Draugen is a first-person psychological horror adventure, set amongst the deep fjords and towering mountains of Norway’s awe-inspiring west coast. The game is a dark and disturbing journey into the pitch black heart of Norwegian national romanticism, as seen through the eyes of an American nature photographer, botanist and entomologist.
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Very nice narrative game in rural Norway with a slight supernatural twist. Looks fantastic, has a really dense atmosphere and a good story. A hidden gem.
I was briefly following this game's development (ages ago), because "sassy girl detective who gives off gay vibes" sounded like a very promising co-protagonist. In light of that, the end of act 2 certainly left me distraught, but perhaps not for the reasons intended.
Draugen does a great job of embodying you in the worldspace, but the story isn't as tight. The game revolves around two central mysteries. One is a grim, atmospheric tale of a town rotted by a family feud. The other is Silent Hill 2. This second plot majorly brings down the first, not only because it's been done better in a seminal PS2 game, but because your jerk of a protagonist cannot be bothered to care about the first one. (Kinda impressive, considering all the corpses littering the island.) Lissie's claim that they were "brought here to tell [the villagers'] story" is pretty rich, when the game can't even bother to do so.
Draugen does a great job of embodying you in the worldspace, but the story isn't as tight. The game revolves around two central mysteries. One is a grim, atmospheric tale of a town rotted by a family feud. The other is Silent Hill 2. This second plot majorly brings down the first, not only because it's been done better in a seminal PS2 game, but because your jerk of a protagonist cannot be bothered to care about the first one. (Kinda impressive, considering all the corpses littering the island.) Lissie's claim that they were "brought here to tell [the villagers'] story" is pretty rich, when the game can't even bother to do so.
Art, scenery, voice acting, detective with a partner concept... they were all too good for an unfolding story with empty places game. Unfortunately, the story wasn't for me in the second half.
This game felt very promising as I love eerie detective adventures like these, felt like a must-play 19th century detective game, but although it had an artful and promising setting, it falls flat pretty quickly. The storyline is not at all long, ends on a whimper and leaves you feeling nothing at all. Sad.
I've never played Gone Home, but clearly it spawned a trend of “art-directed empty-environment games” that play as slightly interactive audio books. Draugen goes a step further with a motion-captured human companion, but the associated plot twist falls flat. Draugen also does Hellblade one further. It not only over-explains the power of myth that it clumsily wields – it actively attacks it. The desecrated church (with the unsubtle placard “God is not here”) and the stern angel phantasm are products of a tedious, reflexive iconoclasm.
I related so hard to the themes of this game that it lowkey felt like it was made for me specifically. Wept big sloppy tears.