The Evil Within 2

[Frag Maniac]

Just beat the first 'The Evil Within', talk about a flawed gem! One of those games where you love some aspects of it but dislike others. Some people love the story but hate the gameplay whilst others love the gameplay but hate the story. I'm gearing towards the latter, but not to the extreme, as I don't 'hate' the story, I just think it could have been better, whilst I did love the gameplay but also can acknowledge that the controls can be clunky at times and perhaps not for everyone.

I'd also wager that this could be Mikami's legacy, as I doubt he'll ever make a game this good ever again, which means it should be an influencial title as there's plenty of elements that future developers of horror titles can borrow from to fit into their own vision. That's the good thing about flawed gems, there's always lots of aspects of them you can borrow from if you're willing to "chew the fat" so to speak.

The game does feel a bit "on the rails" at times and there's no backtracking to speak of, they "fixed" this with TEW2 by trying to make some aspects of it more open world, which I do not think is the proper antidote. The proper way to do this I think is to implement some form of Metroidvania, as in, being able to go back to certain locations anytime you want after acquiring certain items that can unlock previously locked areas. To me, that's the perfect middle ground between linearity and "openworldedness". You'd think Mikami would realize this considering he's the creator of 'Resident Evil', but I guess it wasn't a priority for this game, unfortunately. 'The Evil Within 2' did dabble into some backtracking and unlocks, but not on a sufficient scale as you get the feeling that trying to make it more "Open World" took priority.

Not really much else for me to say here, there is some replay value and also much tougher difficulty options for those who really want a challenge or for those who want to go back and collect the things they've missed or upgrade their weapons and have fun. Those also confused with the story may also want to replay it to help piece it together on their second run, which can be a thing for some people who are interested in lore. All-in-all good job Tango and I hope Capcom borrows elements from this game, specifically the "multiple approach of dispatching enemies" style gameplay.

I wish more people would have taken the time to play and get to know it well much closer to it's time of launch. Too many listened to what the haters said about it, and this is a big part of why I think Mikami pretty much gave up on these types of games. Now I know he's claimed he never wanted to make this type of game, but I have to think had more players appreciated it, he'd not considered it such a failure.

TEW 1 is unique in that you didn't always know if enemies that went down were dead or not. Some would whack at you with their melee weapons out of the blue, even if you were only approaching them to toss a match and be sure to kill them. This made me realize on Akuma, where you die with any one hit, you have to approach them from the feet if face down, and from the head if face up.

I also liked how you had to be very careful how you snuck up on them to not be seen as they twitch from side to side. And running and hiding from them required you to stop running before you got to where you'd hide, as they could hear where you ran to. I also liked how they scaled not just health of enemies on harder modes, but also how alert and fast they are, and how difficult the traps were.

The wall mines had faster moving needles and very slim target windows on Akumu, so I didn't try to disarm them, but they made excellent weapons luring enemies to them with your sprinting footsteps, then toss a bottle at them. Some enjoyed how tossing bottles at enemy's heads would stun them and leave them open for a frontal sneak kill, but I rarely bothered with that, as it took a lot of precision and timing.

I did love disarming all the other traps though, and those trap parts add up a lot even without the wall mines to make valuable agony bolts. I also enjoyed luring them to narrow bridges, where any pistol shot would make them fall to their death. It's a game that has so many nuances to it, if you got to know it well you could beat it on Akumu with no locker keys or upgrades.

I got to the point where I could run past most of the invisible enemies, but also discovered a cool way of killing them easily with minimal resources. If you run to and wait behind a closed door after alerting them, then wait until they start pounding on it, kicking the door open will knock them down and make them momentarily visible. I also used that trick in one spot just to gain time to outrun a visible enemy.

I got so into it I made a video guide on how to do Akumu without the upgrades, keys, or DLC weapons such as the flame bolts and more powerful shotgun.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLHB6vX_n-5BP6l80RHREtCPPce4IfaVfc

 

[Ikawaru]

I wish more people would have taken the time to play and get to know it well much closer to it's time of launch. Too many listened to what the haters said about it, and this is a big part of why I think Mikami pretty much gave up on these types of games. Now I know he's claimed he never wanted to make this type of game, but I have to think had more players appreciated it, he'd not considered it such a failure.

Absolutely agree, and I think a lot of it has to with the game being released at a very bad time, I mean 'Alien Isolation' had come out, was far more user friendly, and a lot of people were thrilled that they finally got a good survival horror game AND a good 'Alien' game. 'The Last of Us' also secured a solid chunk of survival horror fans that may have otherwise went to 'The Evil Within' and was also much more user friendly. 'Bloodborne' also came out at this time and it is widely considered one of the greatest games ever made. And unlike 'The Evil Within', actually had a universally accepted fantastic storyline that people loved to piece together.

I do think time will be kind to 'The Evil Within' though, especially as people slowly start to see its positive contributions to the genre.

 

[Frag Maniac]

Absolutely agree, and I think a lot of it has to with the game being released at a very bad time, I mean 'Alien Isolation' had come out, was far more user friendly, and a lot of people were thrilled that they finally got a good survival horror game AND a good 'Alien' game. 'The Last of Us' also secured a solid chunk of survival horror fans that may have otherwise went to 'The Evil Within' and was also much more user friendly. 'Bloodborne' also came out at this time and it is widely considered one of the greatest games ever made. And unlike 'The Evil Within', actually had a universally accepted fantastic storyline that people loved to piece together.

I do think time will be kind to 'The Evil Within' though, especially as people slowly start to see its positive contributions to the genre.

Honestly, though I enjoyed my first play through of Alien Isolation, upon closer observance with another play through, it became obvious to me much of it was window dressing. By that I mean the Alien was FAR too limited in how it would search for you. I found out it is in fact easy to avoid it because there are rooms it will only go a little ways into, peek mostly forward with a very narrow search (extremely limited head turning), then leave. That means all you have to do is stay near the door at the side of the room. There are 1 or two places where it is scripted to find you if you lurk too long, but it felt like that was just to get you to use the flame thrower. I never had to use the distraction devices at all, even on the hardest difficulty mode.

The Working Joes IMO were actually more challenging to get past and fight. For these reasons The Evil Within 1 had FAR more replay value for me than Alien Isolation.

 

[Ikawaru]

The game's focal story point about dream sharing is a rather fascinating subject in itself.

Yeah but this concept is really nothing new, and is in limbo with new age spirituality concepts like soul connections, telepathy, synchronicity, karmic patterns....and shared dreams. Basically, trying to elevate above 3D realities and implement 4D/5D chakras which many people today claim they have experienced in some degree or another. From Software games, which revolve around "Souls" are probably the shining example of new age spirituality combined with esoteric themes and try to blow past the 3D world. I'd go as far as to say that 'Village' is Capcom's attempt at trying to bring 'Resident Evil' into this phenomenon, it's just that Capcom seems to struggle with it and it is not their forte so it came off as poorly implemented. They are probably better off sticking with 3D viral consistencies and rugged survival horror gameplay, and they especially need to work on better character development.

Old response I know but I just re-read this thread because I am bored and the inactivity is killing me so why not.

Edit: Here's an ok-ish example of the different dimensions and may or may not give an example of what many modern developers incorporate into their design philosophies.

 

[Jonipoon]

Yeah but this concept is really nothing new, and is in limbo with new age spirituality concepts like soul connections, telepathy, synchronicity, karmic patterns....and shared dreams. Basically, trying to elevate above 3D realities and implement 4D/5D chakras which many people today claim they have experienced in some degree or another. From Software games, which revolve around "Souls" are probably the shining example of new age spirituality combined with esoteric themes and try to blow past the 3D world. I'd go as far as to say that 'Village' is Capcom's attempt at trying to bring 'Resident Evil' into this phenomenon, it's just that Capcom seems to struggle with it and it is not their forte so it came off as poorly implemented. They are probably better off sticking with 3D viral consistencies and rugged survival horror gameplay, and they especially need to work on better character development.

Old response I know but I just re-read this thread because I am bored and the inactivity is killing me so why not.

Edit: Here's an ok-ish example of the different dimensions and may or may not give an example of what many modern developers incorporate into their design philosophies.

I know the concept isn't new, you can go all the way back to the 80's and find movies like Dreamscape from 1984 that explores the concept of entering the mind of others. The point is how to take a concept, explore it further and make it interesting which I think the first Evil Within game managed to do amazingly well. The second game, however, is a miserable pile of rubbish.