Thank you GamersGate for supplying this game to us. After what appears to be a post apocalyptic war, the remnant of humanity is in a cryogenic sleep. You are Ashley Simms, a triathlete who is woken up from your icey nap. A computer named OSCAR greets you with the news that the systems are failing and that without your help, the rest of humanity is doomed. You only have ten hours, and for some reason you were the only one who woke up. There appears to be traces of foul play, but who? Can you survive long enough to find out who is behind the sabotage? Twin Sector has many similarities to Valve’s popular physics adventure game, Portal. In Portal you are guided by GladOS and OSCAR assists you in Twin Sector. GladOS has a much better voice, Oscar’s voice just doesn’t fit. Another similarity is that you have to use your surroundings to figure out how to proceed to the next area. The setting in Twin Sector is a space ship where as the setting in Portal is a laboratory. You have no weapons in Twin Sector, you are pretty much vulnerable. I can’t stand the feeling of helplessness. There are no guns and no portals to jump through. In this game your only weapons are a pair of gloves that pull objects towards you or push objects away from you.

Since this is a 3D physics adventure you’d expect the physics to be good right? Wrong! The Havok physics engine is used, but the object manipulation in this game is way too sensitive. For example, there are many deadly lasers and you can use metal barrels to deflect them. Trying to do a simple task like stacking metal barrels is frustratingly difficult. The enemies in this game are few and far between. Other than the lasers, there are deadly turrets and robotic probes that will zap you. You’ll have to be resourceful and use your environment to your advantage. There are some helpful items that are conveniently dispensed nearby. For example one floor on the ship is on fire and nearby are water bottles that you can use to put the fires out. This is easier said than done. The water bottles are on a different level and you either have to use your gloves to throw them up or pull them up without breaking or causing them to leak. For those pyromaniacs out there, you’ll be happy to know that you get to play with exploding barrels and canisters.

When solving these puzzles be sure to use the quick save feature. By default the game only saves by check points. Some chapters have multiple checkpoints but I wouldn’t bank on it. Overall, there are seventeen chapters to play through. In all honesty I got frustrated by chapter 8. I realized that I destroyed all three torrents when I was supposed to keep one active. Apparently not just helpful items continually respawn, there are some areas where the probes just keep on coming. I just don’t have the drive to re-do this save knowing that I’ll have to continuously dodge turrets and robot drones. This game quite bluntly is a chore to play. Graphically this game does fine. The explosions and fire effects are good. The colors are bland but it’s fitting for the backdrop of this game. This isn’t exactly a cheery Mario world here. The loading screen background shows the main character in great detail. She looks very life like and has a lot of detail including her eyes and hair.

The sound department is a mixed bag. Ashley’s voice actress was good but OSCAR’s voice wasn’t very convincing. The background music is suspenseful and fits this game well. The sound effects and explosions were spot on. I didn’t experience any crashes or stability issues but I do have a gripe about the controls. Visibly there’s not much difference between the standing and crouching point of view. For a while I couldn’t figure out why I couldn’t jump. It was because my character was in a crouch position. From an appropriateness standpoint this game is pretty tame. There’s no human violence, you’re just fighting robots, turrets, and dodging lasers. You can still die and get hurt though. I think Ashley said “Oh my God” once or twice. If I was under that much stress, I’m not sure what I would have said. If you’re looking for a fun physics based adventure game, don’t bother with Twin Sector. Get Portal instead. Twin Sector sells for $30 and thankfully there’s a demo so you can try it before spending any money.