A shorter post, since for the first time in many years, I didn't head down to the Expo at all on the Friday. It was a mix of not really being interested in any of the programming and already being done my shopping on the Thursday.
Instead I went to play Outlast 2 with Shauna. We played about an hour and a half of the game, which really, is only the beginning because we got stuck on a part early-in and I got exceptionally mad. Then Shauna made the executive decision to just play on the easiest difficulty so we get more of the story and experience and less of the frustration.
So what do I think so far? Well, starting with a few positive points, the atmosphere and story so far seems to be pretty good. I am curious about what's going on and like the set up for the game. Seems like they've added some new functionality and more gameplay elements for stealth and survival...however...
It's not scary. Not yet at least. I don't know if I'm de-sensitized or if it's the subject matter, or a setting I don't find frightening. It just isn't terrifying. It's disturbing and kind of scary in a "man there's something very wrong with everything here," but if I'm completely honest, I laughed way more than I felt any ounce of tension in that first couple of hours. I think having a segment where an enemy comes out of no where in a bottleneck and instantly kills you despite your efforts to hide or run away really ruined any atmosphere or tension that had built up. Aside from the camera element and some of the control feels, it does not seem like an Outlast game yet to me.
I already know what the problem for me is, and that doesn't make it a bad game. The original Outlast scared the crap out of me because it was in a setting I already find uncomfortable (mental asylums and medical environments) and had characters and inhabitants that just weren't "right". It was unsettling. You didn't know what these people's motivations were, you didn't know what was going on in their heads, they had been tortured and experimented on, half of them were violent, and the rest of them were hysterical or messed up in one way or another. You had patients staring blankly at television screens, banging their heads against the walls, standing in corners, wandering aimlessly stuck in their own delusions, or some that were still there, but had simply seen too much and wanted it all to end. Then, you were stuck in a box with them all. Isolated, trapped and forced to be a witness. Even as an outsider, you end up being a part of the horrors happening. The pacing was good, incremental and tension was built naturally.
Outlast 2 so far is a different kind of unsettling that just isn't...terrifying, because even though you get dragged into it unwilling, you still aren't PART of what's going on. Maybe by the end this will change with some sort of revelation or element that ties everything together, but for now this is a united religious fervor or "effort" rather that takes a bunch of normal looking and acting white dudes and gives them the singular trait of religious fanaticism. The other parties seem to equally be driven by religious reasons (albeit opposite) and are more annoying than frightening. You still feel like even though you can't fight back physically, you can fight back mentally. You can deny that fervor when in Outlast 1, as much as you try to stay "sane," it's impossible to separate yourself from what you're seeing and experiencing.
So no, I'm not scared. I think I'm going to enjoy the atmosphere and be disturbed by the imagery, but I'm not going to experience the terror of Outlast 1 that included the unsettling patients and the Groom and the utter hopelessness and horror of the situation. Perhaps it's just the theme or maybe the game will surprise me by the end, but I feel like I'm going to laugh a lot more than cry in this one.
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