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Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs |OT| - This Little Piggy Cried AAHHH All the Way to Hell

~Kinggi~

Banned
Seems like Outlast is the winner this round. I was expecting this outcome based on what ive seen.

I'd be all for annual Amnesia and Outlast games fighting it out.
 

sam27368

Banned
Wow just finished it, a friend had a review copy and I played it at his. Can absolutely see how this game would get polarising reviews, you will either love it or hate it.

Personally - I love it! The game doesn't need monsters or jump scares to creep the fuck out of you. Hard to explain but it's an experience you have to try.

If you like the psychological aspect horror of the old Silent Hill games you will love it.

The ending, the ending! That was incredible! I haven't seen narrative closure like that for a long time!

Keeping the puzzles simple and in world works quite well in never pulling you out of that atmosphere. And there's a reason the atmosphere gets bought up in the reviews, it's unforgiving, horrible and amazing. There were a few points where I was physically sweating. Anyway, you might love it, you might hate it. But if this is where indie narratives are going then count me in!
 
All of the comparisons to Dear Esther have sold me on it. The first was just way too scary for me so it sounds like I may be able to finish this one, haha.
 

El Odio

Banned
All the talk about how most of the mechanics from TDD have been removed is really killing my hype. It apparently being 4-5 hours too isn't helping. But I already have it bought and preloaded on steam so I guess I'll just see it myself later.
 
All of the comparisons to Dear Esther have sold me on it. The first was just way too scary for me so it sounds like I may be able to finish this one, haha.

It isn't jump out scary, but it's truly disturbing.

I was a bit put off earlier by the word of TCR removing the sanity effects, timber boxes, and oil, but I've come around to it over the past few hours. I've sadly never played the first Amnesia, but I did really like Dear Esther. Seeing the reveal of The Chinese Room developing the game back when it was announced was the main reason why I got excited along with the praise of the first game. I'm totally game for them wanting to make a more atmospheric, disturbing horror game that wants to focus on its story and less on moment to moment scares. Despite my issues with Outlast, I pretty much got a straight haunted house style of horror game out of that so I'm hoping to get something a bit different out of Amnesia: AMFP now.
 
It's unpacking now. Finally after so long. I'm gonna play for about 3 or 4 hours and hit the bed around midnight. I can't wait. It's gonna be fun. I'll post a Stream link when I get it up and going if anyone wants to watch.

edit:
The sound design in this game just nails it. Part 3 of my walkthrough. I literally freak the fuck out at 16 minutes in. O_O

I love your review style, but I'm actively avoiding your videos as to be spoiler free as possible.
 
Game is currently broken on steam at least. Game loads with a blue haze, and even the overlay itself is not black but grey. Changing settings doesn't fix the issue, but the first load of the game didn't have these issues. Interestingly enough the menu graphics are unaffected.
 

Thrakier

Member
Wow just finished it, a friend had a review copy and I played it at his. Can absolutely see how this game would get polarising reviews, you will either love it or hate it.

Personally - I love it! The game doesn't need monsters or jump scares to creep the fuck out of you. Hard to explain but it's an experience you have to try.

If you like the psychological aspect horror of the old Silent Hill games you will love it.

The ending, the ending! That was incredible! I haven't seen narrative closure like that for a long time!

Keeping the puzzles simple and in world works quite well in never pulling you out of that atmosphere. And there's a reason the atmosphere gets bought up in the reviews, it's unforgiving, horrible and amazing. There were a few points where I was physically sweating. Anyway, you might love it, you might hate it. But if this is where indie narratives are going then count me in!

Sounds amazing, loved Silent Hill.
 

XAL

Member
I just watched a playthrough of it.

The buildup to the end was pretty fantastic.

I agree with what some people are saying when they say it isn't as scary as the first, but more deeply disturbing. Narrative, sound design, and voice performances were pretty goddamn good.

I would call it the Mass Effect 2 of the Amnesia games, it's pared down from the first (more linear) and a bit easier to make it more accessible (infinite lantern) but the story is still good.

Although I'm a bit lost on some of the story...

Can someone please explain to me what exactly happened in
Mexico? All I was able to discern was that an Aztec Jaguar god invaded Magnus' mind showing him visions of the 20th century and the death of his sons in battle in WWI and constructed the machine to finish what the Aztecs tried to accomplish by human sacrifice before they died off (or did they die off because they made a similar machine?/pigmen?). Also, what the hell why pigmen? Did they help him build the machine?/pigs because it's under a slaughterhouse?

Also, at the end:
What was the cause of his
space/time/memory loss jumps nearing the end of the game as he was journeying to the heart of the machine? And what exactly was the heart of the machine? ie: those prongs holding the heart/stone before he teleports. What was in the purple room where the Jaguar diety was talking to him?? Were the orbs from the first game hooked up to his sons? How did he stop the machine/Did hooking himself into it overload it and kill the energy field keeping the pigmen alive?

Or I don't know, explain the whole thing to me like I'm slow if I didn't get anything right.
 

dark10x

Digital Foundry pixel pusher
Still no multichannel audio. The sound is great but it does not work in surround mode just like the first. :-/
 

sam27368

Banned
I just watched a playthrough of it.

The buildup to the end was pretty fantastic.

I agree with what some people are saying when they say it isn't as scary as the first, but more deeply disturbing. Narrative, sound design, and voice performances were pretty goddamn good.

I would call it the Mass Effect 2 of the Amnesia games, it's pared down from the first (more linear) and a bit easier to make it more accessible (infinite lantern) but the story is still good.

Although I'm a bit lost on some of the story...

Can someone please explain to me what exactly happened in
Mexico? All I was able to discern was that an Aztec Jaguar god invaded Magnus' mind showing him visions of the 20th century and the death of his sons in battle in WWI and constructed the machine to finish what the Aztecs tried to accomplish by human sacrifice before they died off (or did they die off because they made a similar machine?/pigmen?). Also, what the hell why pigmen? Did they help him build the machine?/pigs because it's under a slaughterhouse?

Also, at the end:
What was the cause of his
space/time/memory loss jumps nearing the end of the game as he was journeying to the heart of the machine? And what exactly was the heart of the machine? ie: those prongs holding the heart/stone before he teleports. What was in the purple room where the Jaguar diety was talking to him?? Were the orbs from the first game hooked up to his sons? How did he stop the machine/Did hooking himself into it overload it and kill the energy field keeping the pigmen alive?

Or I don't know, explain the whole thing to me like I'm slow if I didn't get anything right.

What I gathered this is where it
pays homage to TDD, Mandus at Mexico discovered the Orb (TDD) which gave him visions of the future, the 20th century. Overcome by the visions, he INSERT MAJOR SPOILER and left back for London. The machine from what I gathered was the orb indoctrination talking to you. I think himself and the orb were intertwined in some way, so him sacrificing himself destroyed the machine
. Looking forward to the proper plot analysis.
 

jrcbandit

Member
Not very impressed so far as the screen seems murky/hazy. Are the graphics intended to be this way?? I couldn't stand playing for very long due to this crappy unintended? (I hope) effect.
 

XAL

Member
What I gathered this is where it
pays homage to TDD, Mandus at Mexico discovered the Orb (TDD) which gave him visions of the future, the 20th century. Overcome by the visions, he INSERT MAJOR SPOILER and left back for London. The machine from what I gathered was the orb indoctrination talking to you. I think himself and the orb were intertwined in some way, so him sacrificing himself destroyed the machine
. Looking forward to the proper plot analysis.

But I thought that the
orbs had protectors that prevented anyone from abusing their power? There isn't really anything like that in this game, unless you successfully abused its power and you have to shut yourself down... so there's nothing protecting the orb? lashdksljahdkasjhdkljgsahd
 
A lot of people reporting launch crashes with the Steam version. What's the deal?

I was getting crashes myself. Tried 6 times to get it running, with different settings chosen. It always crashes at the load screen after clicking new game. I'm pretty disappointed. I deleted and redownloaded, I'll give it a try again tomorrow. I have more than enough muscle. i7-920@3.8Ghz/12Gb Ddr3/GTX 680/W7. Dunno, hopefully tomorrow is better after a fresh install.
 

sam27368

Banned
I was getting crashes myself. Tried 6 times to get it running, with different settings chosen. It always crashes at the load screen after clicking new game. I'm pretty disappointed. I deleted and redownloaded, I'll give it a try again tomorrow. I have more than enough muscle. i7-920@3.8Ghz/12Gb Ddr3/GTX 680/W7. Dunno, hopefully tomorrow is better after a fresh install.

The official forum over at frictionalgames.com is worth posting on, the developers are quick to reply
 

Grumbul

Member
Anyone played around with the controller settings?

For some reason if I have RT set for throw, when I actually use it the item in hand just falls to the floor instead of throwing it. Same with trying to "slam" open/close doors - nothing happens.

As some have mentioned already set VSync in Nvidia control panel (assuming you have an Nvidia card of course) as the in-game VSync setting is busted.

Also appears to be a lot of "stuttering" going on but I've not been able to really test anything regarding this yet.
 
Not very impressed so far as the screen seems murky/hazy. Are the graphics intended to be this way?? I couldn't stand playing for very long due to this crappy unintended? (I hope) effect.

No, it's a glitch. The game is screwed up, check your in-game overlay(open a chat window for example) and you'll see the color is messed up there as well. When you load a game you'll also notice that it actually looks normal for a second or two before the haze pops into existence. Hopefully they fix it soon. The first time I loaded the game there was no issue, and now it's every time no matter the setting. Others are experiencing similar issues.
 

dark10x

Digital Foundry pixel pusher
Also appears to be a lot of "stuttering" going on but I've not been able to really test anything regarding this yet.
Same issue here.

Also, a bit further in, there are areas where I'm getting drops from 60 fps which is nuts. :\
 

Shoyz

Member
Weird bugs so far.
The chute can't be fallen down, which seems like it breaks some sort of game making rule..invisible wall if you jump in from a chair. Chairs can fall through though, but don't get pulled along

Falling staircase didn't make me fall. Standing in midair!
 

TentPole

Member
Not very impressed so far as the screen seems murky/hazy. Are the graphics intended to be this way?? I couldn't stand playing for very long due to this crappy unintended? (I hope) effect.

The haze went away after the first "level" so it might be worth just pushing through. It was only the first half hour or so and before much really happened.
 

Firebrand

Member
Personally - I love it! The game doesn't need monsters or jump scares to creep the fuck out of you. Hard to explain but it's an experience you have to try.
Wait, does this game not have you running from danger like in the first game (spoiler the answer if you want)? I was interested in the original Amnesia for its narrative and atmosphere but I really can't handle running sequences, Pac-Man is stressful enough, so if that's not here I might actually be interested in checking this out.
 

Dmax3901

Member
Just played half n hour or so, enjoying it. Really great atmosphere and you can really see The Chinese Room's "telling a story with landscape" influence coming through.
 
So, in summary:

So, they concentrated more on story instead of scariness? Given the lesser reviews, couldn't they have done both? Also, why lose all the interactivity? It made the environment in TDD feel alive. Losing the ingenious mechanics is also woeful, because they provided the perfect survival horror storm. There still could have been that kind of panicked resource management and at the same time providing some more Silent-Hill-esque psychological horror. It's all a matter of good design. Why they forego one for the other completely is beyond me. They've Dear-Esther-ised it.

Don't get me wrong, I like a good story and it appears that they've delivered exactly that. But they also appear to have made the game... there is that dreadful phrase... more accessible to the mainstream. I'll have to play it for myself, for sure, but all that seems, as people before me put it, mildly disappointing (which doesn't translate to "bad" by any stretch of the imagination, of course).

Judging by people's posts in here, there also seem to be quite a few bugs.
 

sam27368

Banned
So, in summary:

So, they concentrated more on story instead of scariness? Given the lesser reviews, couldn't they have done both? Also, why lose all the interactivity? It made the environment in TDD feel alive. Losing the ingenious mechanics is also woeful, because they provided the perfect survival horror storm.

I don't get this, the game is fucking scary as hell, it just doesn't rely on jump scares (there are a few, at least a couple per level). It also tells a disturbing story. Also I found myself running away from monsters numerous times. They just aren't in abundance that you'll come across them every 10minutes like other games
 
I don't get this, the game is fucking scary as hell, it just doesn't rely on jump scares (there are a few, at least a couple per level). It also tells a disturbing story. Also I found myself running away from monsters numerous times. They just aren't in abundance that you'll come across them every 10minutes like other games

Good to hear, then. I'm not trying to get onto the game's case or anything, I just tried to summarise the sentiment of the thread and maybe did a bad job. You decide! I'll be getting into it and judging it for myself momentarily. I'm a survival horror maniac, so I'll probably binge-play it until I'm through. Hopefully, though, the ruminations about it only being a five-hour journey aren't true. In any case, see you on the other side.
 

TentPole

Member
so reading here, I am getting a Gone Home with Horror Elements?

is that right?

That is a poor description. You are getting a game that is very similar to the first Amnesia sans inventory and resource management, with enemy encounters that are not nearly as well implemented, but with a much improved story.
 

MBR

Banned
Played half an hour, then I stopped when
one of those fuse-thingies in the 3rd level clipped into a door, and disappeared.
Ugh. I'll get back to it after lunch, I guess. (Just a day off, not skipping classes for this)
 
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