Horror Games

So Thomas Grip’s favourite game is Warioware?

Is Obscure and Obscure II worth re-visiting? I had Obscure on PS2 when it first came out, but I remember bouncing off it, as it felt not as good as Silent Hill...

I'm mentioning this here over the "currently playing" as it's more appropriate to horror gaming.

So after starting Trepang2 and thinking it's not really scary, I started a mission earlier that is so far managing to not only be on a par with the scary bits from FEAR, but is also channelling an internet creepypasta I've been getting a bit obsessed with of late to brilliant effect. This is after doing a side mission that was...odd, to say the least.

Damn. I like this game a lot. The only sad thing is that I know it's not overly long and I think I've seen a good 2/3 of it already. That's to be expected given the price point etc.

I can now also dual wield though. Shotguns. In slo-mo. Blood everywhere.

Looked at a review of it and I dunno. Visually, it looks really bland, even more than FEAR. Like, zero character. You can tell the enemies all wear masks because it's easier. If there's practically no story, I'd want it to be more visually appealing. Not a massive fan of bullet time in general so think it'd get boring after the novelty wore off

wunty what's the creepypasta?

Think I'll wait until it's cheap in a sale because the FEAR combat was great, but I also really liked the spooky moments in that game (I can still remember the bit where someone is peeking around a corner that really got me)

I’m not kidding this level is freaking me the fuck out.

FEAR had a good atmosphere and decent story. I think it was a fancy new engine at the time as well, which won't be as impressive now

I was playing through FEAR last year, and was generally unsettling for a horror game where you are fairly well armed.

Grab a boxed version?

Most 'Lovecraftian' games etc. are a bit tenuous.

They often just name drop a few things for flavour, Necronomicon sounds more impressive and mysterious than spellbook and is more interesting than grimoire. By that standard, the entire Evil Dead franchise. Games, films, book and comics is Lovecraftian. Splatterhouse takes place in the West mansion, named after Dr West. So, Splatterhouse is Lovecraftian.

I say just go with it.

Oh gosh. Where do I begin. So. Yes. At the beginning.

I am impulsive. I also have a love for certain older horror franchises that affects my decision making. Therefore, when I heard of Stray Souls coming out this week - despite the fact I've already got AW2 pre-installed for tomorrow - the bits of footage I saw got my interest piqued. Fog filled mid western town? Check. Freaky looking monsters? Check. Nefarious cult activity involving the whole town? Check. Akira Yamaoka soundtrack? Check. UE5 powered graphics? Sexy. Check.

So I checked a bit more footage out. Stuff on YT from a demo last year. Sure, it looked a bit janky, but that stuff was a year old. It still looked promising. I thought a year down the line and a bit of the jank will have been ironed out. It's a small indie studio. It looks decent.

So I splurge. Grab it as soon as it goes on sale and download it, firing it up last night.

Jesus. Wept.

It's... hilariously bad. On nearly every conceivable level. It's Deadly Premonition without the offbeat charm. The plot makes NO sense. At all. Scenes lurch from one to the next with only a brief note on a loading screen. Enemy Ai is on a level where it seems the monsters are hastily given stage notes and shoved in front of the camera after they've been drinking in Wetherspoons all afternoon. They don't know what they are doing. The dialogue levels are either far too loud or too quiet. The relationship and narrative between the two main characters makes a lot of assumptions very quickly and goes on from there. Solutions for puzzles, like keys, spawn in AFTER you've checked rooms sometimes. You have a golden gun. Why do you have a golden gun? Because the young lady you met at the beginning who turns out to be your sister (no spoiler, this is right at the start) tells you she nicked it from a cult ritual and now you have it. I managed to get an upgrade for said gun because a cutscene suddenly had her in a different room (after being right beside me) in a policestation and she picked up a piece of paper that then told me my fire rate had increased. Even though I wasn't there, and she vanished after that point.

It's nuts.

Can it be improved with patches? Erm. Unless there's a patch that re-does the whole game then no.

However. I'm going to play through the whole thing. Why? To teach myself a fucking lesson.

This is what I'm doing to myself because I'm so fucking desperate for a new Silent Hill.

Thing is - hilariously - that I actually quite like Bloober's output. One of their Ex-devs in fact is responsible for this car crash of a game I'm playing now. I genuinely think they'll do a decent job.

Then again. I blatantly am one for getting my hopes up against good reason so fuck knows. Fuck. Knows.