Luto is bizarre, perplexing, fascinating, and affecting.
There aren’t many games that when I’m finished I simply sit and let everything sink in, but Luto certainly fit that bill. Whilst it’s, at its heart, a horror game that reminded me of P.T. inspired games such as Madison and Visage, it has a lot more heart to it, and even a little sense of humour akin to The Stanley Parable. With that said, I don’t feel it’s fair to throw those comparisons around as Luto is very much its own thing.
Luto is a very difficult game to talk about without venturing far into spoiler town. I think it’s the sort of game where you need to go into it blind and experience all of its insanity with as little background knowledge as possible. To keep things brief before I dive into the review proper, this is one of those haunted house horror games where you walk around an environment and solve puzzles whilst an eerie atmosphere tries to creep you out, something that Luto does very well. You won’t be getting constant jump scares or horrifying monsters, but you will be getting an ultimately nice story presented in the most bonkers way you can imagine. There are some heavy themes which I’ll get into below though, so be aware. If that interests you at all, stop reading now and go into it without knowing anymore.
For everyone else, you play as Samuel, an ordinary guy who is setting off for work. The game’s narrator acts somewhat like the one in The Stanley Parable, but far less snarky and mean. He’ll tell you what Samuel will do, and comment when he goes slightly off the beaten path, but ultimately choice isn’t something you’re going to get here. You’ll guide Samuel out of his house and then repeat it a couple more times, hammering home the mundanity of his days. It doesn’t take long before things get a little weird though.
Samuel’s house starts changing. Doors lock and unlock seemingly at will, a hidden chamber in his basement reveals itself, and strange figures covered in white cloths appear everywhere. Samuel seems to be trapped in a loop relating to his childhood, and only by finding his way through this ever deepening nightmare can he return peace to his everyday life.
Without getting too deep into the plot, some of the heavy themes I mentioned earlier include loss, self-destruction, and suicide. With that said, Luto isn’t one of those “bad-dad simulators” that I occasionally see people reference in Steam horror game forums. You aren’t playing as someone who did terrible things and is now being punished for it. Rest assured that this comes good in the end and has a more positive resolution than a lot of horror games of this style.
The gameplay itself is engaging in the most part because you’ll probably want to see what bonkers moments come up as the story progresses. Hidden rooms give way to entire hidden houses, interactive video tapes allow you to unlock new chambers, and fourth wall breaks aplenty mean that you’ll always be second guessing what you’re seeing and what’s going to come next. Whilst the plot certainly pushes things forwards, the chance to see what else the devs have come up with is what kept me most interested.
Within a given chapter you’ll often need to solve a couple of major puzzles to move on. These aren’t super easy but are accessible enough once you slow yourself down and pay attention to the environment and the notes you find. The clues are all there if you look for them. An early example is a note from someone telling you not to worry, and if you can’t do something yourself you should call for help. In the next room you’ll find a phone with a note next to it asking if you’re looking for help. If you look at the phone, you may find a way to call for help on it. Luto has plenty of puzzles that use methods like this to help you through, but you have to be willing to look for them, and I can see that this could be frustrating for some.
I did find an issue with this though, as often what to do once you’ve solved one of the puzzles in an area isn’t clear. Sometimes an object will appear in front of you that makes it obvious what to do next. Others though, aren’t so easy to interpret, resulting in you needing to wander around your current environment finding which door has now opened. This isn’t a deal breaker, but some of the areas are fairly large and tricky to navigate meaning you may miss something and spend longer wandering around than you might want to. There’s also one of those irritating sound based puzzles where you need to follow the direction of a noise. Without using headphones this could be very frustrating for some, so be aware of that if you intend on playing.
The world itself is really well presented, with a really well put together set of environments to explore. Good use of lighting does some heavy lifting here making everything look genuinely impressive, especially during some of the outdoor sections. I will say that occasionally things are a little too dark, even when you acquire the torch, but this was rare. The animations on the ghosts were incredibly impressive, with some brilliant cloth physics that made their movements very unsettling. I suppose this using UE5 means it shouldn’t be too surprising that it looks good though. It’s a shame the performance suffers somewhat, with occasional framerate issues playing on Xbox Series X though.
Sound is excellent too thanks to thoughtful use of eerie music and ambient sounds. Big credit to the voice acting and how it shifts throughout the story. The narrator’s initial flippant commentary starts to give way to more sinister tones as you progress, and Samuel’s heartfelt monologues at various points feel genuine. Whilst I’m on the subject of language, I will point out that there are some odd translation issues here and there. This might be deliberate considering some elements of the plot, but some messages are written in English, whilst others still appear in the game’s native Spanish. You can still get an on screen translation so it doesn’t cause a considerable issue, but it was quite noticeable.
Luto is a fascinating horror game that really does try to do things differently. The final act of the game is so utterly bananas in its presentation that I can only think of one or two games that have ever done something like it. No mentions of them here for the sake of maintaining that surprise for potential players though. If you feel like you’ve played every first-person horror game out there, then this may well give you something new to sink your teeth into.
Luto is available now on Xbox, PC, and Playstation.
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