Trenches VR might make you jump once or twice, but it won't linger in your mind the way great horror games do
Trenches VR on Quest 3 tries to throw you into the claustrophobic horrors of World War I, but instead of delivering a meaningful or terrifying experience, it ends up being a loud, frustrating, and painfully basic horror game that relies entirely on cheap jump scares. It could have been something special, an atmospheric descent into the madness of war, but it never reaches that potential.
The game places you inside the muddy, suffocating corridors of a WWI trench, but despite that powerful setting, there is almost nothing here that feels authentic or immersive. You are told that you are a soldier trapped behind enemy lines, but the trenches themselves might as well be a random horror maze. Yes, there's a hint of war raging above and loud artillery sounds, but there's no sense of place, no soldiers, or anything that gives life to the battlefield. It's just narrow corridors, muddy textures, and the constant repetition of the same gloomy scenery.
Your main objective is to find nine dead baby dolls scattered throughout the trenches. That's right, dolls. The game never explains why you need to collect them or what they symbolize. It feels random and disconnected from the setting, as if the developer just needed something creepy to justify the gameplay loop. You wander aimlessly through the trenches, crouching, cutting through barbed wire, and occasionally hiding from a scary monster that stalks you. The whole experience quickly becomes repetitive and annoying rather than tense or atmospheric.
Now, the horror in Trenches VR is not subtle or psychological. It's loud, aggressive, and relentless. Nearly every scare is a jump scare, and not the clever kind. The type where something grabs your head from behind or screams directly into your ear at max volume. It works once or twice, because of course you'll flinch when something screeches in VR inches away from your face, but it gets old fast. After the tenth time, it just becomes noise. The problem is that there's no buildup, no pacing, no tension. Horror is most effective when it plays with your imagination, when you dread what might happen next. Here, you don't have time to feel that dread, because the game constantly throws another loud shriek at you.
And that's the biggest problem here. There's potential. A horror game set in WWI trenches could be incredible. Just look at Conscript, a recently released survival horror game that uses the exact same setting but executes it brilliantly. In Conscript, you're a French soldier navigating the chaos of Verdun, scavenging for supplies, managing limited ammo, and feeling the constant pressure of the enemy advance. It doesn't need ghosts or supernatural monsters, the war itself is the horror. It's tense, grounded, and incredibly atmospheric. Playing Conscript shows just how terrifying the WWI setting can be when done right. Trenches VR, on the other hand, completely misses that opportunity.
You get a few tools along the way, such as a knife to cut through barbed wire and a pistol that, surprisingly, does absolutely nothing. You can hold it, you can aim it, but it doesn't interact with the monster or affect the world in any way. It feels like a leftover feature that was never finished. The rest of the interactions are inconsistent too. Picking up objects doesn't always work properly, and sometimes items glitch out of your hand or fall through the ground. Objects clip through the environment, and the sense of presence that good VR games rely on just isn't there.
Visually, Trenches VR looks rough. The environments are muddy and repetitive, and there's a noticeable lack of detail or variety. The lighting tries to be atmospheric, but it ends up looking flat and unconvincing. The Quest 3 can handle much more detailed and immersive environments, but here everything feels half-finished. The monster itself, which should be the highlight of the game, isn't scary once you've seen it a few times. It simply roams around waiting to scream in your face again.
That said, there are a few things the game does well, particularly in its sound design. The audio work is surprisingly solid, and arguably the strongest element of the whole experience. You can hear the creak of old wooden boards beneath your feet, the wind whistling through gaps in the trench walls, and the distant rumble of artillery and explosions somewhere above. Those little touches go a long way in making the world feel alive, even when the visuals fail to do so.
Another genuinely clever feature is how the game uses your microphone. The monster can actually hear you. If you make too much noise in real life, say you talk, breathe heavily, or shout, the creature can pick up on that and start hunting you more aggressively. It's an interesting mechanic that adds a layer of immersion and tension, especially if you're playing alone in a dark room. You'll find yourself holding your breath or whispering to avoid detection, and in those moments, Trenches VR feels almost brilliant. Unfortunately, the rest of the game rarely lives up to that spark of creativity.
Even considering that this is a solo developer project, it feels unfinished. The core idea is good, a WWI horror game where silence and survival matter, but the execution is messy. The gameplay loop is shallow, the visuals are rough, and the scares are repetitive. The solid sound design and microphone mechanic can't carry the whole experience, and after an hour or two, you're left more frustrated than frightened.
In the end, Trenches VR might make you jump once or twice, but it won't linger in your mind the way great horror games do. It doesn't build tension or atmosphere, and it doesn't take advantage of its WWI setting in any meaningful way. It's loud, disorienting, and, after a short while, more annoying than frightening. There's potential here, but as it stands, Trenches VR feels like a rough concept rather than a finished experience.
If you're looking for a horror game that really grips you, makes you think twice before turning a corner, or uses VR to its full immersive potential, this isn't it. But if you just want something that screams directly into your ears for a few minutes, Trenches VR will gladly do that and little else.
The game was reviewed on a Quest 3S via a promo copy provided by the publisher. Trenches VR is available on Meta Quest, PCVR and soon on PSVR2.
