CODE EXIT, a sci-fi horror game developed by the domestic indie team Crescent and published by LINE Games, has made its appearance at PlayX4. With the AI "Minerva" having gone rogue and taken over the city, players take on the role of a member of the investigation group "Hermes." You must deploy to the site, evade killer machines, restore the system, and uncover the truth behind the incident.
Horror games that involve evading an unstoppable enemy while cooperating to complete missions are a familiar genre to core gamers. The intense thrill and fear inherent in horror games, combined with the indescribable sense of relief and satisfaction upon successfully completing a mission, create a genre with consistent demand. As this is a well-known type of game, the key question was how it would carve out its own unique identity.
Fear Crafted Through Extremely Limited Resources and Psychological Pressure
In survival horror games, pursuing enemies are typically either spawned in the environment from the start or appear suddenly at certain moments, often signaled by specific cues. CODE EXIT blends these two approaches. The moment you are detected by the surveillance network, killer machines sent by Minerva are dispatched, and they will track the players' traces until the alarm stops.
Meanwhile, players must avoid the surveillance network to restore power and disable various system anomalies to reclaim the occupied zones. It was notable that the game doesn't throw you into a pit of terror from the very beginning, but rather introduces these elements step-by-step. In the first area, Minerva's surveillance network is not yet active, allowing players to learn the basic controls and mission mechanics.
In practice, tasks like connecting fuses to control devices, unlocking locks, charging energy at pylons, and collecting records were no different from basic FPS controls. However, since sudden incidents can lead to mistakes, this first stage served as a helpful refresher. Once all records were collected, power was restored, and the password was entered by pressing the designated keys, the player moved on to the next stage.
From the second stage onwards, Minerva's surveillance network is activated, and the appearance of killer machines marks the beginning of true horror. As mentioned earlier, the control device's energy only auto-charges to level 1 when fully depleted. Since a fuse requires two shots to connect, players must visit pylons or use energy batteries found in the environment. However, Minerva's surveillance network is usually focused on areas with pylons, so even a slight hesitation or mistake often meant fleeing without having properly charged. During these moments, if your heart rate rises, Minerva's surveillance network will track you more quickly, so you must run for a bit, then walk to stabilize your heart rate before carefully navigating around the surveillance.
While I described it as "avoiding" them, Minerva's surveillance network isn't always clearly visible, aside from the spotlights installed here and there. Perhaps because it is a rogue, unstable AI, it sometimes seems to monitor you persistently, while at other times, you can charge pylons for a while without any issues. This random tempo actually increased the pressure during moments when the situation suddenly and unexpectedly changed.
Even when there were moments where you could wait to fully charge your energy, completing the mission was not easy. Beyond the charging devices, you have to unlock all the locks scattered around using the control device. Since you can only charge up to 5 times, your actions are restricted, forcing you to find another pylon after unlocking one area.
The core of the horror in CODE EXIT lies in how the screen occasionally distorts or holograms suddenly appear, triggering unexpected actions and narrowing the surveillance net when you are already feeling anxious. The combination of that feeling of being slowly cornered in an environment where anything could happen at any time, along with jump scares, was enough to induce fear even if the killer machines didn't appear that frequently. Furthermore, since items and interactions require holding down a key to respond, you can personally experience the growing anxiety when things don't go as planned in a pinch.
Stay Calm and You'll Survive: Secret Tactics Scattered Throughout
While Minerva itself keeps you psychologically on edge, the player isn't directly harmed unless one of its subordinate killer machines appears. As the stages progress and you move deeper, the surveillance network becomes denser, and the killer machines appear more frequently.
As mentioned, Minerva's surveillance network isn't entirely visible, so you can never be certain when or where a killer machine will appear. It is only when the screen distorts and a "Detected" message appears that you realize a killer machine is nearby and you must find a way to escape.
The feeling of helplessness and fear when encountering an enemy you cannot fight is fleeting; if it happens repeatedly, it only leaves behind stress. Moreover, in CODE EXIT, getting caught once isn't the end, as you respawn a certain number of times, which only adds to the accumulated stress. To help players escape, the game provides tools like lockers, smoke grenades, fire suppression systems, and laser gates.
Typically, these tools—aside from lockers for hiding—are one-time use, but in CODE EXIT, some equipment is not. However, as mentioned, the energy required to activate them is extremely scarce, so you can never truly feel safe. There were times when I was scrambling because I lacked the energy exactly when I needed it, which perfectly synced with the in-game situation of losing one's composure.
Furthermore, if a chase lasts too long, Minerva intervenes, re-locking the doors you worked so hard to open, making it impossible to escape. This forces you to quickly break the killer machine's line of sight and stabilize the situation. Once the aggro is cleared and the state returns to "non-alert," the killer machine is recalled. The thrill of using your wits to escape a crisis in those brief moments and then nervously continuing the mission is the driving force that keeps you thinking about CODE EXIT. Once you complete the third stage mission, an area containing weapons opens up, providing a sense of satisfaction similar to finding a shotgun after being helplessly chased by zombies.
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