Oppressive, terrifying atmosphere
Mentioned in ~3 in 5 positive reviews
“Ambience, atmosphere, gloomy, darkness, specific sounds and hopelessness/ survival scares you to your bones.”
Steam review · 61.8 h played ↗
Darkwood
Worth buying? What 300 Steam reviews say.Worth buying? Here’s what 300 Steam reviews actually say.
Very Positive · 95%Very Positive · 95%Acid Wizard Studio2017Horror · Survival Horror · Adventure
$19.99
Open on Steam ↗US Steam price, checked 4 h ago · Lowest we’ve seen since Oct 20, 2026: $1.99
The verdict
A bleak, brilliantly atmospheric top-down survival horror with superb sound design, but slow, tedious and unguided. Skip it if you dislike backtracking, inventory juggling or waiting out nights.
Great for
Patient players who like oppressive atmosphere, unguided exploration and tense survival horror without jumpscares
Main risk
The repetitive loop of looting, backtracking and idle nights becomes boring and unguided
What changed in the last 30 days
42 recent reviews
Recent negative reviews complain about waiting through empty nights, tiny inventory and a loop that fades quickly. Few reviews, so only modest confidence; no new bug or patch is evident.
42 recent reviews
What players love
Intriguing lore and story with consequences
Mentioned in ~1 in 3 positive reviews
“the writing is on point with an intriguing lore that gets better the more you dig in”
Steam review · 40.8 h played ↗
Tense, rewarding survival loop and combat
Mentioned in ~1 in 4 positive reviews
“at no point did I feel like I was comfortably safe or not at risk of dying to some unknown horror, and as result, virtually every choice you make matters”
Steam review · 16.1 h played ↗
Outstanding sound design and music
Mentioned in ~1 in 6 positive reviews
“I have never played a game with such fantastic and quite frankly, brilliant sound design.”
Steam review · 34.2 h played ↗
Striking art style and creature design
Mentioned in ~1 in 6 positive reviews
“Stunningly beautiful artstyle, immersive soundscape, Lynchian dream sequences, disgusting creature design”
Steam review · 28.9 h played ↗
Horror without jumpscares
Mentioned in ~1 in 13 positive reviews
“This game doesn't rely on jump scares. It lets your imagination do the work until nightfall.”
Steam review · 7.6 h played ↗
What players complain about
Slow, repetitive loop and backtracking
Mentioned in ~2 in 5 negative reviews
“scary for maybe 30 minutes until you fully realise the monotony of backtracking to a loot spot 50 times and AFKing through empty nights”
Steam review · 19.2 h played ↗
No guidance; need a wiki to progress
Mentioned in ~1 in 4 negative reviews
“this game excuses its bad design by saying "it doesnt hold your hand". there is a big difference between a hard puzzle and bad design”
Steam review · 0.5 h played ↗
Clunky combat and controls
Mentioned in ~1 in 7 negative reviews
“The concept is great, but the game is failed by horrible quality of life issues, clunky controls and bad mechanics which all contribute to artificial difficulty.”
Steam review · 30.4 h played ↗
Tiny inventory and tedious management
Mentioned in ~1 in 9 negative reviews
“weighed down by incredibly tedious inventory management. Not only do you have very limited inventory slot system that increase little with upgrades”
Steam review · 5.5 h played ↗
Poor autosave and lost progress
Mentioned in ~1 in 12 negative reviews
“"are you sure you want to exit? You will lose all progress. Last save: 20 minutes ago"”
Steam review · 2 h played ↗
Slow movement and short stamina
Mentioned in ~1 in 13 negative reviews
“You can run for 5 seconds and then you have to walk. And walking speed is slow.”
Steam review · 20.7 h played ↗
System requirements
From the Steam store page
Steam Deck: VerifiedController support10 GB
Minimum
OSWindows® 10 (64-bit)
ProcessorIntel® Core™ i3-2100 (dual-core) / AMD® Phenom™ II X2 565 (dual-core)
Memory4 GB RAM
GraphicsNVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 460 (1 GB) / AMD® Radeon™ HD 5770 (1 GB)
Storage10 GB available space
Recommended
OSWindows® 10 (64-bit)
ProcessorIntel® Core™ i5-2400 (quad-core) / AMD® FX-Series™ FX-4300 (quad-core)
Memory8 GB RAM
GraphicsNVIDIA® GeForce® GT 660 (2 GB) / AMD® Radeon™ HD 7870 (2 GB)
Storage10 GB available space
OSWindows® 10 (64-bit)
ProcessorIntel® Core™ i3-2100 (dual-core) / AMD® Phenom™ II X2 565 (dual-core)
Memory4 GB RAM
GraphicsNVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 460 (1 GB) / AMD® Radeon™ HD 5770 (1 GB)
Storage10 GB available space
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