Lightmatter
Fair · Shooter · 2020
Steam Deck PlayableThe verdict
NO RUSH.
Fair at $19.99. Buy it if you want it.
- Length
- 3.9h
- Value
- $5.13/hr
- Reviews
- 92% positive
Watch this gameOne alert when it is worth buying.
Minimum on the Steam store: 8 GB of memory, NVIDIA GTX 660 / AMD R9 270, 6 GB of storage. Windows only.
A first-person puzzler where shadows kill you. Watch your step or be swallowed by the darkness.
What drives the score
How to read this
Grades run S to D, read from the buyer's side. ▲ marks a lift, ▼ a drag or a dock, ? an input we do not have, • a fact this genre's score does not use. How the grades work
The value story
December 2024 is where it bottomed out, at $0.99. Its cuts run 75 percent off as a rule. There have been 47 in the 6 years tracked, about 6 weeks apart.
On value it sits in the top 30 percent of its genre. It is pricier than 70 percent of its genre, and better reviewed than 84 percent. Among the games that feel like it, Machinika: Museum ($7.99, scores 73) beats it on value, while it beats The Ball ($9.99, scores 35).
Critics scored it 73. Players sit 19 points higher at 92 percent, which usually means a game that plays better than it reviews.
Of the 339 Steam-purchase reviews this site sampled, 3 come from buyers who refunded the game, sampled from reviews written April 2020 to July 2026.
The drop-off
65% start to 7% rarestNo achievement in this game marks the ending, so there is no finish rate. The curve runs from the most-unlocked achievement to the rarest, and its shape is where players stop. Steam global achievements
Players
1 players online when we last checked, on Sep 29, 14:47 UTC.
Player counts from the Steam Web API.
What players say
Lightmatter is a Portal-like that wears its heart on its sleeve. While clearly paying homage to the Portal games, it manages to remain separate and unique on its own with its puzzle mechanics, which mainly centre on using light to avoid touching shadows. It almost reminds me of The Talos Principle for those who've played it before. The game's visuals are also kept simple, but visually appealing with blues, whites...
I run into this phenomenon maybe once a year: the dreaded game that is the pinnacle of mediocrity. I'm not enjoying it. I'm not NOT enjoying it. I played an hour and a half of this with my brain parked in auto-pilot. 70% of players bail on the game before I did. It can feel a bit like a student project or a prototype, a jumble of simple rooms disposed of one after the other, mundane puzzles, nothing clever or...
Steam reviews, mixed to match its Steam ratio and rotated daily. Opinions are theirs.
Cite this score
Lightmatter scores 58/100 on the BANG Score (fair value) as of Oct 2, 2026. The BANG Score rates what a game is worth for the money. Via Steam BANGERS. https://steambangers.com/game/994140/lightmatterReviews set the ceiling, and price against real length moves the BANG Score inside it. How it works, and where it is weak → Steam reviews as of Sep 26, price as of Oct 1.
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