The BOOM of survival horror (indi) games

[Name]

Brothers! After the unstoppable rogue-like and procedure generatation trend (oh how I wish they can write a monkey to procedurally generate EPIC storyfag games), it seems that a wave of survival horror games have arrived for some reason.

Sir, You Are Being Hunted
Outlast
HUNTSMAN: THE ORPHANAGE (what's the deal with uppercase letters)
Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs
Paranormal

So what's the problem with people? Why do they want to torture themsevles with horror games? Why can't they mass produce RPGs instead?

 

[agentorange]

yeah. mass produced rpgs would be great. everything should be mass produced. mass produce dicks into ur mouth. its just another fad, its difficult for people to think for themselves and take a chance making a game that might not be liked by their facebook friends, so they jump on whatever gets the most youtube lets players jacking off. the roguelike shit is popular because people like to brag about how theyre playung THESE SUCH HARD GAMES WOWO THEIR SO HARDCORE LIKE DARK SOULS EVEN THO THEYRE NOT ROGUE LIKES SINCE U CAN KEEP ALL UR FUCKING SHIT WHEN U DIE BUT OOOOOOO. and horror games are the same, except people brag and attentionwhore about how unfrightened or how scared they were while playing them. noone actually gives a shit, everything is just in the interest of seeking approval from others. #horrorlover #sixdicksinarow everything is sht fuck u asidhasidhaoisgda['asnbcaosbaisb

 

[Wirdschowerdn]

I'm not interested in any of these. Except ROUTINE, but that one hardly qualifies as pure survival horror either.

 

[SCO]

It won't last. Real horror will never be mass market*. Maybe a debased form.

*no stephen king doesn't count plebians

 

[Baron Dupek]

Some game success. Others repeat with hope of success too.
Nothing new. I know that trend since my adventure with video games started.

 

[Whisky]

Amnesia was a surprise hit and some assholes LPd it while having their face take up 3/4 of the screen so you can see them go "HOLYSHITIMSCARED!AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

 

[sea]

Hey did you guys remember Amnesia, that game everyone loved? How about we just make that, but... that? Again? Because people like spending money on the same thing over and over, right? The history of mass culture shows that it is driven not by innovation and novelty, but by stagnant trend-whoring, after all.

 

[Whisky]

It's a shame, because I liked Amnesia. Penumbra was better, but it was still a solid game. I just wish games that sought to emulate them did something to set them apart.

 

[Cowboy Moment]

I think most indie horror games aim to emulate Slender rather than Amnesia.

See, indies like horror games, because ultimately the experience is more important in them than technical or mechanical shortcomings. Amnesia is a mechanically poor game, and neither the graphics nor the scope are particularly impressive. The reason it works is that it does the important things very, very well.

It's also the reason most of them are trying to ape Slender. Pulling off Amnesia requires actual talent, the designer not only needs to understand horror, but also be able to wrap his ideas in appropriate aesthetics, and horror is notoriously easy to fuck up with small things. Meanwhile, for Slender you only need a gimmick, because Slender is an extremely gimmicky game. It's important as a proof of concept - it shows how you can achieve a lot with very little when it comes to scaring people, but in and out of itself, it's shit.

Overall though, I see this as a positive trend. At least we've mostly moved past endless jump scares and monster cupboards, towards trying to build a genuine atmosphere of terror and dread with more subtle tools. Most of them will fail, of course, but I still prefer this to Doom 3, Dead Space and Resident Evil.

 

[baturinsky]

I think roguelikes are way more scarier than "horror games". Seeing misfortune of NPCs is one thing, but knowing single wrong step can be your (character's) last...

 

[Dr Tomo]

It's also the reason most of them are trying to ape Slender.

I disagree as I think all of them are just making horror games and Slender started the trend. There was barely any horror games on the market until the casual audience got a hold of Slender and shat themselves saying "OMG! this is sooo scary I iz goin to have nightmares".

I only knew of Amnesia/Penumbra until people jerked off to slender last year and that is when you see a influx of indie dev's trying to tap into the niche market since the triple AAA are too incompetent to tap into it themselves.

 

[Ninja Destroyer]

From every boom comes good/mediocre/bad products. I just hope at least one title to be very good, and I'll buy it.

I didn't know about Amnesia being popular so much. But after playing in the opposite direction (first Amnesia, later Penumbra trilogy) they feel like diffrent games. The foundations look similar, but, as always the the devil is in the details. In Penumbra fear is one of the feelings player can experience, but you can escape the dogs if you are fast enough. The guards are bigger threat, and I admit, had some "nice" moments with them. But with Amnesia, is like walking through thick black fog. I played many survival horrors, and had to do little breaks because it really was frightening and in some way exhausting. Nice setting, good voice acting, and clever puzzles on top of that. I hope guys from Frictional will do something new, because they have really good ideas, and they know how to "translate" them into the interactive environment.

 

[Excidium]

Youtube/twitch celebrities get money by filming themselves screaming with new indie horror game -> millions of subscribers buy the new indie horror game -> developers gets money to make more indie horror games and more developers want to join this profitable fad -> repeat

 

[sexbad?]

Youtube/twitch celebrities get money by filming themselves screaming with new indie horror game -> millions of subscribers buy the new indie horror game -> developers gets money to make more indie horror games and more developers want to join this profitable fad -> repeat

That's what Outlast looks like to me in particular. I watched some footage of the opening area, and it looked like a fucking Condemned game instead of a survival horror. It had no weapons, sure, but it put all its resources in giant shock events that are actually completely harmless. Lots of indies are making horror games with things that they know would get pewdiwpedew to trigger fake screams for his audience of babbys.

Daylight from Zombie Studios seems to be riding the procedural generation gimmick in a way that means peweppeidxw would be capable of producing infinite reaction videos of it for his and the developers' mutual publicity increase. Considering that Routine has been more mature about its advertisement, it might actually use randomized levels to remain mysterious instead of to appeal directly to people who judge horror games by replayability and pewpweidwpe screams.

Surprisingly, Amnesia 2 didn't fit itself into the trend of SPOOK YOUR GUTS OFF for the sake of SPOOK YOUR GUTS OFF as much as its advertising made it look like it would. It's still shitty, but it does its own thing.

 

[JarlFrank]

Why can't anyone make a fucking non-horror survival or stealth game

 

[Cowboy Moment]

Surprisingly, Amnesia 2 didn't fit itself into the trend of SPOOK YOUR GUTS OFF for the sake of SPOOK YOUR GUTS OFF as much as its advertising made it look like it would. It's still shitty, but it does its own thing.

So I take it you have a review copy? How shitty is it, on a scale of Frictional's previous games?

 

[DefJam101]

Whoa I didn't even notice sexbad posted on these forums

you are my hero, sir

Why can't anyone make a fucking non-horror survival or stealth game

They don't sell well, because in our current gaming climate any sort of meaningful long-term decision making translates into endless "5/10 poor pacing, frustrating difficulty, boring" reviews and word of mouth. That's also why "survival horror" means "running away from things".

 

[sexbad?]

Surprisingly, Amnesia 2 didn't fit itself into the trend of SPOOK YOUR GUTS OFF for the sake of SPOOK YOUR GUTS OFF as much as its advertising made it look like it would. It's still shitty, but it does its own thing.

So I take it you have a review copy? How shitty is it, on a scale of Frictional's previous games?

Yes, I did.

I like all of Frictional's previous games, disregarding Requiem, so that's not the best thing to use as a scale.

There's an embargo until a few days from now, so I have to limit what I say if I want to stay away from the wrath of PR folks, but I did a brief post explaining my distaste in it. Apparently this was in a different thread, but the content of this thread made me imagine I had actually posted it here already:

Hiding and running from enemies like in any other Frictional style game is still there, albeit easier and not nearly scary feeling until the game actually tries something new by the end, but any other reliance on player agency is gone. It's all one corridor that occasionally gives you a branching path to go get a thing and bring it with you. You get railroaded from one place where you have to pull a lever to the next where you have to push a button.

Horror-wise it hasn't stooped to the level of something stupid like Condemned or Dead Space, but it is notably less threatening than anything Frictional developed in-house. Its atmosphere is diminished by its belief that pigs and visions of children are actually scary, and though I won't go into much detail I will say that it rides on the coattails of its predecessor so eagerly that a lot of moments are quite similar. Also, I'm not sure if it's because there's just less substance overall or because they occur more often, but shock triggers are definitely more prevalent than in the original game.

 

[Heresiarch]

Why can't anyone make a fucking non-horror survival or stealth game

If someone would remake Robinson's Requiem it would be heavan.

 

[Athelas]

Condemned > Amnesia. I found Amnesia to be incredibly boring. Condemned, for all its flaws (derpy plot, too much filler combat), at least managed to generate some creepy atmosphere.
(Well, at least the first Comdemned, I haven't played the second.)

The horror genre should take a different approach. Trying to make the player feel as if they're in a horrific life-threatening situation is pretty silly since the player character is always a quickload away from being immortal. Jump scares are not effective anymore once you've experienced them, if at all. A much better idea for instance would be to have a bunch of NPC characters with you and depending on your actions, they die in gruesome ways or you're forced to amputate their arm or something. Or a game where you start out as someone trying to run away from zombies only to devolve in a zombie over the course of the game and instead fighti humans trying to protect themselves.

 

[Cowboy Moment]

Surprisingly, Amnesia 2 didn't fit itself into the trend of SPOOK YOUR GUTS OFF for the sake of SPOOK YOUR GUTS OFF as much as its advertising made it look like it would. It's still shitty, but it does its own thing.

So I take it you have a review copy? How shitty is it, on a scale of Frictional's previous games?

Yes, I did.

I like all of Frictional's previous games, disregarding Requiem, so that's not the best thing to use as a scale.

There's an embargo until a few days from now, so I have to limit what I say if I want to stay away from the wrath of PR folks, but I did a brief post explaining my distaste in it. Apparently this was in a different thread, but the content of this thread made me imagine I had actually posted it here already:

Hiding and running from enemies like in any other Frictional style game is still there, albeit easier and not nearly scary feeling until the game actually tries something new by the end, but any other reliance on player agency is gone. It's all one corridor that occasionally gives you a branching path to go get a thing and bring it with you. You get railroaded from one place where you have to pull a lever to the next where you have to push a button.

Horror-wise it hasn't stooped to the level of something stupid like Condemned or Dead Space, but it is notably less threatening than anything Frictional developed in-house. Its atmosphere is diminished by its belief that pigs and visions of children are actually scary, and though I won't go into much detail I will say that it rides on the coattails of its predecessor so eagerly that a lot of moments are quite similar. Also, I'm not sure if it's because there's just less substance overall or because they occur more often, but shock triggers are definitely more prevalent than in the original game.

I feared that would happen. Hopefully it's a result of The Chinese Room not really wanting to make games, and not a sign of things to come in Frictional's next project. Thankfully the former have officially moved to the PS4, where their new game will spectacularly bomb.

Is the writing good at least? The whole "Machine for Pigs" thing sounds like it's setting up some kind of coherent theme, does it work like that or is it just random cool sounding herpaderp?

 

[sexbad?]

I feared that would happen. Hopefully it's a result of The Chinese Room not really wanting to make games, and not a sign of things to come in Frictional's next project. Thankfully the former have officially moved to the PS4, where their new game will spectacularly bomb.

Is the writing good at least? The whole "Machine for Pigs" thing sounds like it's setting up some kind of coherent theme, does it work like that or is it just random cool sounding herpaderp?

The writing is good, and the story it tells is pretty good too, albeit built on a bit of a silly set of contrivances. The title and the line it comes from are actually really great. It's not a game that's worth playing for its story, though, because it nullifies its impact in a way that I'll explain when I'm certain I'm allowed to. I'll probably post my review in this thread after I upload it when the embargo is lifted. It's coming along nicely.

 

[Name]

What's frictional games doing anyway? Engine stuff only? Their own secret project?

 

[sexbad?]

What's frictional games doing anyway? Engine stuff only? Their own secret project?

The last thing I read from them about their future plans involved a game that was going to be serious but not focus on horror, but I may have also read that they decided to focus on horror anyway after they wrote that. They're currently making a new engine that supports better outdoor environments, so that might be a hint.

 

[sexbad?]

I just checked out HUNTSMAN: THE ORPHANAGE's Steam page and saw this:

A HYBRID OF HORROR-SURVIVAL AND CREEPYPASTA...
Finally, a game that gives you rich dialogue, complex characters and atmospheric setting at the same time as it takes away violence as your only way out.

I'm not sure they're with the times, because I'm quite fond of Penumbra and Amnesia for doing just that. Also, creepypasta is stupid.

The writing on the Steam page beyond that is more interesting, though, and sets a pretty neat feeling atmosphere, but then I watched the trailers...