"He who makes a beast of himself from the of being a human". Dr. Samuel Johnson
After I finally beat Amnesia: The Dark Descent (TDD), it was finally time for me to play the next game in the series, Amnesia: A Machine For Pigs (AMFP). This game at the time was not liked by the fans of the original game due to it not being like the first one. Frictional Games did not develop this game, as they were making SOMA then. Instead, The Chinese Room were the developers of this game, and it shows in some areas.
Pros and Cons
Pros
A surprisingly good story
The music and atmosphere are very well done
Cons
Does not work well, as a horror game
The gameplay is a big downgrade from the previous entry, being mostly a walking sim
Resource management has been removed
The lantern does not do a good job of helping me see
Puzzles don’t feel enjoyable
AI is very bad
Lacks the sense of fear that the first title had
Very dark and hard to see in some areas
Story
Set in London 1899 on New Year's Eve, you play as Oswald Mandus who is a wealthy industrialist. He has recently returned from a disastrous expedition in Mexico where a tragedy struck. He was struck with a fever and had frequent dreams of this machine, he wakes up one night, months have passed, and he hears his two kids calling him to find them.
The story for AMFP is well thought out and I liked the narrative that the game had going for it. There are some small references to the previous game (although more on that later) that I did like very much.
Although I do have one issue with the story and it’s just not really that scary and, sadly, this is the case. I feel that something is here that the developers had but I just did not have that sense of dread or fear while I was playing.
Gameplay
AMFP is a walking sim and that’s it that's the game has going for it, It does not work as a horror game. I say that the gameplay here is a huge downgrade to TDD and a lot of things that I loved about the first game, are gone from this one. You go from point A to B and pick up objects to progress through to the next area. The resource management system has also been removed. There are no tinderboxes, and your lantern does not run out of fuel either, it just removed one of the mechanics that made the first game a survival horror game.
The insanity meter has also been removed as well, so you can look at the monsters without issue. Personally, I don’t mind that the sanity meter has been removed, you can make a horror game scary without it and it’s been done before many times.
Then we get onto the puzzles the game has, or what the game calls puzzles because to me, they aren’t puzzles, they are not fun nor are they enjoyable in the slightest. You are just inserting objects into a machine or something and that’s it.
The AI on the monsters is very bad, I can be right next to one and they won’t notice me and one of them just moved in a straight line at this one part of the game. Which I ran past, and it never noticed me whatsoever. There are very few encounters with the monsters in the game and this just leads to my next issue.
AMFP is just not scary in the slightest, I just did not feel any sort of fear or dread like I did in TDD. I don’t feel that a lot is against me as there is nothing really to this game that says this is an Amnesia game. In fact, the only thing that says this is an Amnesia game is that the Orb from the previous game is mentioned. However, it’s only mentioned a few times throughout the game
The game is also very dark, TDD was dark too but in AMFP I have a very hard time seeing things in the game. The lantern you get does not help you see in any way, and I just want the lantern back from TDD.
Graphics and Performance
The graphics for AMFP is well done, the atmosphere is really nice, and The Chinese Room nailed it in this regard. I tested the game on an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 3GB, AMD Ryzen 5 1500X Quad-Core Processor 3.50, and 16 GB of RAM I experienced zero issues while I was playing, and the game ran fine.
Final Verdict
In all honestly, if the name Amnesia, was not in this game's title, I may not have had this many negative things to say about this game. I think this game may have been good but with it carrying the name, it just feels like a disappointment. Amnesia: A Machine For Pigs does not work as a horror game and I think horror fans will be disappointed in this one, especially for those who just got done playing TDD. Waiting for a sale or lucky find when the price is low is highly recommended.
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