AMFP Member Review Thread - Printable Version +- Frictional Games Forum (read-only) (https://www.frictionalgames.com/forum) +-- Forum: Amnesia: A Machine For Pigs (https://www.frictionalgames.com/forum/forum-50.html) +--- Forum: General Discussion (https://www.frictionalgames.com/forum/forum-51.html) +--- Thread: AMFP Member Review Thread (/thread-22825.html) |
RE: AMFP Member Review Thread - SliceAndDice - 09-18-2013 I'm around 4 1/2 hours into the game, so I'm not done yet, but I seriously doubt that there will be anything groundbreaking that will change my mind. I can't really put my finger on it, but I feel like there is too much amiss. The game itself is not bad and I don't regret buying it but it is not a worthy successor to TDD... It feels almost tame compared to TDD. Like a nice Adventure Game and not a Survival Horror what I expected it to be. I'll also never understand why they removed the sanity, the oil and tinderboxes and the WHOLE inventory at that?! All of those added a lot to the terror and atmosphere! Especially the sanity which reminded me of Eternal Darkness. I do want to mention that there is a few things that I like after that little rant. The Soundtrack is excellent (Mr. Burns ) and the game looks really nice. This helps the atmosphere a lot. The Pigmen? seem to be smarter and are harder to avoid than the Grunt and Brute, which I enjoy greatly, since my old strategy of sneaking and hiding in the shadows failed quite a few times versus the Pigs. At this rate, I'd give it a 5/10 while I would rate TDD with an 8/10. I WILL edit this if anything groundbreaking happens during the last few hours of the game, but I seriously doubt it. (Outlast is next. Let's hope this one will not disappoint...) RE: AMFP Member Review Thread - Cuyir - 09-18-2013 Excellent game. Pros: Thick atmosphere, well written, interesting, scary,disturbing, mindfucky, etc. etc. etc. Surprisingly enough felt like Amnesia till the ending, then it turned into a obviously TCR developed and written game (in a gooooooooooooooooood way). Cons: I didn't run into any bugs per se but I got physically stuck in the geometry a few times, which forced me to reload the game. Lack of puzzles both worked for and against the game but I still missed them enough. Regenerating health was out of place but I understand its inclusion. Overall, highly satisfied with the game. Still unsure of what i'd give it out of 10, but it'd be between 8.5 and 9. And because everyone's bringing up TDD: TDD 8/10 RE: AMFP Member Review Thread - zico - 09-19-2013 Since my Review spans over the whole game, I'll put it in a giant Spoiler tag. Please forgive several typos and grammar issues as a) I am not a native English speaker and b) my my is still trembling from the experience. Amnesia - A Machine for Pigs was truly an amazing and extraordinary experience. Here's why: Spoiler below!
RE: AMFP Member Review Thread - Nospheratu - 09-19-2013 To be honest, while i enjoyed the game and found some of it's parts very satisfactory, the distinct abscence of some other parts led to my verdict being an overall 6 out of 10 (like i voted). A quick recap of the pro's & con's in my opinion: THE GOOD
Edit: i rephrased some stuff so i don't sound too harsh since i found it to be a good game in it's own right. RE: AMFP Member Review Thread - Nice - 09-19-2013 I'll share my review but lemme comment on some of yours All the "I was so dissapointed to not see inventory and CS and tinderboxes, i almost got a heart attack!" First of all, they already said what the game will NOT have like 1 or 2 months before release and yet people still act shocked about it Second, you want tinderboxes, oil, terror meter, sanity...What next? Brute? Grunt? Sorry but i believe FG wanted to try out something new otherwise this whole game would be no different than a custom story for amnesia if you know what i mean. Enough reviewing other reviews My personal, short review: I was kinda surprised on how interaction was very limited but then i found out that if it wasnt, the puzzles would be impossible to solve due to no inventory. Think about it, if you could carry and grab EVERY single item in a puzzle game with no inventory...Well..You're in for a rough time. The puzzles were not hard to solve it was pretty straight forward and quite repetitive. Spin the wheel, insert the cog or insert the battery, dont forget the pull the lever ofc. But then again, this game was not made for strictly puzzle solving so its okay. I bought it to explore a dark world, hear a story and get scared, not to solve puzzles. That's just me. The music and sounds were TOO dramatic, complex and loud for my taste. For a horror game i prefer simble but disturbing music/ambience playing in the background. ATDD imo completely dominates AAMFP as far as ambience, sounds and music go. Monster: The problem here, atleast to me was that the monster was very predictable. Ofc it's a pig, and on top of that, it was the only monster in the game. When i played ATDD i was scared senseless because i did not know what to expect. Is there something that can come out of small openings or ceiling? are there ghosts? and so on and so forth. As for AAMFP i was pretty much prepared, i could safely assume the monster will be either half pig on 2 legs or half pig on 4 legs and was prepared to deal with it once i meet it. The ending was better than ATDD, although i dont think i fully grasped the story One type of scare was VERY repetitive, the "monster runs past by" or you get a glimpse for a quick second and then it vanishes. I dont have time right now to get into great detail, i might edit the post later but to put it in short now: From my review it might look like i'm completely hating on the game, that's not true. In my review i pointed out the bad stuff but this game has good stuff aswell. It wasn't better than ATDD at all, but you have to consider the fact that ATDD was extremely beyond awesome. The game was far from bad or dull, i give it a 7/10. Here's also something for you whiny piggies that should know: This game was never ment to be something really big, if i'm not mistaken it was ment to be something a bit more than DLC but that's about it. They never planned for it to be something huge, their current project will take place for that. Anyway, heads up FG and the chinese room i await your next product with excitement Disappoint. - AngelOfPh34r - 09-20-2013 Not done with the game yet, but i'm disappointed by the game so far, just in the play. Sure it's prettier, but we can't pick up ALL the things like before, and it's been oversimplified in other ways which in my opinion makes it TOO easy. I miss picking up oil for a dying lantern, medicine for injuries, etc. (for those of you suggesting an electric lantern, it still needs a power source) Without all these obstacles, everything is just plainly too easy. Even the puzzles aren't as difficult as before... And the map is way too linear. After waiting so many years for the game to come out... I'm just disappointed. RE: AMFP Member Review Thread - JawlessWarrior - 09-20-2013 Editing this in after writing: Anyone concerned about spoilers should skip over this. I know I used spoiler tags, but I've mentioned some smaller details throughout that I just don't feel like picking out. Read at your own risk. Finally finished my second playthrough and got my thoughts together about the game. Probably going to be long. One thing I was expecting but never really got was to be scared to tears. I have already played through it twice, whereas in the original I couldn't play for longer than half an hour a day. The pig monsters were creepier looking than the grunts or brutes in my opinion, but they were never really a threat. I saw it as more of a stealth thriller than a horror game, and thus never really got scared. I had moments of panic in some places, but none where it made me want to stop playing or moving forward. I feel if there were a couple more monster encounters in the game and if the areas the monsters did patrol were more complex and maze-like I'd be much more hesitant when playing. Spoiler below!
Next I am going to talk about the plot and character development. Just gonna spoiler tag the whole thing. Spoiler below!
That brings me to my next point: the animations! Huge improvement, considering there were no unique animations in TDD. The pig monsters were killing people, grabbing things, eating... Was not expecting that. Its the small details that I can appreciate, and the animations were a home-run. Gameplay-wise, the game felt a little shallow. It could have benefited from more complex puzzles, perhaps a cool physics based puzzle that requires heavy thinking but gives you that awesome "AHA!" moment. But no, they were all pretty straightforward and easy. The only reason for exploration was notes (TOTALLY worth it though). I am extremely glad they did away with tinderboxes and oil. I see some people complaining that it was the 'survival' in 'survival-horror' or that it gave you something to worry about. Really it didn't. I had dozens of tinderboxes by the end of TDD (never used them) and lantern oil was more annoying than anything. In AMFP at least there is a very valid reason to turn it off. The only times it was off for me in TDD were when I was out of oil or when I was hiding. But again, it wasn't scary or even a cool feature. It was just annoying. Another thing I think could have been done very well was the exclusion of an inventory. They could have pulled off some interesting puzzles without it, but they didn't. I can see why it wasn't included (and I am so thankful there aren't any damn keys in the game), but if I had to choose I'd rather go with an inventory system with complex puzzles rather than the shallow stuff we got in AMFP. I give Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs a 7/10. It wasn't Amnesia. The plot, atmosphere, music, character development, and animations are fanflippintastic but it wasn't scary. It was more stealth thriller than horror at many points. There were improvements in a lot of areas compared to the original, but it changed too much. I give A Machine for Pigs a 9.5/10. Huh!? Yes, thats right. If I take away the Amnesia name, this game is so much better. I don't have the expectations of horror and nightmares. I don't have any expectations at all really, its a brand new game. What I get is a great storyline following a character I care about who is selflessly trying to stop the end of the world at the hands of a machine he himself built. The gameplay is essentially based on exploration with some stealth thriller (which I never said was bad) elements thrown in. The Good: - No more tinderboxes/oil. It was never a fun mechanic and it should stay gone. And to the people complaining about not being able to pick up everything and its grandmother, who cares!? Why is that relevant to the gameplay? Throwing a chair across the room is fun I guess to see the physics engine at work, but it was never a huge part of the game in TDD. - Plot is significantly improved. - Animations (for me) were surprisingly excellent and added so much more the character/personality of the monsters. - Voice acting/writing was top notch. Easily the most well written notes I've seen in any game. - Atmosphere was perfect. The world could some to an end, and I felt like it really could if I didn't complete my mission. - Didn't mention this before, but I am very happy there was no 'sanity' effect. It felt really forced in TDD and considering that AMFP isn't all too scary, it would be sorely out of place. The Bad: - Not really an Amnesia title. - Environments could use a little more complexity, especially around monster encounters. A great AAA quality game. Most of the criticism stems from the title of the game rather than the game itself. I loved every second of it, but it was not the sequel to TDD. I have to give props to thechineseroom. They deviated from the source material a little too much but created a bada$$ game nonetheless. I apologize for any spelling/grammatical errors/any gameplay mechanic or plot device I left out. Very tired but this was the best time for me to write this. Edit: Also I don't care what you say but electro-pig was friggin awesome. Loved the mechanic and story to it, I just wish it was more of a threat. 2nd Edit: Also wanted to address people complaining about length. I don't know about you, but it took me 7 hours total to complete TDD on my first playthrough. AMFP took me about 6, 6.5. Now take into consideration that the puzzles in TDD required an inventory and were more complex. However, they usually boiled down to running around a series of rooms over and over until you found what you needed. While this did set you up for a nice scare, it also felt a little frustrating and artificially bloated the length of the game. AMFP does not have this kind of bloat, so it will obviously be shorter. RE: AMFP Member Review Thread - Fortigurn - 09-20-2013 (09-17-2013, 06:13 PM)Fortigurn Wrote: Seven hours in, and I've just completed the room with the control rods. Additions to my working hypothesis. Ten hours in. Spoiler below!
RE: AMFP Member Review Thread - Nospheratu - 09-20-2013 (09-20-2013, 04:13 AM)JawlessWarrior Wrote: And to the people complaining about not being able to pick up everything and its grandmother, who cares!? Why is that relevant to the gameplay? Throwing a chair across the room is fun I guess to see the physics engine at work, but it was never a huge part of the game in TDD. I'll try to clarify this becouse for me personally it actually doesn't have almost anything to do with throwing things around "being fun". I think that one of the major traits of such games is the immersion factor - the more the player feels like he is a part of the enviroment and story in the game, the better the whole expirience becomes. Everyone of us probably at least once in his/her life dreamed,that he/she was doing some ordinary stuff like in the dreaming persons' waking state, for instance walking around the house, doing daily chores and talking to friends and/or relatives. Now let's say you have 2 versions of the same dream - one where you can fully interact with the enviroment and one where you can't interact with almost anything around you. In which one of those two dreams would you have figured out that you're dreaming earlier, in the normal one or in the restricted one? I for one usually think at the first sign when something is out of place in my dreams: "There's something wrong here; oh wait, i must be dreaming!". The same thing happened to me in AMFP - i honestly wanted to immerse myself in the game just like i did in TDD, but most of time i failed to do so becouse the lack of interactivity constantly reminded me that i'm only playing a video game. When i started playing TDD, i moved a lot of stuff around in the first couple of rooms, but later on, when i figured out that most of it doesn't do anything, i stopped poking around as much as i did in the start. But here's the thing - just by being aware that i could pick up that figurine on the top shelf at the end of the hall if i wanted to made the whole expirience much more realistic to me, even though i actually left about 90% of the stuff intact. As for most of the interactivity being removed becouse it would make the game more taxing for computers, i fail to see why they left the chairs interactive in AMFP since that also unnecessarilly taxed the CPU and there was absolutely no use for them anyway. Sorry for the slight offtopic, just wanted to clarify this part. RE: AMFP Member Review Thread - Nice - 09-20-2013 @Nosfer i can see your point but the reason they disabled interaction is because of no inventory. As you may have noticed, usually only the items ment for puzzle solving are able to be picked up, which ofc makes it possible to find them. If every single item was able to be picked up in a puzzle game with no inventory, you're in for lots of trouble. I think they removed inventory and other stuff for the sake of trying things out, bringing something new or fresh to the table and not just something that could aswell be an Amnesia CS. edit: which also brings me to Speaking of "immersion", having no inventory is more immersive than having one. I dont see how a person can carry 4 cogwheels, hammer, acid, huge machine batteries in his pocket. |