![]() People praised it for a while but after some time it seemed like, out of nowhere, everybody just forgot about it. Layers of Fear was kind of a phenomenon on the internet when it came. I may not like Gone Home because it overplays its own hand, but at least it had a hand to play! The narrative prods at ideas of depicting alcoholism and grief after suicide as monsters, but clearly the story's implications were far sadder than the devs were really willing to grapple with, so it's all very thin, very spoon-fed even with the abstract chronology of events, and doesn't at all engage with its own material emotionally, instead mining it for whatever cheap scares it can. A game with no actual gameplay and just jumpscares can at least make those jumpscares technically sound and not entirely telegraphed.Īn engaging story might have saved it, but here too is Layers very paint-by-numbers (LOL). The atmosphere is almost non-existent, with little consistency to each level's feel, and the scares are all absurdly awful. Some great use of shifting level design and non-Euclidean space to make the psychological horror aspects feel bewildering give the game a slight identity, but on all other fronts, it is the exact kind of low-budget low-frills low-thrills experience that gives first-person indie horror a bad name. I'm probably not quite as down on Layers of Fear as most people scared for the new Silent Hill are, but I have trouble finding any sort of meaty, tangible quality to the experience. I don't doubt that Bloober Team has a good game in them, and I think the further they move away from walking simulator's the better they'll improve, but Layers of Fear is to me just a haunted house simulator at best and a dull walking simulator at worst. Despite being very portentous, the story did not involve me at all and just felt like a recycling of many tired video game horror tropes. Whereas a game like Outlast is at least tongue-in-cheek enough to allow for trashy, grindhouse thrills, this game goes the wannabe Silent Hill 2 route where our protagonist is trapped in an eternal hell of his own creation, tormented by his demons and the violent crimes he committed against his family, or whatever. The game also takes itself WAY too seriously. ![]() As a result, even with headphones and a pitch-black room I did not feel even an iota of dread or fear playing this, just the occasional jump scare, which even stopped working after a while. the level of immersion is actually pretty low. Because there are not actual gameplay mechanics besides using the move forward and strafe buttons to move and mouse button to pick up and read notes. But regardless of how cool some of the visuals are, this game is just an unscary chore to play. Amnesia's narrow corridors and defenseless stealth gameplay was unprecedented and terrifying in 2010, but by the time Layers of Fear came out in 2016, the genre of defenseless horror had totally run its course and left me feeling mostly bored playing this game.ĭon't get me wrong, Bloober Team works actual magic with the Unity engine, and the graphics and presentation are top-notch.
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