I actually thought Nemesis was much worse than Mr. X myself.
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The Suffering [PS2/2004]
The Suffering is a 50% action 50% horror and 0% puzzles affair, as such it bears a close resemblance to games such as
RE4 and
Dead Space. The game has you playing as a man named Torque unjustly (?) accused of murdering his wife and kids. The game's set on Abbot State Penitentiary, an isolated and ill reputed high security prison off the coast of Maryland. When I first tried the game last year, it didn't stick with me. That was partly because I judged it too hastily and also because the game lets you switch to first person view and I did try to play it like that at first, but it's ultimately much better played in third person.
While I was wary of
The Suffering veering too much into all the gore and shock factor it undoubtedly has going for it, it wasn't long until I got sucked into the game's setting and atmosphere. The monster design reminded me of
SH: Homecoming - meaning it's very good - although luckily it almost completely lacks the focus on melee combat from that game. Monsters fit the prison theme very well: for example, you've got the
Marksmen, who are supposed to be the 'reincarnation of a military firing squad'. Then there are the Mainliners and Noosemen, monsters that are supposed to represent prisoners that have been executed with lethal injections and by hanging respectively.
Through the game, you're also confronted with several 'moral' decisions, like cooperating with wardens against the monsters or helping one of the other inmates out. Your wife's voice will tell you whether you did good or bad. These decisions eventually affect the ending you get. Torque can also turn into a powerful monster after killing several enemies and filling his 'Rage' bar, although apparently this does also affect the ending if you abuse it, so it should be used with moderation. Combat is gory and satisfying, but it's nothing extraordinary either. Weapons are run-of-the-mill stuff: revolver, shotgun, tommy gun, etc. The game's divided into levels which are relatively large but mostly linear, but they do have some 'secret' areas that reward exploration. For example, you can come across the remains of a
stealth Nazi aircraft from WW2 that somehow crashed on the island decades ago.
The game is fairly prone to bugs and it often feels rough around the edges. The boss fights were few and underwhelming, while the final boss was needlessly frustrating because it wasn't very clear what you needed to do.
+ Good atmosphere, convincing setting; Gory and fairly solid combat.
- Either underwhelming or annoying boss fights; General lack of polish.
3/5Pics:
The Suffering: Ties That Bind [PC/2005]
The Suffering 2 is a direct sequel to the previous game. This one's set on the mainland and is supposed to reveal more about what happened to Torque's family. My first impressions were very good, presentation actually seemed much stronger this time around and the story featured some seemingly interesting new characters. The game definitely looks better - although that's partly because I played the PC version - but the level design and balancing make
The Suffering 2 a complete mess. The story also ended up being incredibly disappointing and went for the lamest, most predictable Shyamalan twist ever.
In the previous game, you had a sort of rudimentary inventory that let you carry up to nine healing items. That's not a thing anymore, you can merely use painkillers laying around to heal yourself, but you can't pick them up and use them at a later time. You're also restricted to carry two weapons at a time (that includes melee weapons). Levels now feel cramped and claustrophobic and you're basically fighting your way through small arenas as the game throws increasingly stronger enemies at you. To make it all feel even lazier, most areas now have ammo crates that never deplete. The game is also rather short compared to its predecessor, so it just feels as if the devs were trying to artificially make the game longer by forcing you to fight every inch of the way.
One thing
The Suffering 2 does better compared to its predecessor, it's that now you're encouraged to use your 'monster' form seeing as carrying out good deeds actually makes your transformation powers stronger. The downside to that is that now some enemies - which are just darker colored versions of regular enemies - can only be harmed when you're currently in your monster form. They just keep summoning regular enemies - which you're supposed to kill in order to recharge your Rage bar - until you can finally transform and take them out. It's pretty awful.
Other than that, I used the first person view quite a lot this time around. That's because the PC port doesn't come with the autoaim function from the console versions and also because you fight a lot of human enemies, whereas that was a pretty rare occurrence in the first game.
+ Combat is still gory; Good visuals.
- Arena-like level design feels cramped and lazy; Poor balancing with crazy difficulty spikes (I've beaten the game on Normal); Disappointing story twist, abrupt ending.
2/5
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