The epitome of what Iām trying to refer to is the Playdead games (Limbo and Inside). Dark Souls and BioShock both hit on this idea but not quite so directly. The game BADLAND is also a great example of this, too. The mobile game The Silent Age also did this exceptionally well. Never quite knowing whatās going on, and maybe some tension without release, but again not straight up horror. A feeling of uneasiness is what Iām looking for.
When playing through Inside, thereās never any moments where youāre scared, but youāre never sure whatās going on and thereās always a level of unease. What are all the mindless zombie-like people? Why is everyone hunting the player? What happened to this city? Whatās the goal of the character the player controls? What exactly is going on here? Thatās what Iām looking for. If you know of any other games which do this, Iād greatly appreciate hearing about them. Itās a very specific niche so Iām not sure how many games do this, but the games that Iāve seen do this tend to be some form of post-disaster or dystopia. Iāve seen some great artwork do this too. ZdzisÅaw BeksiÅski had done some stuff like this. Some great dystopian novels also do this quite well.
I loved Dishonored 1 and the second was also quite good. I know Redfall was a disappointment but Iāve never played it, so every experience Iāve had with Arkane has been positive so far. Iāve been meaning to play Prey because of this, and I think I bought it over the previous steam sale. Iāll consider downloading it soon to try it out.
I picked up Death Stranding as one of the free games over the Christmas free games thing with Epic, so I donāt have an excuse to not try that one.
Incidentally I just started Prey about an hour ago after sitting on it in my backlog for a couple years. Itās very good so far, seems to have a good spread of systems with decent depth and the graphics are still 2023-approved.
Iāve been playing a lot of DOOM so the combat feels a bit Liteā¢, but I felt that way about Dishonored tooāblows land like wing chun and not like a rock crusher.
Itās got BioShockās turrets, F.E.A.R.'s slow-mo and Dishonoredās stealthy parkour, and so far it all comes together nicely.
It feels very much like an Arkane title, too. Maybe a bit too much going on at once, but boy do they know how to throw everything at the wall to see what sticks.
Slightly off topic but how do you like the newer Doom games? Assuming thatās what youāre referring to. I still go back and play Doom 1 & 2 quite frequently, but I never got into 2016 or Eternal. My coworkerās favourite game is Eternal and he raves about it all the time. I played a few minutes of 2016 and it seemed alright but I didnāt play enough to get a good idea.
I love them both. I feel like they both need to be played on harder difficulties because theyāre built for a pushy playstyle, especially Eternal which requires melee finishers for ammo drops even more than the '16 game already did.
'16 has more of a straightforward plot. The story is fine. The main NPC looks and sounds like James Spaderās Ultron, which thrills me. I love the Mars station design and wish the Hell levels were a bit more creative. Other than some mysterious hints at a connection between Doomguy and all the Hell stuff, '16 doesnāt bother much with lore.
Eternal takes everything good about '16 and gives it an espresso, some laughing gas, and a whole bunch of lore that might have been written by Tenacious D. Itās deeply silly, very hard and has some of the best game design Iāve ever seen. I donāt think one is better than the other; 2016 is more nostalgic, but Eternal is more ambitious. The only catch about Eternalās ambition is that you really have to be on board, because there arenāt optional play styles ā you play Eternal the way the devs tell you itās supposed to be played.
I might just have to give them another shot then. Eternal sounds like my type of game anyway, so I might go for that one first. Thanks for the explanation!
Iād recommend against playing the Epic version that was free. That was the standard edition. Product placement ruins the atmosphere. Your health potions are literally Monster Energy Drink. If you want to play this game, get the directorās cut.
I was one of the few to get the directorās cut before they switched it, and I kept my copy of the directorās cut and also got the standard edition as well. I guess I got lucky
Redfall was a break from their usually fantastic single player immersive Sims.
The dishonored games obviously has the top slot, but prey follows the same type of setup. Then deathloop is similar in presentation but mixes the formula up with some roguelike-style repetition.
Redfall was unfortunately just the death rattle of arkane as their first xbox-involved launch, if developer interviews are to be believed
What made Redfall so bad? I havenāt really heard anything about the game other than that it was a massive disappointment. Is it just that Arkane usually does a fantastic job and so when they didnāt it was perceived as worse than it was? Or is it genuinely a bad game?