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.
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.