Not only I’m interested in people telling the history of their places, away from the USA and Japan, in videogames, but here you also have at least the influence of an older person that I think it’s very necessary in a medium as juvenile as this. And sure, I can understand where some of the critiques of the game regarding a voyeur or a tourist approach come from, the end credits telling you that you don’t see the same thing in every playthrough and a scene selector with places locked behind a question sign unfortunately give weight to this argument. But ultimately, I think the game really comes from a more honest place. To have a touristic voyeur approach to these kinds of places we already have too many action games that disregard the rest of the world as cool setpieces at best or amusement parks at worst. To me the slow pace of your walking in Promesa seems to be a responsive contrast to such a fast paced careless view (maybe it’s representing someone who cannot move as fast anymore too).

Even thinking that Promesa is honestly interested in the places and histories that it contains, I also think that the game doesn’t trust those enough. Julián Palacios puts a lot of care into recreating something that is, or was, existent and habited. It’s when the game just puts you in a mundane place with mundane sounds in the background where I feel it achieves the most. The street that you walk each day or the home where you have lived for years tell more about the life of someone than anything else.

But in its insecurity of not believing in the inherent expressive strength of these places, numerous abstract sections will appear oftenly. Not only seeing a distorted view of the aforementioned real places while flying strips any of the mundane sense that there could be, but the evocative aspects are also a lot weaker in comparison. When you lose someone that has been living with you for all your life it isn’t hard because you see a floating dress in your dreams. It’s hard because you turn your head while sitting in your own home and you’ll notice that they are not there anymore.

There are spoilers in this, but I put them all at the bottom so I didn't bother tagging it so beware! Also don't read this if the mention of animal abuse will make you very upset!

For reference, I played this on challenging difficulty and I have never played any of these games before with the conceit of just not having to. I watched someone else play Until Dawn a loooooong time ago, and I watched someone play Man of Medan and that game seemed OK.

I've seen a lot of horror movies. I've seen a lot of bad horror movies. This is a bad horror movie, but not in the fun way. Do you like... Slasher films with little to no slashing? Do you like... bad Saw movies? So just most of Saw, don't answer that regardless because you won't like this either way. I really don't have anything against these vaguely interactive cinematic type games, they seem pretty cool honestly, I hope there are better examples than this one. I very rarely feel like I've had my time wasted playing a game or watching a movie. Watching bad horror movies that take themselves too seriously is fun! It's not fun when it's a 7-8 hour long game with literally no payoff! Every time characters are running around, hiding, unlocking doors, climbing walls, running from man, it's for nothing. I literally every time some character getting split from the gang and then scene resolves said out loud, "you didn't do anything you didn't learn anything you did nothing", and they continued to do nothing.

Also the conceit of this guy just being down on his luck and having someone randomly call him that can seemingly fix all of his problems that this RANDOM guy couldn't have possibly known about, is very funny in hindsight. There is nothing supernatural afoot here, at least they never say so. They sure make you want to think there is early on, but they don't really care. This killer is just a guy. He's not an animatronic, he's not a ghost or a "Devil", he's just a guy. He gets fucked up a lot and never seems to care, he fell off a fucking roof and did a literal slapstick family guy broken limbs pose and just stood up immediately, he gets his face cut open in a boat that crashes into a rock and explodes, totally fine. I assume the conceit is that it's something supernatural but they don't fucking TELL YOU THAT.

Again hackish horror stories like this can be fun but this overstays it's welcome badly and half of this cast is just insufferable. Also they aren't people. Director CEO guy who is CEO pilled and treats everyone like shit, guy who's scared of heights and also dumped his girlfriend that's pretty much it, girl who got dumped, girl who likes audio, girl that can hack things. These things don't even dominate their personalities it's just all they have going on. Their personalities are hating on each other insufferably for no reason, except audio girl and hacker girl who are lesbians and carry this game on their back until the very end when they are the product of one of the worst scenes in the game.

I guess I'll get into the spoilery stuff now. This fucking bozo is literally teleporting across the entire island constantly and they never explain how. "Oh well he had that sci-fi maintenance tunnel that he toooootally built himself" how did he get out of the wall he got trapped behind LITERALLY IMMEDIATELY. For the longest time playing this I just assumed there were multiple people involved, one of the characters even brings up that possibility at one point and is immediately shut down. So are there multiple people involved? I don't know, they don't fucking tell you anything ever! He even completely whiffs the boat they escape on and misses them and is SOMEHOW on the boat when they're in the middle of the lake, gets his face cut open, crashes into a big rock and explodes, and is still alive. Is there something supernatural afoot? Idk didn't seem like it don't ask me. Also I don't care if you don't have to do it but them giving you the option to kill the dog to make it stop barking is fucking gross. Especially when if decisions are already made so that both of the normal people will survive the scenario it literally doesn't change anything. I didn't do it obviously but I was still upset that I even had the option in the first place, feels fucking gross.

Bottom line, if this were a bad horror movie that took itself way too seriously for like an hour and a half it'd be fun! But it's an 8 hour long 40 dollar game! It's not fun and the few moments of gameplay that were literally just find a door to open move a thing and jump on it was fucking boring I would have rather they'd just not been there. Also I had a bug where one of my decisions I made got a character killed EVEN THOUGH I did exactly what I needed to do for them to live, so I restarted the scene from the beginning, did it again, still died, restarted, tried another method that lets them survive, still died, tried the last possible one, still died, fuck you. Fuck you especially because that specific scene is so overly gross out gross. Maybe this is a PC thing but I looked it up and other people also had this happen at this exact scene so seems like a pretty fuckin big oversight.

The most terrifying, oppressive, claustrophobic experience I've had in the medium is no surprise a stalking disturbing message of an encroaching patriarchal faith. Heather wants nothing to do with it, and neither will I. Monsters of repressed memories and physical/sexual trauma stalk the corridors, but catharsis is found in making them all Burn. Aborting god is probably the rawest turn on killing god tbh. I personally got lost in the woods of the threads near the end but I think on just initial reflection that there's a large point in there about an incomprehensibly massive societal issue that makes it difficult to form into something tangible (e.g. male gaze and abuse). It's also like a crystalized end to everything the series culminated in before, tying everything back together. Genuinely super well crafted, and a crazy good final message. That cycle of disparaging hatred is still overturned by the real spark of sympathy, we just want love.

Is it bad to stay in your comfort zone when your comfort zone is so damn good? Puppet Combo introduces nothing especially new to Stay Out of the House - you’ll find identical gameplay in Nun Massacre and a similar murder house in… well, Murder House. But by this point, Puppet is at the peak of his powers, his formula more refined than ever: the design of the house is delightfully grotty and labyrinthine, the puzzles are fun and fleshed out, the sound is suitably cursed. Most notably, the unhinged shriek of The Butcher when he pursues you, gives him creepiness as well as a certain vulnerability - it invites the player to want to fuck with him in his house; an appealing element of replayability lacking in the almost impenetrable horror of Killer Nun. Moreover, Stay Out of the House may not be Puppet Combo’s scariest game (it has its moments), but as a claustrophobic puzzle adventure, it’s certainly one of his most enjoyable.

a crossection of too many things i find evocative to not be entranced...lonely fog and repetitive tasks and cyclical horrors always going One Further Horrifying Layer then expected thru perfectly placed nightmare logic with a tinge of traumatic religion. the fact that i genuinely found the buildup stuff Comfy (i like repetitive tasks! i like isolation! i like islands! i like rain and thunderstorms!) is a rly good indicator as to how tailor made for me specifically this feels. i dont Understand everything obviously but i kinda dont want too...it feels evocative enough to get obsessed with without any fan theorizing. some amazing flourishes in here, esp anything involving the physical presence "monster." upset and disquieted me in a way ive been craving for ages !

features one of the greatest lo-poly rain effects ive ever experienced, fwiw

The main issue with Alan Wake, still, is that he's a pretty naff writer. Sure I wasn't expecting to be playing Thomas Ligotti Remastered, but this dude's schlocky narration just about dampens any tension otherwise well established when the world goes dark and strange.
As with Deadly Premonition, I enjoyed the overt Twin-Peaksian influence particularly on the setting. I only wish it strived for that level of eccentricity. Most of the characters play it straight, the only exception being Alan's buddy, Barry, who often veers into Disney sidekick territory. The supernatural forces at large feel ominous but the samey evil townsfolk feel disconnected from the actual goings on (also in the same way later editions of Deadly Premonition has thrown in baddies as an afterthought). The combat is also incredibly repetitive: most of the main game just has Alan running through samey drabs of woods and warehouses firing away at the same 3 or 4 guys.
However, as the remaster also includes the two extra 'specials,' I would like to mention that they add significantly to the otherwise underwhelming final act of the main game. Whilst narratively unadventurous, the specials' combat and level design are actually even more varied and interesting - making unique use of floating word barriers (the writer making his words a reality, get it?) and one particularly Silent-Hill-esque level set on a town sized ferris wheel.
Speaking of Silent Hill, as I always fucking do, Alan Wake has similar issues to that of the post Team Silent games, mainly in its lack of character, tension and pacing.
Despite that, this game is not quite as constricted to being a horror game, and probably should have ditched most of the combat sequences in favour of the investigative mystery thriller segments it usually PEAKS in.
Not as unique or groundbreaking as its long legacy would have you believe, but usually pretty fun.

Ditching homicidal maniacs for religious nuts, who also happen to be homicidal maniacs, Outlast 2 can sometimes be as tense as its predecessor, plus slicker visuals and a more ambitious, albeit messy, story.

My main criticism is that much of the time I was able to evade the psycho townspeople by running past them in the wide open village spaces - sometimes the chases were thrilling but most of the time it loses that tight-corridor claustrophobia the first game excelled at. This is probably why some of the most effective horror in the game comes from the psychological segments that flash back to a labyrinthine school setting, where you unravel a suppressed childhood trauma through spooky hallucinations. It’s quite an uneven balance between these ‘classier’ segments and the exploitation gore fest craziness of the main game, but it keeps an interesting pace.