Amnesia: Rebirth

A brilliant tale of terror, even if the ride is a little old and clunky.

Spiralling towers, endless deserts and impossible geometry; Frictional's return with Amnesia: Rebirth showcases why they're the masters of horror.

Rebirth feels like a celebration of the series, with great ideas and terrifying moments that reminds us why the fathers of the new wave of survival horror remain undefeated.

Despite some boring locales and an over-reliance on the darkness just for the sake of it, Amnesia: Rebirth is an excellent horror game with some fun puzzles, well-written characters, and genuinely terrifying moments.

Amnesia: Rebirth is a game that deserves the name of the series with its gripping story and exquisite design. Anyone who loves horror games should buy and play it.

The uneven storytelling is a shame, because if Amnesia: Rebirth had a narrative as unsettling as its play loop, it might be an all-time great. Frictional’s ability to generate tension and moment-to-moment fear is unparalleled, and SOMA showed that an equally powerful story is within their abilities. Unfortunately, Rebirth doesn’t reach those heights, though it remains a tremendously effective vehicle for scares.

With a tighter script and more polish, this could've been a fantastic game that paralleled the trauma of child loss to the evil enterprise of colonial expansion. Instead, it's one that insincerely mines trauma from a colonizer's perspective... then asks you to do a half-hearted physics puzzle.

Amnesia: Rebirth is a work of mastery, and as such it reflects the artistic ability of the developers as well as their mental schemes. It has one main problem: It comes as an indirect sequel of a legendary game, The Dark Descent. In this sense, making a hit is always both a benediction and a curse, as all the titles Frictional made and will make after it will be compared to it. Rebirth expands the Amnesia universe by directly projecting the players into the unknown that in the Dark Descent was only suggested to imagination, and it does it very, very well. During the entire story, it's inevitable to feel a sense of hope in contrast with a growing feeling of desperation. The Good: - Wonderfully designed in every aspect. - Great story that drags into a storm of emotions and doubts. - Superb voice acting and well crafted dialogues. - Immersion is well achieved. - Frightening. Not as much as other Frictional's games, but a must for horror enthusiasts. The Bad: - Some enemy encounters feel frustrating and unfair. - Dealing with enemies is much less interesting than in other Frictional games. P.S.: Amnesia: Rebirth is great, but it reflects the modern times' tendency to exasperate and exaggerate things a little too much, with a partial loss of the beauty that older games have.

alzheimer's simulator pregnant mom edition is a horror game but its actually an adventure game. you play as a woman (yuck) who is pregnant. since she doesnt remember, she wont realise until its too late and after she has made some questionable decisions. stupid game.

Finally, some kind of sane game_design (in a bad way). Sadly, scripted one-hole journey with non-skippable animations, again. After 3/4 of walkthrough I just wanted it to end. An extremely interesting lore of the game is revealed in minimal details and in broad strokes. The development of the environment balances at the junction of the intriguing and the tasteless. To this part, the Darkness completely turns into a game-design "crutch" and "piano in the bushes". Absolutely exhausted mechanics. Nevertheless, it's worth playing for the sake of an episode in the fortress with the radio, if you came for horror. And for the sake of the views/moods of a pre-antique parasitic civilization, if you are a connoisseur. Gameplay: combat mechanics 1/10 stealth 4/10 atmosphere [very uneven] 8/10 Gameplay as immersive horror (the Fortress only) 7/10 Story [AMAZING lore again, with morbid **** plot] 7/10 Graphics 7/10 Sounds & music [annoying "scratching bugs" sound again!] 7/10 . I just hope that The Bunker was 'based' on the Fortress from here.

Easily the worst story in the series. Unlike the previous two entries, this game was written by Ian Thomas, whose greatest achievement up until that point was being a programmer on Soma. And his approach to writing is indeed very programmer-like (at least in this title - he's also written about a dozen indie games that no one has ever heard of). Everything is very neatly structured and logical, but it has no soul to it. What we are being sold here is basically a girly sob story with vaguely Lovecraftian horror elements haphazardly thrown on top. Mikael Hedberg and Thomas Grip, the writers of The Dark Descent, had such a great understanding of what Lovecraftian horror was about and how to make it work. And A Machine For Pigs, say what you will about that game, Dan Pinchbeck may not be the best horror writer, but he definitely knows how to write drama. Not the cheap, soap-opera kind, but a real drama in the best traditions of classical literature. What on earth made Frictional hire this Ian Thomas guy instead is beyond me. Every single loading menu narration had me literally rolling my eyes at how overly melodramatic, corny and cheap it looks and sounds. And the Otherworld stuff... While it's not as bad as Tasi's story straight out of the Lifetime network, and some of the efforts to explain the workings of the Otherworld are admirable, as a whole (and as a distant byproduct of the Lovecraftian mythos) the entire Amnesia lore works best when it explains the least. The first game understood this very well. But this game completely misses the point. There's something bitterly disappointing about discovering that this mysterious otherworld you've heard about is (well, was) not so different from ours. People went to work, had families, had mundane things to take care of. It kind of takes away the element of mystery and excitement, doesn't it? I hate seeing that in the media. It reminds me of the work of Wayne Barlowe, whose pictures of Hell were so, well, otherworldly and mesmerising, and then he turned to writing and it turns out that Hell is basically pretty much like Earth, except a little more grim. Nothing like tarnishing your own legacy. But I digress. On the gameplay front, things are just as bad. There are two types of puzzles - those that are simple and lame, and those that are simple but deliberately confusing to hide their simplicity, thus making them even lamer. Needless to say, neither are remotely fun to solve, with or without creepy demons breathing down your neck. The locations are... okay, I guess. They're not particularly interesting to explore, even more so when you can't see anything and only have a very vague idea of where you're supposed to go half the time. Overall, I think the idea of setting a game in a desert was unfortunate. Temperate regions have forests, rivers, mountains, so many interesting places to set your game in. Deserts have... sand. Occasional rocks. Do you like looking at monochromatic, boring sand and rocks for hours on end? Then you will probably enjoy this game. The Otherworld provides some relief, but it's nowhere near enough. And, to be honest, I was expecting more. These people had computers, teleports and other high-tech stuff, yet somehow still lived in bloody caves? Make it make sense. Even the visuals and atmosphere are somehow lacking here. The overbearing brownish-yellow colour scheme of the desert landscape is boring as hell, and the soundtrack is kind of mediocre too. Some vague, nondescript ambient drones - I mean, they're okay, but after the masterpiece that was the soundtrack to A Machine For Pigs, this certainly feels like a downgrade. In conclusion, Rebirth is a very weak title in the series, especially after such strong first two entries. Especially off the back of such a sci-fi horror masterpiece as Soma - arguably Frictional's best game.

As a fan of Frictional's previous games, I was expecting something great after the brilliant SOMA. Sadly, Rebirth falls back on the lamest horror cliches: walking through endless dark hallways, enemies that are basically zombies, spooky images popping out of nowhere. The puzzles are very mundane and frustrating. For example, in one area I couldn't figure out how to progress; the solution was to pick up an object in a dark room that didn't look like it could be picked up and use that. It's never very clear what details in your surroundings are important. The main gameplay mechanic is collecting matches to activate light fixtures, so the protagonist doesn't get too "scared." But unlike real life, you can't use a light source that's already burning to light other light sources. There's also a lantern, but it runs out of oil so quickly and its light is dimmer than a single lit match. So it quickly feels very silly and contrived. The game is fairly immersive, and the voice acting is great. It's just so monotonous to actually play. And as a final slap in the face, you'll probably get the "bad" ending unless you have fore knowledge of what you're supposed to actually do. If you're curious about this game, just watch it on youtube; it's one of the worst games I've ever played to completion.