Titanic: A Space Between - First Impressions

Titanic - A Space Between is some pretty serious wish fulfilment for a Titanic geek like me. Yes, I really enjoyed James Cameron's nautical epic, but my interest in the world's most famous doomed vessel actually started decades before the arrival of that film. In fifth grade, I picked up the book A Night to Remember at my school's book fair, and I never looked back. Before long, I was devouring any Titanic content I could find, culminating, of course, in Jack and Rose's ill-fated transatlantic voyage. 

Titanic: A Space Between puts the player smack dab in the middle of the famous shipwreck in real time, via some pretty slick VR implementation. I'm not 100% sure how accurate the depictions of the innards of the Titanic really are, but the level of detail certainly convinces me that everything from the floorplans to the wall hangings are authentic recreations. The team at Globiss Interactive clearly spent a lot of time tuning the fine details to make everything feel and sound as though you are really on board the sinking vessel. The groaning of the stretching metal is downright spine-chilling. 

There are great little touches everywhere. Indeed, while I was slinking through the hallways of the ship - while it was actively sinking - I found myself stopping to read and admire the various signs and notes I found laying around. In one instance, while trying to escape the flooding mailroom, I was amused to find a note from the mailroom staff, attesting that they did their best to organize the mail properly before finally deciding to evacuate. Dedicated folks, those mailroom workers.

Players find themselves in this dire predicament as the result of some time travel shenanigans - told as part of a fairly intriguing science fiction/horror tale. It seems that, while time travel has been outlawed following its initial discovery, certain factions are still engaging in this potentially disastrous activity. One such person - a lady named Diana - has gone missing while on a mission to the Titanic. It is up to the player to pop back to 1912 to search for clues as to her fate, which seems somehow tied to the inventor of time travel himself. Unfortunately, scientists haven't quite worked out all the kinks, and the player arrives 24 hours later than expected, and finds themselves aboard the actively sinking ship. This is, as they say, a massive bummer, but it's funny how the characters in the game are just all "Righty-o, then, we can still solve this mystery. Get to it, guy-on-the-most-famous-sunk-ship-as-it-is-sinking. Time's a-wasting!".  

In gameplay terms, this means that the Titanic functions as a giant floating escape room. The player moves from section to section of the ship, searching for clues and solving progression-related puzzles while staying one step ahead of the rising water. The puzzles involved are of a reasonable difficulty - not impossible, but requiring a bit of thought. The rising water seems to be mostly played for effect, adding a bit of psychological pressure while not really impacting gameplay all that much.

Those looking to fully explore the Titanic might be a tad disappointed - the ship is not reproduced here in its entirety. Rather, the player is whisked from one smallish subsection to another, with just enough extra space and content thrown in to make exploration interesting, especially for dorks like me that want to see as much of the ship as possible.

Of course, the player isn't alone. While the game finds narrative ways to obscure most of the other passengers, other characters are also circling around the sinking vessel, increasing the depth of the mystery. And something even darker is lurking in the shadows...

Interested players should go into Titanic: A Space Between with the understanding that this is a complex VR title made by a team of two developers over several years. While it is very impressive visually, it is also somewhat rough around the edges mechanically (though it is important to note that I was playing a pre-release build). During my time with the game, I had a few technical hiccups, including some lost inventory items, some strangeness around my save file (I think I loaded in later in the game than I should have at one point), and a bit of the usual "VR jank" - which is basically my way of saying that items behave in unusual or unnatural ways. 

Still though, it is worth a bit of item shuffling to get to stand on the deck of the Titanic just moments after the iceberg collision, with large chunks of ice still resting on the wood. Or to escape the boiler room while it is quickly filling with jets of burbling sea water. Or to see a realistic depiction of the grand staircase in scale...regardless of what evil might be lurking around the next corner. 

Titanic: A Space Between launches on Meta Quest on February 14, 2024.