I found Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs to be much more entertaining than The Dark Descent.
First off, this game does get some negative points because they removed a lot of the fun physics from the Dark Descent.
The sound design in Pigs was honestly really fucking good. Early in the game where you hear stomping behind a door, when you open it, something starts banging on the door, then it stops and walks away, feels like a real 3D space. The Music is also pretty fucking good. The music in Dark Descent isnt bad, the few pieces it has are cool, but the fucking strings in Pigs is just :0.
I found the story to be more entertaining than Dark Descent's. I don't really feel like trying to determine which is a "better" story, I just know Dark Descent's is kind of dull to me, while Pig's had me hooked more. Like the set piece when you go back to the city and the Pigs are fucking destroying everything. My god, the sound design, the music, and horror of it all, all done so amazing.
I found myself actually worried about the monsters in this game. The monsters in Dark Descent have nothing to them, Except the water monster (easily the best moment of Dark Descent), and this is just because when you die, nothing is reset except your position. So you can literally just run by monsters and not care at all, they arent a threat. Now Machine for Pigs also runs like this, it doesn't reset puzzles and only resets you, but there aren't a lot of puzzles, so it makes you have to move through a section matters more. They also used "monster chases you for a set piece" a lot more effectively.
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Also kind of want to go on a tangent about the stigma against walking sims here. I can understand why people would want gameplay in a video game, but I don't get the point in negatively reviewing a walking sim type game and saying that there is little gameplay; thats like negatively reviewing a fps for having guns. I understand that maybe coming from the Dark Descent people were put off that this was more linear and "easier" puzzles, but this game wanted to focus more on telling a story.
And I hate the argument of "well I could just watch a movie instead" that is brought up with these arguments because a movie is not going to have the same interactivity as a game, even if the game has no risks for the player. A movie might be more entertaining maybe, but movies are NOT going to let you walk around in a virtual world to explore, and see the sights.
First off, this game does get some negative points because they removed a lot of the fun physics from the Dark Descent.
The sound design in Pigs was honestly really fucking good. Early in the game where you hear stomping behind a door, when you open it, something starts banging on the door, then it stops and walks away, feels like a real 3D space. The Music is also pretty fucking good. The music in Dark Descent isnt bad, the few pieces it has are cool, but the fucking strings in Pigs is just :0.
I found the story to be more entertaining than Dark Descent's. I don't really feel like trying to determine which is a "better" story, I just know Dark Descent's is kind of dull to me, while Pig's had me hooked more. Like the set piece when you go back to the city and the Pigs are fucking destroying everything. My god, the sound design, the music, and horror of it all, all done so amazing.
I found myself actually worried about the monsters in this game. The monsters in Dark Descent have nothing to them, Except the water monster (easily the best moment of Dark Descent), and this is just because when you die, nothing is reset except your position. So you can literally just run by monsters and not care at all, they arent a threat. Now Machine for Pigs also runs like this, it doesn't reset puzzles and only resets you, but there aren't a lot of puzzles, so it makes you have to move through a section matters more. They also used "monster chases you for a set piece" a lot more effectively.
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Also kind of want to go on a tangent about the stigma against walking sims here. I can understand why people would want gameplay in a video game, but I don't get the point in negatively reviewing a walking sim type game and saying that there is little gameplay; thats like negatively reviewing a fps for having guns. I understand that maybe coming from the Dark Descent people were put off that this was more linear and "easier" puzzles, but this game wanted to focus more on telling a story.
And I hate the argument of "well I could just watch a movie instead" that is brought up with these arguments because a movie is not going to have the same interactivity as a game, even if the game has no risks for the player. A movie might be more entertaining maybe, but movies are NOT going to let you walk around in a virtual world to explore, and see the sights.