, avoiding enemies, and solving easy puzzles to progress to new areas. The addition of VR throws in aspects we’ve come to expect from the medium, including climbing and swinging, but overall, Altered Echoes retains the experience typically provided in a Little Nightmares title. Now, though, the often grotesque enemies are in your face more often, leading to more jump scares and tension-filled moments.

The move to VR allowed the developer, ICONIK, to really up the ante on weirdness, leading to a story centering around surreal imagery and throwing the player face first into thrilling, and sometimes disorienting, environments. As you progress, Altered Echoes begins to dive into VR controls more often, leading to neat set-pieces where you are hanging, swinging, and even zip lining, around the world. Another aspect of the switch to VR  I appreciated was the chance to peer into locked rooms and other forbidden areas. Due to perspective limitations in previous games, this was not possible. In VR you can slide open the food hatches on doors and look inside, often catching a glimpse of others trapped or being experimented on. It’s a subtle addition, but helps to make the world more immersive and the entire facility more foreboding.

Altered Echoes can be played both standing or sitting, though I highly recommend standing as you do often need to reach down to pick up objects. During my playthrough, tracking seemed to work much better while in standing mode. Of course, your mileage may vary depending on your room and lighting situation. Default movement settings are smooth locomotion for walking and snap turning. Aside from one very early area where you are being dragged through a portal, I never felt any nausea from the movement, though I am pretty well acclimated to VR by this point. Climbing is as simple as alternating your hands while holding R1 or L1 to grab a ladder rung or other climbable object, and then using both R1 and L1 together to pull yourself on top of an object. Likewise, climbing a rope requires hanging on via R1 or L1, and holding X to slide.

My only gripe is the game’s length, which even compared to past Little Nightmares titles, is quite short. The five chapters took me maybe 2.5 hours to complete, and there’s little to no replayability aside from a few secrets to uncover. Still, as a huge fan of the series, I enjoyed my time with Altered Echoes, and found myself thoroughly enthralled with the narrative by chapter 5. The entire last chapter ending features some of the most surreal and exciting set pieces for the series yet.