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haveblue
Aug 15, 2005



Toilet Rascal


Amnesia: Rebirth is the latest release (out now on PS4 and major PC storefronts) from Frictional Games, creators of the original trailblazing indie helplessness simulator Amnesia: The Dark Descent, to which it serves as a loose sequel. You are Anastasie “Tasi” Trianon, and the last thing you remember is waking up in the wreckage of an airplane in the heart of the Algerian desert. There is no sign of the rest of the crew and you have no idea what brought you here or why things went so spectacularly awry. With only your wits, a voice on a broken radio, and a strange bracelet you’re pretty sure you weren’t wearing when you boarded, you set out to figure out what happened, piece together your own past, and find rescue…



The obstacles in your way are represented by Frictional’s two signature mechanics. Direct physical manipulation is everywhere- doors and containers must be swung or slid open and shut, levers pulled, cranks cranked, components pushed into slots, heavy debris awkwardly shoved aside. New to Rebirth is the ability to collect matches, which function as sources of both light and fire; if you're lucky enough to find a candle or fixture you can create a permanent pool of safety, or you can let them burn to hold off the darkness for just a bit longer.



The darkness is the other major mechanic- you must deal with Tasi's phobia of it, and her fragile mental state in general. The absence of light is an unsettling source of stress, as are close encounters with disturbing items and phenomena, and going too long without relief risks losing the struggle against blind panic. Not to mention getting noticed by anything very real and malevolent that may be lurking nearby. And when those things do notice you, there is no fighting them, only hiding and running. If you can get the door open in time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uqrahIxQe7Q

haveblue fucked around with this message at 23:39 on Oct 24, 2020

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veni veni veni
Jun 5, 2005


I just did something that I’m pretty sure is going to come back and bite me in the rear end because I just must. Solve. Every. Puzzle.

Sakurazuka
Jan 24, 2004

NANI?

If you mean torturing the guy to get baby vitae I never even realised you could just not do it and leave lol

veni veni veni
Jun 5, 2005


I did, because before figuring the machine out, I went to the station to see if there was a battery and she says "maybe I should just leave, I don't know why I am trusting weird rear end ghost lady anyways" but then I went back and killed him anyways cause I figured he was screwed either way and I needed juice for my bb...maybe. I haven't finished yet but I know there is a good and bad ending. And I would be surprised if that wasn't the thing that triggers it.

tensai
May 8, 2007

Just trying to keep my boyfriend away from that redheaded harlot.
If anyone has a coupon on the Epic store from either claiming rocket league or by buying a game during the summer sale, you can grab this for $20. I did so and will start it up tonight.

Tenzarin
Jul 24, 2007
.
Taco Defender
Game looks pretty good, so I'm prob gonna try it out cause its October and all. I heard you can't die in this also, so it sounds perfect for me to be scared and not have to live.

Tenzarin
Jul 24, 2007
.
Taco Defender
Also, Booooooooooooo!


Tenzarin
Jul 24, 2007
.
Taco Defender
Game is pretty scary but I think I found a way around that. I now have the sound of the completely muted with subtitles on and I have 99 red balloons playing looped. Working good so far.

haveblue
Aug 15, 2005



Toilet Rascal
Not going to guess how far through the game I am but this... goes places

veni veni veni
Jun 5, 2005


I got the shittiest ending by literally backtracking 20 feet which pissed me off, but mercifully the game saves before the final encounter and lets you go back and get all of them.

Flimf
Sep 3, 2006

Only played a few hours of this and the game seems really good, but I do NOT like the lightning system. The lamp burns through oil way too fast, to the point where it doesn't really feel like you can even properly explore a room before it's done.

I am whining about this not because i want to run around with the game completely lit up constantly, but because i don't understand why anyone would think that having a billion loving matchbooks just randomly lying around all over the place would be the better solution.

Tiny Timbs
Sep 6, 2008

veni veni veni posted:

I got the shittiest ending by literally backtracking 20 feet which pissed me off, but mercifully the game saves before the final encounter and lets you go back and get all of them.

So it’s not based on how many times you get caught by monsters or panic? You can get all the endings in a single play through?

Pyrolocutus
Feb 5, 2005
Shape of Flame



Fallom posted:

So it’s not based on how many times you get caught by monsters or panic? You can get all the endings in a single play through?

Correct. The three currently known (I mean, that might be all, just hedging) endings are all dependent on what you do in the final level and I just reloaded my save over and over to get all three in one go. There's a choice which is made in the previous level but it doesn't seem to impact the ending, just some dialogue between making the choice and the end.

There do seem to be some cheevos tied to avoiding monsters/not undergoing the panic event, but that's it, it seems.

Tenzarin
Jul 24, 2007
.
Taco Defender
Game is really pretty and the evil monsters that scare me are also very pretty looking. This game is very pretty. It has come a long way from the first game graphics.

haveblue
Aug 15, 2005



Toilet Rascal
Sometimes you forget the first game was made more than 10 years ago by a small indie studio on a shoestring budget, a lot has changed since then

veni veni veni
Jun 5, 2005


Fallom posted:

So it’s not based on how many times you get caught by monsters or panic? You can get all the endings in a single play through?

I heard that rumor too, but at least as far as any known endings go that have trophies attached to them, it pretty much boils down to which direction you decide to walk in at the end.

Tbh I don't love that this game has multiple endings. I prefer something definitive from a game like this. I liked how Soma handled choice in general much better. One ending, but a few very important, non black and white choices that will have you thinking about your decisions.

veni veni veni fucked around with this message at 19:50 on Oct 23, 2020

ThomasPaine
Feb 4, 2009

We have no compassion and we ask no compassion from you. When our turn comes, we shall not make excuses for the terror.
Absolutely loved this game, just finished it today. Thought the ending was a little abrupt but it's a minor criticism. I didn't realise that it was possible to read the blue alien tablets until I got a fair way in, so I'm wondering if I missed some cool lore in the earlier parts.

A few questions I do have (do not read any of the following if you don't want huge story spoilers):

- Wtf is going on with the other world. It's all hosed up but the empress sits on her tower seemingly fine, saying she can look after your baby on the terrifying torture planet. Is it ever explained what caused the great disaster, and how long could she even keep going given the factories are semi-destroyed and no longer being maintained.
- why did tasi end up back at the plane??? and what explains the weird accelerated pregnancy she seems to have?
- I'm not quite getting the point in harvesters etc. Are they normal citizens of the other world? What use is a bestial creature that just wants to kill, if you're trying to capture people to use as batteries? Does the otherworld hunt exclusively interdimensionally?
- wtf is the empress, and is there a weird warped altruism there, somehow? why does she want the baby really?

veni veni veni posted:

I heard that rumor too, but at least as far as any known endings go that have trophies attached to them, it pretty much boils down to which direction you decide to walk in at the end.

Tbh I don't love that this game has multiple endings. I prefer something definitive from a game like this. I liked how Soma handled choice in general much better. One ending, but a few very important, non black and white choices that will have you thinking about your decisions.

The game does make a big thing of telling you to avoid succumbing to the fear etc, so it would have been a good mechanic, but yeah the three big endings we know of are all possible regardless. I would be interested to see if anything changes on a perfect run where you don't lose it once - tasi's corruption clearly worsens every time, and by the end you see your reflection and you're all hosed up. surely the game must address it if you look just fine? I kind of want to find out but it's a long game to play through again, and I'm not good enough to not gently caress it up at some point lol.

pedro0930
Oct 15, 2012

ThomasPaine posted:

Absolutely loved this game, just finished it today. Thought the ending was a little abrupt but it's a minor criticism. I didn't realise that it was possible to read the blue alien tablets until I got a fair way in, so I'm wondering if I missed some cool lore in the earlier parts.

A few questions I do have (do not read any of the following if you don't want huge story spoilers):

- Wtf is going on with the other world. It's all hosed up but the empress sits on her tower seemingly fine, saying she can look after your baby on the terrifying torture planet. Is it ever explained what caused the great disaster, and how long could she even keep going given the factories are semi-destroyed and no longer being maintained.
- why did tasi end up back at the plane??? and what explains the weird accelerated pregnancy she seems to have?
- I'm not quite getting the point in harvesters etc. Are they normal citizens of the other world? What use is a bestial creature that just wants to kill, if you're trying to capture people to use as batteries? Does the otherworld hunt exclusively interdimensionally?
- wtf is the empress, and is there a weird warped altruism there, somehow? why does she want the baby really?


The game does make a big thing of telling you to avoid succumbing to the fear etc, so it would have been a good mechanic, but yeah the three big endings we know of are all possible regardless. I would be interested to see if anything changes on a perfect run where you don't lose it once - tasi's corruption clearly worsens every time, and by the end you see your reflection and you're all hosed up. surely the game must address it if you look just fine? I kind of want to find out but it's a long game to play through again, and I'm not good enough to not gently caress it up at some point lol.

Reading the tablets will answer most of your questions, though not all of them.

Some of the Otherworld people rebelled and sabotaged the gate, causing the shadow to invade and hosed up the world. The queen became sterile from the vitae treatment and just REALLY want a baby. No idea if there's any in-universe reason for how Tasi got back on the plane or accelerated pregnancy.

The harvesters seems to be a way to create terror. The underground maze with the closing gate where you encountered Leon is used to basically torture their victim. Though it seems it's an earlier method or just one of many ways to induce fear. No idea why the harvester the group encountered were just straight up killing people though, maybe they went feral after the Otherworld exploded.

pedro0930 fucked around with this message at 21:00 on Oct 23, 2020

ThomasPaine
Feb 4, 2009

We have no compassion and we ask no compassion from you. When our turn comes, we shall not make excuses for the terror.

pedro0930 posted:

Reading the tablets will answer most of your questions, though not all of them.

Some of the Otherworld people rebelled and sabotaged the gate, causing the shadow to invade and hosed up the world. The queen became sterile from the vitae treatment and just REALLY want a baby. No idea if there's any in-universe reason for how Tasi got back on the plane or accelerated pregnancy.

The harvesters seems to be a way to create terror. The underground maze with the closing gate where you encountered Leon is used to basically torture their victim. Though it seems it's an earlier method or just one of many ways to induce fear. No idea why the harvester the group encountered were just straight up killing people though, maybe they went feral after the Otherworld exploded.


Ah cheers, that's cool. Is there ever any way of decoding the red tablets or are they just there for flavour? That's another good question - why are some of the tablets legible in English (or French, I guess)

Sakurazuka
Jan 24, 2004

NANI?

I putting everything I don't understand down to her drinking the hosed up harvester water.

As far as I know there's no way to read the red tablets.

Tenzarin
Jul 24, 2007
.
Taco Defender

Flimf posted:

Only played a few hours of this and the game seems really good, but I do NOT like the lightning system. The lamp burns through oil way too fast, to the point where it doesn't really feel like you can even properly explore a room before it's done.

I am whining about this not because i want to run around with the game completely lit up constantly, but because i don't understand why anyone would think that having a billion loving matchbooks just randomly lying around all over the place would be the better solution.

Tasi banging on the lamp and complaining that they don't make lamp oil like they used too in 1839.

haveblue
Aug 15, 2005



Toilet Rascal
The match mechanic just makes me wonder why I can't use any of the loads of small flammable objects lying around to transfer fire from one torch to another, or make a makeshift torch if I can't rip any of the actual torches off the wall

pedro0930
Oct 15, 2012
You are suppose to run out or short of light once in a while. If you are able to stay in the light at all time the entire system is pointless.

veni veni veni
Jun 5, 2005


Yeah it can be frustrating that the matches and lantern last for 2 seconds, but the whole point is that you are supposed to be stuck in the dark sometimes. If the game gave you the ability to just always light everything up, it kind of defeats the purpose of a game about going insane in the dark.

haveblue
Aug 15, 2005



Toilet Rascal
Yeah, that was mostly a joke, I know why there aren't movable torches. But little scraps of miscellaneous kindling would have made more sense than matches in a lot of the places you get sent while being almost identical mechanically.

veni veni veni
Jun 5, 2005


Anyone else find the people stuck in the pods to be one of the more unnerving things in the game? Like, not scary just disturbing.

Tenzarin
Jul 24, 2007
.
Taco Defender
Saw all 3 endings was an alright game. I also enjoyed the part where you can never actually die.

Also the first cliff I came to in the game, I was like gently caress it, and jumped into the pit below. Then to my surprise the screen flashes and Tasi starts grunting growling and it showed her climbing back up in first person. I was like, "drat this bitch ain't alright!". It was a pretty big clue to what was happening.

I can see why people complained about this game and called it a scary walking simulator but it doesn't really need to be anymore. I want to see a story and I don't want to get stuck trying to get past unkillable monsters forever.

I hardly used my lamp, I had so much lamp oil at the end of the game because I just never used it. I thought there were plenty of matches to do the whole story and they felt more interesting to use.

There was alot of tying the story back to the first game around the middle of this game also. The roman ruins on top of the portal room was where Daniel found the orb for TDD, the dead professor at the start of the game in the otherworld was the expedition leader that was leading Daniel and also who sent him back to England which led him to Brennenburg Castle with fragments of the orb after Daniel was locked in the chamber with the orb and it broke. They kinda retconned how the expedition was wiped out because Professor Herbert found another orb and then the shadow came after him and that's why he used the portal to the otherworld.

Tenzarin fucked around with this message at 05:44 on Oct 24, 2020

Tenzarin
Jul 24, 2007
.
Taco Defender

ThomasPaine posted:

Absolutely loved this game, just finished it today. Thought the ending was a little abrupt but it's a minor criticism. I didn't realise that it was possible to 6- read the blue alien tablets until I got a fair way in, so I'm wondering if I missed some cool lore in the earlier parts.

A few questions I do have (do not read any of the following if you don't want huge story spoilers):

1- Wtf is going on with the other world. It's all hosed up but the empress sits on her tower seemingly fine, saying she can look after your baby on the terrifying torture planet. Is it ever explained what caused the great disaster, and how long could she even keep going given the factories are semi-destroyed and no longer being maintained.
2- why did tasi end up back at the plane??? and what explains the weird accelerated pregnancy she seems to have?
3- I'm not quite getting the point in harvesters etc. Are they normal citizens of the other world? What use is a bestial creature that just wants to kill, if you're trying to capture people to use as batteries? Does the otherworld hunt exclusively interdimensionally?
4- wtf is the empress, and is there a weird warped altruism there, somehow? why does she want the baby really?


The game does make a big thing of telling you to avoid succumbing to the fear etc, so it would have been a good mechanic, but yeah the three big endings we know of are all possible regardless. I would be interested to see if anything changes on a perfect run where you don't lose it once 5 - tasi's corruption clearly worsens every time, and by the end you see your reflection and you're all hosed up. surely the game must address it if you look just fine? I kind of want to find out but it's a long game to play through again, and I'm not good enough to not gently caress it up at some point lol.

1:The Queen reigned over a kingdom either or on earth or another world. People rebelled blowing up what they call is a gate and that shifted the entire kingdom into the other world. So it stopped the Queen from ruling whatever world she was at but it just transported them to the otherworld. Where you get what they call is the flesh injection which is the shadow, there's a note on how their sabotage didn't go as planned and they did not stop the Eternal Queen and they wish who ever finds their dead body with the note either people that knew them or some explorer to finish their mission to stop everything.

2:Escaping the Queens tower Tasi prob ran through some portal then turned ghoul and ended up running back to the plane, like what happens when you die in the game. Prob best not to think about this one, game needs to happen.

3:Harvesters were used to farm vitea from people, back in the roman ruins they built a maze to throw people into with harvesters to scare them enough to suck the vitea from them. There's a note talking about how they made the gates closer together so that harvesters could catch up to people faster. Then They were torturing Richard from the plane crash and Tasi turned into a ghoul and finished the job. Alot of the scare>torture>vitea energy drink formula is from the first game, where they explain the same process.

4:Queen just wants a baby. There's a note somewhere by the Queen saying yes they have made her immortal but what she really wanted was to have a child.

5-There is another ending that they said is slightly different if you play the whole game and don't die less than 3 times.

6-I think your are correct here as alot of this information came from those tablets.

Tenzarin fucked around with this message at 05:45 on Oct 24, 2020

haveblue
Aug 15, 2005



Toilet Rascal
Well that was a hell of a ride. There was only one segment that became tiresome and not scary Leon's maze and almost everything else was really solid. It had been much too long since I played the first one to pick up on all the connections so I'm going to have to go back and read guides for that.

I'm not sure which ending was my favorite or want to be canon, they're all disturbing. At some point I'll try to see the no-deaths ending but not for a while, this doesn't seem like the sort of game you immediately jump back into and redo.


I actually appreciated that "dying" usually neutralizes whatever problem you were unable to surmount. Repeating a jump scare or scripted sequence sucks all the intensity and fun out and too many games hurt their own experience by allowing it.

I also subjected Tasi to a long fall only to have her get back up again and run snarling through the level, but knowing you can't die doesn't make the audiovisual stress or her situation any less frightening.


:orb:

haveblue fucked around with this message at 17:27 on Oct 24, 2020

veni veni veni
Jun 5, 2005


The sound design on those floating wraith type guards was loving crazy.

Flimf
Sep 3, 2006

Having just finished the game, i would say I overall enjoyed it but not as much as I remember enjoying TDD.
Also the game completely broke at the end and I was getting voice overs from what I can only assume was from three different endings at the same time lol.

Questions:

The laudanum you pick up in the fort. Did any of you use it? There was a warning about how it was not to be used by someone who is pregnant so I just had it sitting in my inventory the whole game.

That loving lantern. Suddenly it was just broken. No cutscene or dialogue or anything. At some point I tried to pull it out and Tasi just went "too bad my lantern broke". When the hell did that happen and why am I entering new areas that has oil lying around after this has happened????

In the fort, there were some notes that refered to ghuls and a benevolent spirit that might help people in need. These are obviously the harvesters and the empress, but I seem to remember there was a third note referencing a third type of spirit?

Flimf fucked around with this message at 22:53 on Oct 24, 2020

Pyrolocutus
Feb 5, 2005
Shape of Flame



Flimf posted:


In the fort, there were some notes that refered to ghuls and a benevolent spirit that might help people in need. These are obviously the harvesters and the empress, but I seem to remember there was a third note referencing a third type of spirit?

Pretty sure the third type of spirit the djinn, is the floaty lantern guys in the dark world.

Flimf
Sep 3, 2006

Pyrolocutus posted:

Pretty sure the third type of spirit the djinn, is the floaty lantern guys in the dark world.

That would definitely make sense. Not that I noticed any evidence of them in the normal world. They seemed more like security in the dark world.

haveblue
Aug 15, 2005



Toilet Rascal

Flimf posted:

The laudanum you pick up in the fort. Did any of you use it? There was a warning about how it was not to be used by someone who is pregnant so I just had it sitting in my inventory the whole game.

I used it after the one final memory moment where the doctor can be heard saying it might help, which IIRC is while you're staggering around the town in labor. I can't tell if it affected anything.

quote:

That loving lantern. Suddenly it was just broken. No cutscene or dialogue or anything. At some point I tried to pull it out and Tasi just went "too bad my lantern broke". When the hell did that happen and why am I entering new areas that has oil lying around after this has happened????

The lantern breaks when you fall out of the monorail, it's easy to miss seeing it drop away because it's a dark and chaotic sequence. I can only assume the extra oil cans after that are a mistake, maybe the lantern breaking was added very late in development.

haveblue fucked around with this message at 23:40 on Oct 24, 2020

ANIME AKBAR
Jan 25, 2007

afu~
Came looking for this thread expecting a babby-themed thread title, was not disappointed.

Overall a very solid horror game, the sequel that The Dark Descent really deserved.

The match/lantern mechanics were really well done, until about 3/4 into the game. Near the end I had more matches than there were torches to light, but was burning through oil. Until my lantern inexplicably disappeared. wtf is up with that?

Major complaint is the flashing visions when low on sanity. Just loving over the top and annoying. Sometimes I just wanna look at a pile of guts or a cool skull, don't give me poo poo.

Tiny Timbs
Sep 6, 2008

ANIME AKBAR posted:

Major complaint is the flashing visions when low on sanity. Just loving over the top and annoying. Sometimes I just wanna look at a pile of guts or a cool skull, don't give me poo poo.

Yeah the game is just way too obsessed with taking control of the player and obscuring their vision. The flashbacks, low sanity effects, baby complaints, crawling, etc. are all annoying. For the flashbacks, I would much rather have seen what other games do where a ghostly scene plays out while you remain in control.

Overall I'm a little mixed on the game. The desert ruins setting isn't that interesting most of the time, and the other planet starts off extremely spooky and foreboding but by the third time you come back to it it feels like something in a Chronicles of Riddick game..

Does anyone know what the deal is with the meat dimension? It's some other world than the two you see, right?

Tiny Timbs fucked around with this message at 04:22 on Oct 25, 2020

Sakurazuka
Jan 24, 2004

NANI?

One of the earlier blue slates talked about it, it's an entity they accidentally brushed up against during the initial teleportation experiments that did a poo poo load of damage to the alien world before the stuff that actually ruined it happened.

Flimf
Sep 3, 2006

Fallom posted:

Does anyone know what the deal is with the meat dimension? It's some other world than the two you see, right?

Sakurazuka posted:

One of the earlier blue slates talked about it, it's an entity they accidentally brushed up against during the initial teleportation experiments that did a poo poo load of damage to the alien world before the stuff that actually ruined it happened.

It's the "Shadow" from the first game, that hunts down anyone who uses the orbs.

Tiny Timbs
Sep 6, 2008

Flimf posted:

It's the "Shadow" from the first game, that hunts down anyone who uses the orbs.

I guess that’s how it was in the first game but it sure doesn’t seem like I’m being stalked by a monster when meat explodes out of small tubes

Tiny Timbs fucked around with this message at 18:19 on Oct 25, 2020

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Sentinel
Jan 1, 2009

High Tech
Low Life


ANIME AKBAR posted:


Overall a very solid horror game, the sequel that The Dark Descent really deserved.

If this statement is true in the least I'll buy it and give it a chance.
TDD was awesome and I've been waiting years for a decent sequel.

Seriously gently caress machine for pigs.
I was so damned stoke waiting for that game to be released. And then well it was just a giant pile of...loving pigshit.

Soma was alright. And while it had some scary moments it still just didn't feel the same.

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