Classify all games from Frictional (from worst to best)

[GrAVit]

I'll rank these from best (1) to worst (6). Bear in mind that there will be some spoilers here.

1: Amnesia: The Dark Descent - Great horror game that brought me into the genre itself, incredible atmosphere and terrifying monsters, intriguing story that made me want to replay the game thrice, beautiful 19th century environments, astonishing music and sound effects, nice puzzles that were actually fun to do, and ultimately, arguably the scariest game ever made. If I had to state some negative things about this game, those would be how obvious it is when a monster appears or disappears, but terrifying nonetheless.

2: Penumbra: Black Plague - Fantastic atmosphere and great improvements from the first Penumbra. Many memorable parts, for example the Kennel. The new monster scared me shitless, I also like how it doesn't necessarily disappear. The plot is somewhat confusing at certain points, still nice.

3: Amnesia: Justine - This is a tough choice between Justine and Overture, but since I generally like Amnesia games more, it's Justine. Perhaps short and no save points, but the fact that the game quits itself if you die does add a lot more pressure to chases and such (which this game includes a lot) although it might also elicit some anger in players. Absolutely terrifying, scariest chase scene with Malo since the water monster from A:TDD. Interesting story, even if short. However, ethical choices of what to do with the prisoners didn't concern me too bad.

4: Penumbra: Overture - Classic. It did scare me shitless when I encountered the first dog/wolf and heard it howling. The combat is pretty poor, and the AI seems mentally challenged most of the time, but the story and atmosphere manage to compensate for that well enough. The rock worm chase was horrifying. Frictional sure knows how to make good chase scenes! But really, being able to blow the dogs/wolves up with dynamite / flammable fuel canisters made the game a lot less scary. It made it kind of funny, actually. This is understandable, as it was Frictional's first *major* horror game, if you can call it that. Playing the game stealthily is the best approach for a proper, immersive and scary experience.

5: Amnesia: A Machine For Pigs - I was kind of disappointed in this one. It offered fantastic environments, sound effects, music and story, but it lacked in horror. There were quite a few scary parts and awesome Silent Hill-like mindfuck moments, but overall, the game didn't feel that terrifying, especially when compared to TDD, and the developers (TheChineseRoom) aimed to best it. The huge lack of gameplay elements was a huuuge strike on this one. Not being able to interact nearly as much as in TDD was a real setback, and kind of ruined the immersion of many players. If I had to give the story some critique, it would be that it was very very cryptic, and often just left me confused as to what the hell I was doing. Lack of inventory and picking up items also sucked real bad, since that was a major part of Amnesia in general, and the puzzles were far too easy and felt kind of pointless.

6: Penumbra: Requiem - Well, it isn't *as* bad as many people say. I did enjoy the atmosphere a lot. It's heavily, or more like completely focused on puzzles. There aren't even any real dangers in it. I did feel kind of lonely in it, as if I was dreaming, which it probably tried to resemble. Pretty psychedelic, to be honest I don't remember much of this game, but it had interesting concepts at the very least. I wouldn't classify it was a horror game, which I expected it to be because of the title "Penumbra:", but yeah, it left me somewhat disappointed. Wasn't expecting such a short and odd ending to the otherwise great trilogy.

Really looking forward to SOMA, I trust Frictional in this. It should and probably will be scary as hell!