Amnesia: Rebirth - sequel to Amnesia: The Dark Descent set in the desert of Algeria

[Cromwell]

You are right about the hook to the story there is none. I assumed about 10 minutes in that

Spoiler

her child is probably dead and now shes heavily damaged in the head

but that is uninteresiting. You arent somewhere mystical you are in a cave in bumfuckistan and can walk straight ahead. Shit is lying around like they used the place as a garbage dump and I really dont care for the love letters of her possibly deceased crew because I dont know them at all. I also dont really care about her backstory via diary of her possibly also deceased lover which name I have already forgotten again because without a ongoing mystery story who gives a shit about the explanation that led to things.

Another problem for me is that I dont know why she goes crazy if shes in the dark because theres nothing there so why would I fear a big empty cave.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Another problem for me is that I dont know why she goes crazy if shes in the dark because theres nothing there so why would I fear a big empty cave.

She's also scared of heights and dead people. I already commented on this to a friend that she's as omni-phobic as Jack Walters (the protagonist of Dark Corners of the Earth), but unlike Jack Walters she ain't a ninja commando field surgeon.

 

[Jenkem]

>take a step
>entire screen goes blurry
>''QUICK BRING THE BANDAGES''
>can't do anything because the screen is fucked up
>back to normal
>take another step
>same thing happens
>''NO NO RACHEL''
>take a step
>''OH CHRIST OH FUCK WE ARE FUCKED HERE''
>take a step
>Yasmin: <<<sobbing>>>
>take a step
>screen cuts to a drawing
>''WAIT HANK! IT'S SALIM HE IS HURT!''
>game finally lets you walk around
>find a box and touch it
>screen cuts to a drawing
>''BUT IT'S GOOD ISN'T IT? PEOPLE HAVE BEEN HERE!''
>take a few steps forward and look at a postcard
>screen goes blurry
>''RACHEL? YEAH SHE ORGANIZED THESE LECTURES IN LONDON AND CHARLIE BACK AT THE INSTITUTE RECOMMENDED HER!''

 

[Cromwell]

I am pregnant again from the looks of it, she didnt notice it.

 

[Creamy Muffin]

As someone who loved original Amnesia, Penumbras and SOMA I have to say this is a real dud. I'm 2 hours in and absolutely nothing interesting is happening. The "gameplay" is not fun in the least, it's just frustrating.

 

[Cromwell]

I gave up on it. I tested what happens if you stay to long in a dark place and after a long while you see some pictures screaming at you then you get something like a qte and if you fail that you get ported 5 meters back. The otherwrold is somewhat cool but the game is not only uninteresting with all the touchy feely story stuff it is not very subtle about it and is annnoying to the point it actively discourages me from playing further.

 

[Spukrian]

I've played about ten and a half hours. I must admit I'm a bit disappointed.

There are a lot of things that annoy me:
*Tasi talks too much (already mentioned by others)
*Too many intrusive flashbacks (already mentioned)
*Tasi often gets stuck on geometry: rocks that are barely three inches high that she has to jump over, corners of door frames she should be able to walk past, etc

Spoiler

*Chase sequences are overused and they always end with Tasi getting knocked unconscious.
*The thing that scares the most in a game from Frictional is sneaking and hiding from monsters AND THERE IS BARELY ANY OF THAT IN THE GAME.
*YOU CANNOT DIE IN THIS GAME. YOU NEVER DIE.

But there are actual puzzles in this game, which is good. And I quite enjoy learning more about the setting and backstory of the Amnesia world.

Spoiler

Not getting the voice actor of Professor Herbert back was a missed opportunity IMHO.

I'd like to think I'm near the end of the game but I'll continue tomorrow. I might have more things to say then.

 

[Nano]

I gave up on it. I tested what happens if you stay to long in a dark place and after a long while you see some pictures screaming at you then you get something like a qte and if you fail that you get ported 5 meters back. The otherwrold is somewhat cool but the game is not only uninteresting with all the touchy feely story stuff it is not very subtle about it and is annnoying to the point it actively discourages me from playing further.

QTEs in a Frictional game, wtf is happening

 

[Cromwell]

QTEs in a Frictional game, wtf is happening

its "hammer wasd and move the mouse to regain control" you get that if you are about to "die" from craziness. It doesnt help the game that the "gameplay" is essentially the same just even more dumbed down. I can only play so many games that work with "stay out of the dark and dont look at the thing to long, run away from the thing". Since there are so many games that came out since the first amnesia I would think a lot of people are also just tired of that formula.

 

[Jenkem]

sent in a refund request...

RIP Frictional games.

 

[Wunderbar]

The machine for pigs was better...

 

[Zarniwoop]

Yeah if it's even more declined than pignesia and SCUBA I'm definitely out.

 

[some funny shit]

Machine for pigs is walking simulator but at least story was nice and music was great.

 

[Sore Loser]

.

 

[Spukrian]

I've finished it now.

Someone pointed out that the backstory contradicts and retcons certain aspects of Dark Descent's backstory. I thought about it and realized that while I really like the lore of Rebirth, some of really doesn't make sense as a sequel to Dark Descent.

Weird, I've finished the game and I remember like 4 chases and neither ended in getting knocked out.

I think I remember at least 6 chases in the game, but maybe I'm confused. Feels like running from the first enemy happened more times than I could count. And me getting knocked out, well, maybe I took a few wrong turns. Can't know for sure.

The problem with hiding segments is that they spaced out unevenly throughout the game and that most of them happen on a pretty small territory.

Yes, small and incredibly short.The only hiding segment where I felt I actualy needed to think was the one near the end of the game.

Not being able to take the torch didn't bother me, because there is overabundance of lamp oil and matches (though penumbra and amnesia had too much resources too).

I actually used up a lot of matches and oil and was almost always short on them.

The story is probably not that awful but I don't really care about children and in the end I don't really understand the motivation of the main villain.

Spoiler

The villain couldn't have children of her own because of her condition and that was her only motivation

Before playing rebirth I've replayed both penumbra games and amnesia. Except overture I haven't played them for almost 10 years. On replay I didn't find any of these games particularly scary, I guess I still knew too much about hiding and that monsters are not that dangerous. Funny thing is that dogs in overture were probably the scariest simply because on hard difficulty they are much faster than all humanoid monsters and kill in 2 hits. There is a monster in amnesia that can kill 1 hit but it was too easy to avoid. What really surprised me is the length: penumbra 1 and 2 took me around 4 hours each which is what I thought it would take, but amnesia was only 5.5 hours, I didn't even rush it, I tried to find all notes and tinderboxes/oil. Overall I liked all 3 games, but I didn't thought that they were very good, just good or maybe decent-good. My memories of them were more favorable and I remembered them as more scary, I guess I was just younger and also back then these games were novel, they set a trend for horror games and now this type of gameplay is too familiar.

I need to replay Penumbra, it's been too long... This is the thing: when first playing Amnesia it's scarier than when playing Penumbra for the first time, but on subsequent playthroughs the games become less scary, because you know what to expect. On replays Penumbra is scarier for me than replays of Amnesia, because in Amnesia everything is scripted and in Penumbra, the scary parts are mostly governed by AI. I've played Dark Descent three times, the third time I wasn't scared, no tension at all, yet I still feel tense playing Penumbra (or at least I did last time I played it).

And it is probably the worst frictional game so far (let's forget about requiem, ok?), though still better than machine for pigs for me.

I enjoyed Requiem for what it was. And I was probably more scared playing Machine for pigs than Rebirth, but Machine has lots other problems of course.

EDIT: One more thing...

No one in the thread mentioned it yet but it seems that main hero has nu-lara croft (TR2013) syndrome, they just like to make her fall from something, make something fall on her, she takes quite a beating but barely acknowledges it.

Spoiler

Yes, I agree. Tasi also experiences an Orb and the Otherworld, just like Daniel, except Daniel was nearly driven insane by them and Tasi isn't. This diminishes the Dark Descent's story

I need to stop thinking about this game because I'm sure I'm going to find lots more that I don't like about it.

 

[Sore Loser]

.

 

[Silva]

Yeah if it's even more declined than pignesia and SCUBA I'm definitely out.

SOMA is best walking sim ever.

 

[Darth Roxor]

A good moment that illustrates the decline of this game perfectly relative to Frictional's previous material is during the first time you land in the ~otherworld~

You stumble upon a dead guy dressed like an English explorer/safari enthusiast. Next to him lies a note that says, roughly, 'zomg I can't carry on anymore, to whoever reads this, ur doomed - xoxoxo, professor Wossname.' Immediately after reading the note, the protagonist remarks, "[Intelligence] This must be professor Wossname." Wow, thanks game, I woulda never figured this out myself.

 

[Wunderbar]

The game has a very poor pacing. During the first 2 hours the game is just a worst kind of walking sim frontloaded with unneeded flashbacks, boring notes and lore dumps, then there is a short exploratory segment in the fort, then there is a segment in Xen from half-life where you read e-books of long lost civilization, and only then the game actually starts feeling like a proper Amnesia sequel (cistern, talking ghoul in the Ayleid ruins). But by that point it's too little too late.

Rebirth doesn't work as a walking sim because the story, writing and pacing are poor; Rebirth doesn't work as an adventure game because puzzles are too rare and simplistic; Rebirth doesn't work as a horror because it's not scary and the difficulty is piss poor. What happened? Even SOMA, despite being a story-focused walking sim, was much scarier and atmospheric. Did Frictional suddenly lost their skill?

 

[Jenkem]

apparently the guy who wrote TDD and Soma left the company

 

[Ivan]

Finished my first session and one pretty funny bug aside I had a great time. This really does feel like the a merger of the character and voice work of Soma combined with the wooooooh spookiness of DD. I was instantly reminded of that first Resident Evil 5 trailer where Capcom touted "horror in the daylight." So far, the fort was my favorite bit of the game. Very well done design, fun puzzles with little hand-holding

Spoiler

wish they had separated the tank wheels to different rooms

. Oh yeah that funny bug: I was exploring the 2nd floor of the fort, when all of the sudden the ghoul teleported in front of me, ran around hectically, then de-spawned. Startled the crap out of me then I realized it was a bug. :D Oh yeah, the music is very well done as well. It reminds me of the ambient Fallout tracks a bit like The Glow.

Taking a break after the tank bit. Looking forward to see how future environments look. Hoping they do more of this type of open design, maybe allow me the chance to go to different areas instead of the fort's A-B-C structure.

 

[Wunderbar]

Tomb Raider 2013 comparison is apt, both games even end with main character climbing atop some tower, fighting a bad guy, and then defeating an evil empress in an epic showdown.

Amnesia my ass.

 

[Starwars]

About 6,5 hours in and I'm liking this quite a bit more than the original Amnesia but I was never that much of a fan of that one, though it did scare the pants off me when I first played it. But I'd say that ,given the "cult classic gone mainstream" thing that happened to Amnesia, Frictional were setting up for disappointment in trying to do a sequel to it. There is just no way it would ever have the same impact, and a game like this is all about the impact.

But it's a pretty uneven game. Like someone said, the biggest problem is the pacing. Personally I don't really mind the main character, even though there is a bit too much emoting going on (mother of god!) but it's not a problem for me. But the way everything is spaced out, from flashbacks, notes, puzzles, spooky sequences, it feels very "choppy". Especially the beginning of the game kinda infodumps on you with characters and stuff right away, and all you want to do at that point is just *get into the gameplay*.
It gets better as the game goes on but it still feels uneven, much due to how the journey unfolds with various environs and the way you go from to another. I mean, it's *good* that the environs are varied (and some are very well done) but it really highlights that you're really going through various levels.

I like that there are some puzzles to be found. The sequences with monsters feel too easy and forgiving of the player. It needs to feel way more deadly and punishing than it is now. In 2020, the saturated horror market just makes it too easy to see through some of the tricks that the game pulls. There are some nice "setpieces", interesting setups but the actual gameplay of the whole hide and seek thing isn't very interesting any more. And again, too forgiving.
Story-wise it's also a mixed bag. Some parts of it are really good, some parts have potential that just isn't quite reached and some parts just aren't that interesting.

When it's good, it's really good and still quite scary to me (though I'm a wimp when it comes to these types of games). It's just that the lows are a bit too low. I still have a ways to go but I'd rate it above The Dark Descent so far (again, not a huge of TDD). But I much prefer the Penumbras and especially SOMA. Machine for pigs is not worth mentioning.

In some ways, it is what I expected for the game. I would've rather had them do something completely new like they did with SOMA.

 

[Ivan]

Finished my playthrough - about ten hours or so.

It's a solid title let down by contrived "evil verse" and cheesy setpieces (oh no I'm slipping, oh no the floor collapsed, oh no...). The monster design is aces per usual (the wraiths are lovely). I really enjoyed how the cast of characters you read about/have flashbacks about are integrated in the gameplay as it unfolds, something Soma and DD didn't do well or attempt. The voicework was damn good, especially given how many characters there are. Unfortunately, there aren't as many puzzles as I would have liked. My favorite section of the game has definitely got to be the fort, I really feel like that's the bit where the game had my personal favorite elements I would like to see expounded: a more open design where the player is tasked to collect items to solve a puzzle, a lurking monster, and that nice dichotomy of a horrific interior feeding into a sunny outdoor area.

The late game features more of that cheese peek-a-boo horror stealth sections mentioned by Starwars but I do feel Frictional did a good job of making me care and feel for the baby. It's almost like an escort game without the annoyance of having to guide a separate AI.

In sum, I definitely want to see Frictional expound on some of the open level design the game rarely touches, but when it does it does it DAMN WELL. Also a bit disappointed that the touchy physicality of the physics system didn't really evolve from the previous titles to this.

Story spoilers

Spoiler

which of you monsters were ok extracting the fear juice from the captive man? I didn't have the guts to do it

 

[Wunderbar]

Story spoilers

Spoiler

which of you monsters were ok extracting the fear juice from the captive man? I didn't have the guts to do it

Spoiler

the game was so on-rails it didn't even cross my mind that you can avoid torturing that guy.
anyway, the torture was lame because it happens off-camera, and Tasi herself barely reacts. What a psychopath.