Total Reload is the debut title from 2-person indie development team Torshock. This 3D first person puzzle game puts you in the robotic shoes of an artificial intelligence on a very special mission.
When your consciousness wakes inside the damaged robot body of a lonely AI named Hawking, you must learn to work together to navigate and operate a giant cube-like structure it was busily assembling (right next to a black hole) before an accident caused it to be separated from its task.
Hawking’s mission is simple. It’s been pretty lonely as the great expanse’s only sentient creature, and this determined being feels sure it knows how to put right everything that’s gone wrong so far: Together you’re going to reboot the universe! To do that, you’re going to need to activate something special at the heart of the complex you’ve found yourself in.
Along the way, you’ll need to learn how to navigate through your environment, interact with your surroundings, solve a number of spatial puzzles, figure out the game’s crafty wiring mechanics, open locked doors, move platforms, sensor grids, and energy filters, and try not to frighten the shy mechanical AI’s in the process. Phew!
Total Reload is a solid puzzle game crafted with obvious inspiration from similar spatial puzzle-solving titles as Portal, Superliminal, The Witness, and more. In fact, Torshock even leans into the theme with a remark about the cake being a lie — a fan favorite reference to Portal. But that’s not the only pop-cultural reference to be found in-game. Look out for easter eggs containing songs from rock band Muse and books by sci-fi author Robert Heinlein too.
For a debut game, Total Relaod’s puzzles are knotty, well-crafted affairs that will absolutely appeal to puzzle enthusiasts. From the get-go you will need to “think with wires” as you figure out how to get power to various objects and move on to the next location.
Would we like to have seen a little more of an initial learning curve, and some visual rewards from our solved puzzles? Yes! Could Hawking have been voiced by someone who didn’t sound quite so much like a member of the Torshock team? Also yes! However, these irritations are minor quibbles when set against the game’s solid structure, intricate puzzles, and intriguing sci-fi narrative.
Some locations display hand-drawn murals on the walls (was that your handiwork, Hawking?), which when combined in sequence allow the player to craft a rudimentary language of sorts with which to communicate with Hawking and ask important questions: Who are you? Who am I? What in the world is going on? and so on. This ability to structure words from symbols is a nice touch and grants the player a little more autonomy than in games of this ilk, in addition to filling in some much needed story beats.
For all its technical flair there is a sense of melancholy to be found in Total Reload that is more than just the story of a solitary character working diligently against the backdrop of an impressively large and liminally-spaced maze, and Torshock have admitted as much.
“This is a story about loneliness and difficult challenges posed to oneself — a story about the search for absolute universal knowledge,” the developers said. “In a sense, this is a metaphorical narrative hidden under science fiction about the game developers themselves, alone trying to complete a difficult task and overcoming various intellectual obstacles.”
That haunting sense of cosmic melancholy lingers throughout your journey in Total Reload. Is it the sterile hum of the machines set against the cube structure’s vastly empty spaces? Or perhaps it’s the distant but inevitable pull of the nearby black hole? Whatever the source, there’s a pervading feeling that this game isn’t just about solving puzzles, but confronting the void itself.
For all its cold metal and vast empty spaces though, Total Reload still feels strangely human. There’s a quiet meditation here on creation, purpose, and the loneliness of those who dare to build.
Total Reload is a debut that feels both intimate and vast, a digital soliloquy whispered into the cosmic dark.
Platforms: Windows, macOS, and Linux. Release Date: November 7, 2025. Developer: TORSHOCK. Publisher: TORSHOCK
Thanks to TORSHOCK for the game key.
Total Reload: For all its cold metal and vast empty spaces though, Total Reload still feels strangely human. There's a quiet meditation here on creation, purpose, and the loneliness of those who dare to build. This is a debut that feels both intimate and vast — a digital soliloquy whispered into the cosmic dark. – jgriffin
