I'm halfway through the second level and generally liking it. It's basically a serial killer/CSI type thing and boy does it lean into the tropes - Se7en-style opening titles (haven't seen those since SiN and Thief 1), mannequins in abandoned tenement buildings, scanning for clues with little gadgets (no semen yet though). They do lampshade this right at the start, though, with a fellow detective complaining that the serial killers never go to nice clean places for their killings. And tropey though it is, the atmosphere's pretty effective, as you slowly creep around some grotty location, hearing what might be footsteps above you, then seeing a paint can move out of the corner of your eye. Then suddenly a crazy guy's running at you and you're stoving his head in with a lead pipe you pulled off the wall. The serial killer stuff is mixed in with some hints of supernormal abilities too, which is pretty cool. It's not as brutal or as scary as I remember it being when I played the demo (which consisted of the first level) at the time, but I think that might be because I'm just coming off Bioshock which pulls a few of the same moves in its early stages when you're whacking away at splicers with your spanner. And to be fair, I have felt a little nervy walking around the flat on my own after playing it!
Some things kill the atmosphere a little - a lot of bad line readings, and the 'find all the dead birds for achievements!' sub-quest which the game sometimes prioritises over the homicidal junkies swinging planks of wood at your head.
It's got a pleasingly simple melee system - swing, block, kick, use the taser if possible; basically the Prince Of Persia system, which I see as the platonic ideal. The one thing letting it down is that it's so damn hard to time blocking correctly. I'm sure I had this problem with at least one other game, perhaps Jedi Knight 2? [EDIT: looking back, also TRON and Riddick] If I see a dude start to swing at me and I click block before he hits me, it shouldn't read as mistimed! Or if you're going to insist on there only being a brief window for success, give me a tutorial so I understand it, because it's too damn frustrating having to work it out during the real thing.
It's generally doing well at making me feel like Will Graham, though, so I'll be eagerly getting back to it tomorrow (in daylight, phew!).
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Okay, I've done dilapidated abandoned tenement building and metro station tunnels, I'm now onto dilapidated abandoned department store. This is where mannequin guy gets his mannequins.
It's feeling a little repetitive already, but there are some new enemies - brutes and wall-crawling weirdoes - to play with. It's introducing more supernatural stuff too, which is effectively creepy - rat-creatures scuttling through adjacent rooms into vents, one guy disappeared into thin air before my eyes and I'm also getting visions of flocks of birds crashing through windows or what the serial killer's been up to. (I think I read a few years ago that the bird stuff never gets explained, but it's still good flavour - they're flocking to certain areas then having brain haemorrhages and die, and these areas are the same that are seeing huge aggressive crime spikes. Presumably the killer and/or myself are giving off some kind of psychic signal.)
I'm getting a bit better at blocking. It seems the trick is to wait til the last moment, though this doesn't always work either. I'm wondering if different enemy/weapon combos mean I have to adjust my timing slightly. If so, that's asking for a ridiculous amount of finesse. It's very satisfying when it works, though, and you block a swipe, crack them in the head, kick them to the floor then snap their neck. Combined with the 'tase 'em, steal their weapon' move, you've got a few options. Still some irritations, though, like how stealing someone's weapon causes them to grab you so you have to waggle your mouse to get loose but there's no way to tell when you've succeeded or which way you're facing, so you often end up facing away from them doing a Turner And Hooch impression like an idiot. Or how you're only able to hold one thing, so if you've got a shotgun with 4 bullets but there's one on the floor with 2 you're not able to combine the ammo, and you can't just tuck a pistol into your belt or something to tactically save it for later, you just have to use it on the first mook that comes along until the bullets run out then swap it for whatever comes to hand. The melee system is the focus of the game, so these little quirks glare more than they might in another game.
I feel like I might need another game to dip into while I'm going through this, as it's not something you binge-play. The pacing is too methodical for that (not in a bad way), plus like I say there's the repetition. Seems I'm about halfway through, which suggests there won't be much more variety but not much more padding either.
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I finished Condemned. It turned into a little bit of a slog towards the end, as they took away my taser and put me up against a row of really tough enemies. The end fight was just a bunch of them in a room then brawling with the same Pinhead-type guy 3 times in a row, as you strip out his metal spine like you're opening a can of corned beef, and then finally rip his jaw off. It was all rather underwhelming. They did manage to keep the scares and chills up all the way through up till then, though - heroin addicts weaving through water on their backs towards you, or turning around to discover a bunch of mannequins have appeared behind you.
The writing throughout was abysmal, and the ending particularly bad. They make sure to tell you one banal bit of information about a million times throughout the game, but then when it ends they leave a ton of plot threads dangling in a way that seems purely due to clumsy dialogue, plus they chuck in "oh, there seems to be an ancient cult involved, bye". Very frustrating, and not in a 'we're leaving this for the sequel' kind of way. Speaking of the sequel, apparently it goes bananas - your character is now alcoholic and has to keep drinking booze to keep his vision clear, plus he's fighting a massive cult conspiracy as well as possessed baby dolls, crazy clowns, and bears.
Overall I liked the game, but the block move is flaky yet accounts for like 40% of the game mechanics, plus it's really repetitive and badly written.
Rating: Orange.
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