Code Violet Review Overview
What is Code Violet?
Code Violet is a third-person action horror survival game developed and published by TeamKill Media. The game is inspired by genre classics like Resident Evil, Dead Space, and, predominantly, Dino Crisis. After Earth becomes uninhabitable, humanity must relocate to a new planet: Trappist 1-E. With this in mind, the Aion colony decides that the only way to save mankind is to harness time travel by kidnapping women from different timelines to serve as surrogates and rebuild civilization anew.
Code Violet features:
⚫︎ Story-Driven Horror Survival
⚫︎ Third Person Shooter Perspective
⚫︎ Dinosaurs
⚫︎ Outfit and Weapon Customization
⚫︎ Crafting and Inventory Management
| Digital Storefronts | ||
|---|---|---|
 Playstation |
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| $49.99 | ||
Code Violet Pros & Cons
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
 Has Customization Options Decent Landscapes |
Unfocused Tone and Setting Horrendous Animations Atrocious Gameplay Loop Visual Clipping and Glitches |
Code Violet Story - 4/10
Code Violet has a story, and that’s probably the best thing I can say about it. It tries its absolute hardest to remain mysterious, but somehow it does it in the worst way possible. The sci-fi horror blend is definitely not new, yet the game still makes it look bad because of its unfocused writing. To top it off, all of the characters, including Violet herself, make the game worse, as none of them are likable or competent throughout the story.
Code Violet Gameplay - 3/10
Code Violet’s gameplay takes heavily from common horror-survival mechanics from some of the genre’s greats, like Resident Evil and Dead Space, but executes it in a poor way. Shooting has no weight to it, enemies are like bullet sponges, weapon upgrades don’t feel like they actually add anything, and, of course, a simplistic AI that has a tendency to get stuck behind doors and objects. The cherry on top is the game’s poor level design, as areas tend to look and feel the same after the first area.
Code Violet Visuals - 5/10
The visuals in the game suffer from a lack of cohesion in its art direction, as the whole thing just feels confusing. The theme is also lost in itself, as the blend of futuristic sci-fi environments, jungle elements, and Victorian decor is a disaster to look at. The animations are also horrendous, as the models in motion tend to look comedic rather than whatever they’re trying to portray. At least, Violet's character model looks good and that there's customization options as well.
Code Violet Audio - 5/10
The ambient music and sounds are surprisingly decent, effectively adding to the game’s horror elements and atmosphere. However, it’s a shame that everything else aren’t great; they tend to feel out of place or just downright horrible. While some of the voice actors did a decent job with their respective characters, there’s a severe lack of voicelines during gameplay, making the game feel hollow and empty in motion.
Code Violet Value for Money - 4/10
There is no way, shape, or form that this game is worth $50. There’s not much in the game to like or even experience, since the game only has about 5-6 hours of content. There’s some sort of replayability with the missable collectible items, but the game, as it is, doesn’t inspire a second playthrough worth doing.
Code Violet Overall - 42/100
Code Violet is a classic case of "looks can be deceiving," or in this particular case, the trailers can be deceiving. The horror elements are absent due to the game’s lackluster presentation and uninteresting gameplay, making it a horror-survival title that tries to emulate the genre’s greats and failing at almost every aspect. Everything about the game feels confusing, and it feels as if it’s made to cash in on a void that people have been clamoring for.
Code Violet Review: This Game is In Crisis
Taking the Torch
Every year, we expect new remakes and remasters of our favorite classic titles. It’s also no secret that Capcom has been hard at work revitalizing the Resident Evil franchise with the many remakes they’ve released thus far. However, even then, they’re still radio silent about a certain horror-survival franchise centered on dinosaurs, Dino Crisis.
While I’m not the biggest fan of the series or even horror games in general, I understand why people are asking for it. Given how well-received the Resident Evil remakes are (except for Resident Evil 3, but we don’t talk about that), it seemed like the easiest slam dunk for Capcom to even drop a teaser that it’s in development.
So leave it to fans and other studios to take up the heavy job of releasing something like it. And lo and behold, we have an actual competitor. TeamKill Media took it upon themselves with Code Violet, as they’ve even advertised the game to be the spiritual successor to the fan-favorite title. But does it actually do a good job of carrying that heavy torch? Or is it just another flop that wants to cash in on people wanting to see their favorite series make a comeback?
Well, it definitely tries.
A Barbie Girl In a Jurassic World
The game starts off with an intro showing the protagonist, Violet Sinclair, in what seems to be a dream sequence. Immediately after, she is awoken to someone trying to unlock her pod, exclaiming that she was going to "save her," until she’s violently dragged off.
The game doesn’t waste any time getting into the thick of things. Confused, dazed, and barely clothed, Violet gets out of her once-locked pod only to find everyone dead. At this point, we don’t know what dragged the person who unlocked her pod or where we are, but it seems to be a research lab of some sort.
The intro is actually a decent setup; the dark atmosphere and foreboding ambience definitely fulfill the spooky vibe. But then, everything crashes and burns right after you experience the first scripted chase scene, with the reasons why everyone in the facility is dead. Spoiler alert: it’s the dinosaurs.
Listen, I’m not a big fan of horror media, and I’m very easily scared by anything and everything, but the animations look so goofy and rough that it completely diminishes the horror aspect. Seeing the dinosaurs struggle to catch up to you while Violet is able to easily dodge their lunges was honestly comedic and a sign of things to come.
The game's narrative and direction are very confusing, to say the least. It struggles to capture any tone that it attempts to convey, and the worst part is that it tries hard to do so.
Emotional scenes feel empty because we can’t sympathize with Violet since there’s absolutely nothing that we know about her. Scenes that are supposed to be frightening end up with no impact because of the funny animations or the mismatched music. Even getting the special suit felt weird, since it looked like it was designed to showcase Violet’s assets.
"
In one of the game’s supposed pivotal moments that sets up the game’s title drop, where you’re told to go "find the truth" by a dying character who’s remorseful about what they put Violet through. There’s no emotional impact; there’s a severe lack of connection and context between the player and Violet because you don’t know what happened to her or even a clue as to what’s going on.
This carries on the whole game, all six hours of it. The game tries very hard to make the plot mysterious, revealing nothing about the characters or the game’s central plot until about halfway through or the very end, but it never sticks the landing. In the game’s case, Earth had supposedly perished due to an event called the Cataclysm, but they never explain what happened or how it happened.
If the game had explained the whole premise through an intro sequence or cinematic then maybe it would’ve gone better, or at least we would’ve known or had a hint of what Violet’s going through. Instead, we’re forced to learn this information through the scattered notes throughout the game’s stages, which aren’t very easy to read. The combination of its lackluster presentation and lack of context leaves you feeling even more confused and baffled than Violet herself throughout the game.
A Visual Crisis
While I had already said that the animations of the game look abysmal, the actual look of the game isn’t actually bad, at least not up close. The first time you get out of the research lab, you get treated to a scenic sight that shows off its jungle environments.
These happen after almost every area, so you can at least look forward to some good-looking landscapes. When you get up close and look at the detail, that’s when you see the texture issues that tend to clip against each other.
The game’s aesthetic direction is just unclear. Like in one area alone, the theme is just way off the mark. There’s one facility in the game where it’s supposed to be a Preservation Lab for dinosaurs, but the decor inside the seemingly militarized building was laid out like a museum, complete with displays and exhibits.
That’s not all; there are even portraits and paintings of aliens and different skeletons, which seem to be generic Unreal Engine portrait assets. In a way, the stages feel like an asset flip, as they laid out the map first and found that it felt too empty, then added all the unnecessary decor even if it didn’t make sense aesthetically.
Poorly Executed Gameplay
So if the visuals and the story are already rough, the gameplay has to be at least good, right? Wrong. It’s definitely inspired by other horror-survival games and borrows many gameplay mechanics from them. Or, again, tries to.
Movement is clunky, shooting feels weightless, and the enemy AI is so easily predictable and exploitable that the challenge in combat is not to run out of bullets. On the flip side, the AI is omniscient, so sneaking is never an option even if they included the option to move "silently" via crouching. It honestly kind of feels like the unwanted offspring of the original Resident Evil 4 and Dead Space.
We’ll get into the gunplay later, but first, let’s get into the barebones inventory system. Like the aforementioned Resident Evil 4, the inventory system uses a grid-based system. You want to organize your items because the game doesn’t pause when accessing the inventory, which means healing or treating an ailment mid-combat will become a chore if you don’t do so.
Inventory space is also something you have to deal with, as the game definitely gives you more than enough items to fill up your inventory twice over. This isn’t uncommon, and it at least creates a challenge in balancing the items that you want to carry over. After getting a few inventory expansion upgrades, however, that challenge is gone, since now you have enough space to store everything you need.
While I briefly mentioned that the game’s shooting mechanics are weightless, the gunplay itself feels overall. Dinosaurs are typically depicted in popular media as resilient creatures that can tank hits, sure, but none of the guns feel strong enough to take down the scaly predators consistently. The game even has a weapon upgrade system that doesn’t really make sense.
I’m not entirely sure if dinosaurs become tankier as the game progresses, but fully upgrading the pistol’s damage felt like a scam since it felt as if I needed the same amount of bullets to kill one of the game’s limited enemy types. Not even the magnum or the shock rifle felt satisfying to use, as none of the shots you take feel impactful.
Speaking of enemy types, there aren’t a lot of enemies in this game. There are the tiny velociraptors that hit-and-run, the human-sized velociraptors that chase you until they die or out of sight, the dilophosauruses that spit poisonous projectiles, and these weird alligator-like dinosaurs that you don’t see until the penultimate area of the game.
Each of them has its own attack patterns, but since the AI is predictable, they’re also fairly easy to deal with. It’s only when the game throws you multiple enemies in a cramped room that it starts to feel a little uncomfortable. But even then, the fact that these enemies drop ammo and healing items sometimes makes it easier than it actually should.
And then, there are the boss encounters. Or rather, the three bosses that basically play the same way. While they’re all tankier than the average dino, they all move and fight the same way: get close, lunge, and repeat. They don’t have any variety of attacks or approaches; they just run at you and do a little animation before they lunge. This means that all you really have to do is dodge at the right time to avoid any damage.
Technical Issues
With poor gameplay, a confusing narrative, and a lackluster presentation, does the game at least run well? If you mean that it can run stably with framerate issues during gameplay, then yes. In terms of its performance, the game runs well for the most part, except for a few segments, but I didn’t notice anything particularly negative on that end. But if you meant to ask if it was free of any technical issues or glitches, then no.
There’s some visual clipping here and there, but honestly, it’s not that bad considering that you expect some sort of clipping to happen in games nowadays. There are, however, other weird visual inconsistencies, like the odd focus and blurring in cutscenes, or the letterbox display. It could be a stylistic choice, but it felt jarring to see all the time, even during gameplay.
But that’s not the game’s biggest problem. Its biggest problem is reloading the game after a death or a checkpoint. To be more specific, there were two separate problems that made me scratch my head during the playthrough: some items in my inventory were missing, and that items respawned.
In this case, I had already unlocked the door to one of the locked doors in the first chapter, but never entered the room. I went to explore one of the other rooms and found myself at low health, but was rewarded with a tactical shotgun and some supplies for my troubles. I got jumpscared by a velociraptor that jumped out of the vent in the same room where I found the gun and died due to low health. But here’s the weird part: I reloaded inside the locked room.
I checked my inventory and found that I still had some of the supplies I picked up before dying, except the shotgun. I went back into the other room, looted it, got the shotgun, dealt with the surprise, and got rewarded for double the health items. I even went to the room with the keycard to unlock the locked room in question, only to find that the keycard had respawned as well.
It’s a weird glitch, one that I’m not particularly sure what the cause is, but it happened less throughout the game since it places save rooms right before boss fights or big enemy encounters in later stages.
Is Code Violet Worth It?
Definitely Not Worth the Price.
For $50, Code Violet is definitely not worth it. Nothing about the game is worth that much money, unless you want to waste a few hours on an obscure plot that tends to bewilder you the whole time. The art direction is off, the animations are wonky, the gunplay is extremely light, and none of the gameplay loop is engaging, aside from collecting and crafting items. I would even go so far as to say it fails as a horror game, as nothing about the game fulfills that vibe.
I wouldn’t recommend this game to anyone, even to diehard fans of Dino Crisis, since it might even feel disrespectful to them. If the game were on sale or at least $20 to $30 off, it might be a decent purchase, but paying $50 for 5-6 hours of story-driven gameplay that’s not even good for the most part is pretty criminal. You could play any other dinosaur-themed shooter, and it would probably play much better than this.
Hey, at least the outfits look good, right?
| Digital Storefronts |
|---|
| Playstation |
| $49.99 |
Code Violet FAQ
Will Code Violet Be Released on Other Platforms?
As of writing, the game is exclusive to PlayStation. The developers have also stated that they have no plans to port the game to other platforms.
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Code Violet Product Information
 |
|
| Title | CODE VIOLET |
|---|---|
| Release Date | 1/10/2026 |
| Developer | TeamKill Media LLC |
| Publisher | TeamKill Media LLC |
| Supported Platforms | PlayStation 5 |
| Genre | Action, Horror, Shooter |
| Number of Players | 1 |
| ESRB Rating | M17+ |
| Official Website | Code Violet Official Website |
