Exploring Europa In The Turing Test

I’m a bit of a sucker for titles with a strong sci-fi aesthetic, so when I saw The Turing Test I simply had to give it a try. Its look will likely remind you of 2001: A Space Odyssey, or any of the dozens of sci-fi titles it inspired, as you explore a base on Europa with crisp, white walls broken up into regular panels. It’s a classic look but the developers, Bulkhead Interactive, put it to good use here, using it to build a real sense of place. The visual style also helps you to put you on edge as you work you through a seemingly abandoned base that really shouldn’t be abandoned.

Gameplay wise, this is a first person puzzler where you wield a gun called the Energy Manipulation Tool that allows you to grab energy spheres from power slots on the walls and fire them at new slots. There are also blocks that have these energy spheres trapped inside them that you can lug around, slotting them in where they’ll fit and powering elements of the base, like a door or moving platforms.

While the instant comparison that many will make is to Portal, given it’s broken into puzzle rooms and sees you using a gun to solve puzzles, it actually feels a lot closer to The Talos Principle, mostly due to its pacing and lack of physics puzzles. Instead of bouncing around a room to get to higher ground as you do in Valve’s puzzler, you take a more measured approach as you work out which energy plug will power the element you need.

As with any good puzzle title the challenges start out simply enough, but by the end of the demo I was certainly spending a few moments working out how to get the energy where I needed it to go. The addition of levers at certain points, which allow you to switch the energy between multiple paths, adds depth quickly, and hopefully the game will continue to throw new elements at you as you progress.

For example, the ability to use your Energy Manipulation Tool to grab two energy spheres instead of one would open up new puzzling potential, adding longevity to the game. Even the original Portal started to get a little stale towards the end, so hopefully The Turing Test keeps it fresh because I really want to spend some time exploring the game’s story.

That story is based around humanity discovering life on Europa, one of Jupiter’s moons, hence the building of the base there. There’s actually a lot of real world speculation about the possibility of life on Europa, so Bulkhead have chosen a good location for their version of humanity’s future to explore.

You play as Ava Turing, an explorer who seems to be in awe of the new life discovered on this distant moon. Humanity, however, has lost interest in Europa after finding out more about the life there, leaving Ava something of an outsider. It seems that she’s only just arrived on Europa though, as the opening of the game has you move from a landing craft to the base, which is buried under Europa’s surface ice to help protect it from the harsh atmosphere.

As you explore the base you find it deserted, with your AI companion informing you that the base’s crew have likely taken shelter somewhere deeper inside the base. It’s not, however, clear what they’re hiding from, which is somewhat disconcerting.

They have, however, used the base’s modular design to reconfigure it into the puzzle rooms you make your way through. Specifically these are puzzles that are designed to only be solvable by a human and not an artificial intelligence, a revelation that paints the AI voice that accompanies your in a much more sinister light. It seems that the aesthetic might not be the only thing the game shares with 2001: A Space Odyssey.

After playing through the demo, The Turing Test has definitely earned itself a place on my personal ‘Most Anticipated’ list. The aesthetic style the game is going for is realised remarkably well, the puzzles feel good, the voice work is solid, and the story has certainly captured my imagination. I’ll be looking out for it when it releases this August on Steam and Xbox One.