Skip to main content

This bizarre Franz Kafka game might just be a perfect fit for VR

Bugs stand on a table in Metamorphosis VR.
Ovid Works

Even as someone who has played countless VR games by now, I’m still a sucker for jaw-dropping scale. There’s still magic in those moments where I pop on a headset and see a giant boss towering above me or have to climb up a huge cliff. The best VR games, from Astro Bot: Rescue Mission to this year’s excellent Riven remake, all take advantage of that idea to create special experiences that work best in VR.

The developers at Black Sun Productions seem to understand that judging by Metamorphosis VR. The project takes a 2020 game adaptation of Franz Kafka’s classic novel and brings it to the Meta Quest. It’s a strange elevator pitch on paper, but one that made a lot more sense when I got a hands-off preview of the project. Metamorphosis VR uses its first-person bug perspective to play with scale in ways that will make you feel like it was built for VR first, not years later.

Recommended Videos

Living like a bug ain’t easy

Metamorphosis VR acts as a bit of a deluxe edition of its PC counterpart. It doesn’t just bring the full game to VR, but also includes its two DLC levels. Lots has been tweaked to make it run on a headset (and to reduce motion sickness), but the general flow is the same. It’s an adventure game that has an old school flair to it.

The story follows that of the book while taking some artistic liberties along the way. In it, players turn into a cockroach and are left exploring a house from their shrunken perspective. A stack of chairs becomes a convenient set of platforms. A gramophone becomes a dance club for bugs. There are even surrealist interludes that capture the tone of the text in visually inventive ways, like twisted hallways full of moving portraits.

A man stands near a table in Metamorphosis VR.
Ovid Works

There are two big changes from seeing all of this in VR instead of on a flat screen. The most important change is the visual scale of it all. The adventure takes place from a first-person perspective, which lets players see household items towering above them. In one sequence, our brave cockroach walks near a full-grown man standing by a table. His hand looks massive as the bug skirts around it. Experiences like that are where VR games set themselves apart from traditional games, and Metamorphosis VR is built on sequences like that.

Watching footage of a VR game is never the best indicator of the final product. On a flat screen, Metamorphosis VR looks a bit ugly, with rough textures and some gaudy UI. But visuals look entirely different when you’re actually in a headset. I’ll save any judgment about how the PC version visually translates until I can fully immerse myself in the world and see it all in context.

The other major change is a reworked locomotion system that utilizes the Quest’s motion controls. In the demo, I could see the roaches spindly legs in front of it as it crawled around. Players will get to replicate them by using running and crawling motions, as well as other movements to crawl on walls and jump. I’ll have to try it for myself to see how well they work, but it’s a fun way to get players in the mind of a bug.

Bugs rally near one another in Metamorphosis VR.
Ovid Works

Metamorphosis VR seems like a smart match for the tech. It’s an imaginative project that should benefit from the technology more than its standard PC version did. If I’m going to play a game about turning into a bug, I want to actually feel like that bug. I want to see the world through its eyes and crawl around myself. It looks like I’ll get that experience here.

Metamorphosis VR launches on October 10 for the Meta Quest 2 and 3. Black Sun Productions plans to bring it to other PC headsets at a later date.

Giovanni Colantonio
As Digital Trends' Senior Gaming Editor, Giovanni Colantonio oversees all things video games at Digital Trends. As a veteran…
This PC strategy game is the perfect next step for Manor Lords fans
cataclismo recommendation hooded horse manor lords horros

Hooded Horse, a PC video game publisher that rose to fame earlier this year for backing real-time strategy (RTS) game hit Manor Lords, will release another excellent game into early access next week. The game in question is Cataclismo, the latest effort from Moonlighter and The Mageseeker: A League of Legends Story developer Digital Sun Games. It mixes real-time strategy and tower defense mechanics, and players have a lot of freedom in terms of how they build up the defense around their bases in order to ward off the "horrors" that attack them each night.

Although Cataclismo will still be in early access when it launches next week, fans of the RTS genre, base-building games, and tower defense titles will want to keep their eye on Hooded Horse's latest. With Manor Lords and Cataclismo, Hooded Horse is cementing itself as the PC game publisher to watch.

Read more
This is the perfect moment to buy a Meta Quest 3 for gaming
The Quest 3 and Touch Plus controllers appear in Meta's charging dock accessory.

A person is enthusiastically enjoying a game while wearing the Meta Quest 3. Meta

At this point, you're probably bought in to VR gaming or you've not. The tech has a notoriously mixed reputation among gamers, some of whom have embraced VR as a gaming option and others who still reflexive sneer at it. I've been a supporter ever since the original PlayStation VR launched as I've played plenty of great games using the four headsets I've owned over the past decade. So believe me when I tell you that this Prime Day is the perfect time to grab a Meta Quest 3, which is .

Read more
3 Xbox Game Pass games to play this Independence Day weekend (July 4-7)
Fallout 3 key art featuring the protagonist wearing the iconic power armor.

It's Independence Day weekend, so you're probably looking for some games to play if you don't have to work this holiday weekend. If you're subscribed to Xbox Game Pass, the service offers plenty of games to choose from. This weekend, three titles from its catalog stand out as particularly fitting to play on this holiday weekend if you plan on spending more time on your Xbox or PC rather than outside with this time off.

The first is an indie game from Free Lives and Devolver Digital that satirizes the over-the-top, bombastic nature of both American patriotism and blockbuster movies. Next, there's a Fallout video game set around Washington, D.C., that you can check out if you're getting tired of playing Fallout 4 and Fallout 76. Finally, I'm recommending a baseball game that's on Xbox Game Pass for those who'd rather play a game themselves than watch one on TV.
Broforce

Read more