I always wanted to play Until Dawn but lacked a PS4, so I guess this is the next best thing.

Honestly, the horror stories set on a ghost ship have always bored me to death, and I guess this one is no different. I'm very into the "butterfly effect" mechanic and the different outcomes it creates in the story depending on the most minimal details and choices.

I would have rated this game a little bit higher if it weren't for the stupid jumpscares coming at me every 3 minutes, it gets reeeeeaaaaallyyyyy annoying really fast. Also there's cringe dialog here and there.

I already knew this game wasn't very good from the start but holy mother of God, I didn't expect it to be this bad. I mean, Until Dawn, with all it's flaws, was such a fun game! But Man of Medan is just... so uninspired and dull. For something that relies so much on it's story and narrative you would expect a little more effort put into it.

This first chapter in the Dark Pictures anthology brings absolutely nothing new and is a massive downgrade, even mechanically, compared to an interactive movie released 4 years before. Great stuff.

From Edgar Allan Poe’s Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque to Orson Welles’ The Mercury Theater On Air to The Twilight Zone, horror anthologies have been successful in almost every medium for nearly 200 years. Supermassive Games wants to make video games part of that illustrious club with its Dark Pictures Anthology series. Man of Medan is the first foray into that space, telling a shorter story that has a ton of branching paths similar to Until Dawn, the studio’s breakout hit from 2015. Man of Medan has the narrative-heavy framework and most of the inherent positive qualities of Until Dawn but it also manages to fail a few more quick time events on its journey to the end.

Read the full review here:
https://www.gamerevolution.com/review/588285-man-of-medan-review

Just a fair warning, I can't really review this game without spoilers so if that's not your thing then be warned.

So way back in 2015 Supermassive games came out with their absolute horror masterpiece game "Until Dawn", if you've read my review of Until dawn then you probably already know it's among my favorite games ever and probably my favorite horror game. While it is unlikely that Until Dawn will ever see a true sequel, the developers have been working on a new series of anthology games that are all spiritual successors to UD as they play very similarly and are all horror games where everyone can either live or die. The first of these was Man of Medan. So how does Man of Medan stand up to its predecessor? Well, not incredibly well, it's a good game no doubt, but it's kinda just OK in my opinion. First off the gameplay is mostly the same as Until dawn like I mentioned, you play as a group of characters who are trying to survive their horror movie setting and their fates are in your hands as you make decisions for them and manipulate the game's story based on those decisions. There is once again items for you to collect in the form of these portraits which give you possible hints at future events and there are plenty of exploring sections to go through, there's also a new feature where you have to press certain buttons in rhythm in order to avoid being detected by an enemy character, I found these to be a little frustrating but they didn't really explain them super well, no big deal though.

The real highlight of a game like this though is always its story so how's this one? Well like I said it's alright. First off this game is way shorter than Until Dawn, while Until Dawn can take the average person about 6-8 hours to complete assuming you're also trying to get all collectibles and explore as much as you can. This game I'd say will take you about half that time, again assuming you're exploring and trying to find everything. The story this time around is you are playing as 4 friends who are out on a deep sea diving trip looking for a lost WWII ship said to be full of treasure. While they are out at sea, they encounter a group of pirates who take them hostage and bring them to the ship in hopes that they will be able to force them to find the treasure known only as "The urca gold". Not much is known about the Urca gold or the sailors who died on the ship but based on the games prologue we can assume they saw some really crazy things on the ship prior to them all going missing. While you and the friends are on the ship your main objective is to find a way to escape from the pirates but also you begin encountering some weird things much like the sailors did, I'm going to get into spoiler territory now so be warned. It turns out that the Urca Gold is not gold at all but is actually a hallucinogen that causes the people who breathe it in to see weird and scary things but of course none of them are actually real. As they travel the ship, the group of friends and the pirates succumb to the effects of the drug and while the friends are able to figure it out, the pirates aren't so lucky. The game obviously has many different endings depending on how you play but somehow I managed to keep everybody alive on my first playthrough which I really was not expecting but I guess I've seen enough movies that I know what decisions to make. Anyways, I was also able to figure out the "twist" of this one fairly easily so it wasn't much of a surprise to me when it came up and overall I thought it was just OK, personally I don't like stories that rely heavily on a twist in order to make it exciting, and that's exactly the problem with this game, it just isn't that interesting. The characters I didn't feel like I knew at all and I frankly just didn't care whether any of them lived or died, add the lame twist into everything and I felt that this was a pretty disappointing and underwhelming experience especially when compared with the last game that this company made. If you love Until Dawn like I did then you might enjoy this one but don't expect too much.

That sure was a game that exists...

Across the board a downgrade from Until Dawn, unfortunately. The cast and story weren't compelling and what was going on with the graphics and performance? It went to shit in the last few chapters of the game. Some of the multiplayer stuff looks promising but it won't fix the problems with the core of the game.

I hope Little Hope is better.

I still consider 'Until Dawn' to be one of the best, or maybe even THE best interactive movie / adventure even to this day. So, naturally, I got really hyped when I first heard news of 'The Dark Pictures Anthology', and its first installment, 'Man of Medan', following in the footsteps of 'Until Dawn'.

Even if it could not live up to its predecessor, overall, I wasn’t disappointed in this game. It was exciting, it was scary, sometimes it was even quite challenging. Unfortunately, it’s quite short and there are a few glitches here and there, but as far as I’m concerned, the replay value and co-op mode made up for these shortcomings.

I believe the weakest element in the game is the graphics, especially the facial expressions. Don’t get me wrong, they’re not ugly at all, but compared to 'Until Dawn', that came out four years ago, they look somehow awkward. Still, not bad, just could have been better.

All in all, I highly recommend this to all fans of the genre. Great, budget-priced thrill!

Bargain bin film of the week level stuff. Kinda cynical in that way but it’ll be interesting to see where these games go as they continue to refine and find ways to broaden its interactive horror gameplay. What we have here is not nearly as exciting to play as Until Dawn but the promise of more innovative features is there despite shoddy pacing and stuttering tech performance. The cast isn’t as dynamic but I still found my heart pumping in some of the chase sequences and relentless QTEs. There’s something about what this brand of games offer that fascinate me and keep me coming back. Was hoping for more diversity in how your choices and actions (or lack thereof) based on curiosity and artificial recklessness would impact the character growth and overall consequences. There should definitely be more fluidity but that would require a lot more development time. Its predecessor served as a base model for this but is somehow more complex and challenging. I’ll continue to support this franchise of horror gaming because overall its a medium that has so much potential to churn out strong, psychologically taut material. What‘s here though is infrequently effective jump scares and C-grade storytelling laced with half baked mechanics.

English/German below

Very interesting "horror" story Game to play in KOOP. The Multiplayer part is very well integrated and the Game is all in all a good one. The Gameplay is very simple but its more about your decisions in certain situations.

The main thing horror isnt really that good, mostly these parts are jump scares, but you never feel very frightened. The facial expressions are sometimes way over the top and some graphic issues coming along.

Sad is that the game is very short and u cant really connect to the characters.

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Kurzweiliger "Horror"trip der es aber nicht allzu oft schafft wirklich zu gruseln. Optisch ist das ganze hübsch, hat jedoch ein paar Ruckler und FPS Probleme (halten sich aber noch in Grenzen). Schlimmer fand ich die teilweise völlig überzogene Mimik, ist diese aber on Point sieht das schon sehr gut aus.

Haben es Koop gespielt, was wirklich gut umgesetzt wurde und Spaß gemacht hat. Das Spiel ist halt einfach zu kurz, weswegen man kaum eine Charakterbindung herstellt. Steuerungstechnisch kennt man es ja QuickTime und schnelle Entscheidungsfindung.

Da wir uns das Spiel geteilt haben gehen die 15€ in Ordnung.