EXD - Extra Dimensional Review

A nostalgic and ambitious VR adventure that recaptures the magic of PCVR, despite technical issues.

Virtual reality has been around for a little while now, but games that actually use the tech and aren’t just a case of retrofitting traditional gaming features might still be a bit of a rarity. EXD - Extra Dimensional, by the four-person indie developer Lords of Illusion, seems like a reminder of what made PCVR amazing in the first place.

Straight away, the game reminds me of older VR titles like The Gallery, Vanishing Realms, Wanderer, and Boneworks. There is something especially refreshing about an experience that understands why virtual reality matters and uses that technology to build moments that just wouldn't work nearly as well on a standard screen. EXD – Extra Dimensional shows a strong understanding of VR design, from the complexity of the settings to the weight of particular weapons.

The size of the development team makes this achievement much more interesting.

Lords of Illusion has created an adventure with huge environments, excellent lighting, complex animations, physics-based interactions, and an orchestral soundtrack. Not everything works as it should, and a few annoying issues keep it from reaching its potential. Still, there's enough effort and originality here to make this one of the most memorable indie PCVR trips.

EXD – Extra Dimensional follows Max Ventura, an everyday warehouse worker whose normal day takes an unexpected turn when he and his daughter are transferred to another dimension. First, Max works at a warehouse known as Magazone. His job includes picking up shipments, fulfilling orders, and making deliveries. This intro establishes his daily routine and introduces the game's interactive features through common work activities.

The intro also establishes Max's relationship with his daughter, Julia. From their chats, we learn that Max works long hours and doesn’t have time for her. He says he'll make up for those missed moments, giving their connection an emotional basis that grows more significant as the experience unfolds. But things get difficult fast when Max finds himself on another planet called Ath. He learns he was meant to protect this strange dimension from a powerful menace.

His daughter is also involved, turning the trip into a personal quest to protect her while possibly saving an entire globe. The story uses familiar fantasy-adventure tropes, blending elements of old heroic stories with science-fiction influences. The core idea isn't particularly original, yet the mix works remarkably well. The plot is also supported by its mysterious surroundings, weird characters, and the various papers and nods that seasoned VR aficionados may recognize.

The game hides loads of notes and clues throughout, offering extra insight into the universe and the events that happened before Max arrived.

These texts are worth reading, as they help clarify some puzzles and slowly reveal more about the surrounding regions. The storytelling, however, is not consistently good. Some plot developments feel rushed, and the pacing sometimes suggests that central themes were left unexplored. The ending also gives the feeling that the tale might have changed during development.

Despite these flaws, Max’s quest is compelling, mostly because his motivations are personal rather than simply about becoming a great hero. EXD – Extra Dimensional begins to reveal its best traits in the gameplay. It's fundamentally an action-adventure experience focused on exploration, environmental interaction, puzzle-solving, and occasional battle.

Instead of constantly shoving you into foes, the game invites you to explore, interact with objects, find hidden passages, and learn how its many mechanisms work. The opening warehouse scenario is quite enjoyable. Your tasks are straightforward: find certain goods, read their labels, and place them on a conveyor belt in the correct order. These activities may look easy, but they lay the foundation for physical interaction.

So as Max enters the other dimension, the gameplay slowly introduces more complex interactions. You will visit fantastic surroundings, underground corridors, temples, caves, ruins, and other places full of machinery and hidden mysteries. One of the most interesting mechanics is the Q Smart system, a device powered by your daughter’s phone that becomes lodged in Max’s left hand.

This essential tool throughout the adventure lets you manage talents, track energy, and access various powers. You progress by acquiring objects and then absorbing them through the Q Smart system. You begin with telekinesis, one of the most commonly used talents. You may use it to wield objects and interact with the world from afar, which is extremely handy when solving riddles.

As you progress and level up, you unlock more elemental abilities, including fire, lightning, and ice. The system also needs AA batteries to operate. You can find batteries throughout the environment and carry up to four in your tool belt. Managing this resource is another small aspect of exploration, especially when you rely heavily on your abilities.

There's no traditional XP-grinding system where you level up your character by repeatedly defeating foes or doing rote tasks.

Instead, progression comes from finding artifacts, unlocking new skills, and learning to use your growing collection of capabilities. This works well for the adventure because it promotes exploration instead of turning the experience into an unnecessary slog. You can also find consumables like drinks and chocolate bars that replenish health.

These are distributed throughout the settings, often in familiar-looking warehouse packages. Along the route, you'll also find weapons and other important goods, though the inventory system could have been much better. Space on your tool belt is limited, so you have to pick which items are worth carrying. Unfortunately, the game doesn’t always indicate whether a particular object will be valuable later on.

Some things stick around in your inventory long after they’ve served their purpose, while others could become important in unexpected ways. The experience is broken into around 30 segments, and a full game takes about six to seven hours. The chapters vary widely in length, and some feel more like bridges between vast areas than true chapters. The good news is that load times are usually brief, so traveling from one place to another rarely feels like a huge interruption.

Puzzle solving is undoubtedly the strongest gameplay aspect in EXD - Extra Dimensional. Developers have incorporated many environmental obstacles that encourage you to observe your surroundings instead of just following directions. Some puzzles let you physically manipulate objects, while others require you to memorize information, read documents, locate clues, or use your unlocked powers in imaginative ways.

You will find the usual traps: pressure plates, spikes, moving devices, and deadly paths. Some parts have a strong Indiana Jones vibe, especially when you're exploring ancient temples full of hidden perils. Other problems require you to figure out what to do after reading information in scattered notes. One of the best moments was being chased by a huge creature and needing to open a gigantic gate at the right time to stop it.

The sections show how environmental puzzles can generate excitement without relying completely on traditional warfare.

The problems aren't particularly hard, but that isn't necessarily a drawback. They’re satisfying enough to keep exploring engaging, but not so much that they constantly interrupt the experience. Some obstacles could use a bit more explicit communication, especially when the game wants you to know which objects are crucial and which you can overlook.

But the puzzle design also suffers from some serious issues. At times, you can miss an item, making it hard to go further, so you have to return to a previous checkpoint. This is particularly aggravating because the game doesn't always tell you when you've passed the point where you can no longer pick up an important object.

Objects get stuck behind metal bars, levers stop working, and interactive objects behave unexpectedly. The game offers many melee and ranged weapons, and their physical depiction is excellent. Weapons have physical weight, so swinging sounds and animations make holding them feel more realistic. Some weapons have little flourishes as you draw them from your back, a nod to the developers’ attention to the VR-specific interface.

You can also use your unlocked elemental powers to deal with adversaries. The physics system offers some funny moments, as adversaries respond to your attacks with ragdoll physics. Sometimes it’s really thrilling to land a perfectly placed shot, especially if you can dismember an opponent. However, the real battle mechanics are much less remarkable than they appear. Enemy reactions are variable, and some enemies are powerless after a single successful hit.

This makes encounters feel cheap and removes much of the thrill of overcoming hazardous monsters. Some other adversaries can be surprisingly annoying. Flying creatures and spiders can be really irritating, and certain encounters suffer from uneven hit detection. Some attacks are immediately effective, while others let you hit an enemy many times without dealing significant damage.

The boss fights also don't live up to the challenge their presentation indicates. Some conflicts build up a lot and turn out shockingly simple. This leaves the battle feeling undercooked compared to the otherwise amazing experience.

The physics-based method is ambitious but needs further work.

Arms sometimes get caught, objects sometimes clip into each other, and collecting some items doesn’t always work as planned. These things can spoil otherwise wonderful meetings. The checkpoint system doesn’t help either. Some checkpoints are neatly placed, while others make you replay long sections after an unexpected death or technical glitch. It is especially frustrating when combat or environmental interactions don't go as planned, and you lose several minutes of progress.

Overall, the puzzles are one of the game’s biggest features, but combat remains its weakest gameplay component. Visually, EXD - Extra Dimensional is one of the most striking parts of the entire experience. The developers have clearly put a lot of time into making the landscapes feel authentic, evocative, and well-built for virtual reality.

The game has carefully made locations instead of repeating artificial environments. You will explore massive caves, underground tunnels, enchanting ruins, ancient temples, and other areas that offer plenty of visual variety. Another big plus is the lighting. Dynamic shadows, detailed environmental lighting, and atmospheric effects help define each area's character.

Whether you are wandering a gloomy catacomb with a torch or entering a large underground cavern, the presentation always gives a great sense of immersion. The little things also merit appreciation. The Q Smart device has good depth; its animations are great, and even swapping the batteries is quite satisfying. The elemental powers also look good, with the visuals corresponding to the physical interactions.

The character and weapon models are similarly stunning, though some animations show the limitations of the small production team. You don't have a fully visible body; you control a set of arms and hands. These hands have slightly odd proportions and don't always interact naturally with each other, but they do interact quite well with the environment.

There are also odd clipping issues, strange ragdoll movements, and items getting stuck in the environment.

These issues can break immersion, especially when they disrupt essential interactions. The other problem is performance. The game features intensive visual effects, and DLSS can help boost performance on supported hardware. However, some say it causes perceptible blurriness, regardless of quality or performance settings.

I mean, it has all the technological flaws you would expect from an indie VR effort, but the overall visual presentation is amazing. Sometimes the environments look far more expensive than you'd expect from a four-person development company. The sound design is vital to bring the world of EXD - Extra Dimensional to life. The symphonic score is also noteworthy, giving a fitting musical accompaniment to the investigation, strange discoveries, and grander adventure set pieces.

The soundtrack knows when to build atmosphere and when to let environmental sounds take the lead, rather than continually bombarding the experience with music. This helps maintain immersion throughout.

The weapon noises are another highlight. They all sound great and have weight. The different weapons swing differently. Environmental sound effects also make the experience more believable when operating machines, handling objects, or exploring perilous regions. Overall, the voice acting is really good, with some amusing dialogue and funny banter.

Interactions with other people help establish the game's personality, and initial chats with Julia provide some emotional background. The voice acting, however, isn't entirely consistent. At times, Max’s voice varies dramatically, sounding American one moment and more heavily European the next. This generates a strange inconsistency that can distract from otherwise good discourse.

There are also minor audio bugs, like weapons periodically clashing when you’re on your back. Still, the orchestral soundtrack and overall mood are some of the game's best parts.

EXD – Extra Dimensional is an ambitious VR adventure that understands something many contemporary VR releases miss: virtual reality should deliver experiences that only benefit from physical involvement.

The Lords of Illusion adventure packs a potent blend of exploration, environmental riddles, physics-based mechanics, and dramatic scenario design. Its handcrafted backgrounds are always stunning, its growth system grants interesting powers, and its dedication to physical interaction produces a few memorable moments.

The relationship between Max and his daughter also provides the journey with a real emotional core, even if the narration is sometimes uneven. Meanwhile, the puzzles offer pleasant chances to explore the surroundings and find fresh ways to progress. Inconsistent combat, annoying physics issues, uncertain inventory management, and poor checkpoint placement hold the experience back. Some of these issues can be really disruptive, especially if they make a key item unavailable or break an interaction.

Let's not disregard these concerns because this is an indie production. The devs are promising a lot, but the experience would be greatly improved with more polish and more consistent testing. But there is something really exceptional about EXD - Extra Dimension. It's got the adrenaline of early PCVR experiences and enough innovative concepts to develop its own character. Fans of Wanderer, Boneworks, The Gallery, and Half-Life: Alyx will probably enjoy what Lords of Illusion is trying to do here.