FIRST IMPRESSION

This is a very cool game but not really a horror game. It is a thrilling mystery about a woman, Marianne who can be in two different realms. The realm of the living and the dead. She uses these powers to help the dead move on and be at peace.

On the day of her father’s funeral, Marianne receives a mysterious call and heads over to an abandoned vacation resort Niwa Workers’ Resort. The resort is all sorts of bad news bear, due to an event called Niwa Massacre. And we must survive and discover the mystery of call, the dreams, and the resort.

The premise itself is intriguing and keeps me engaged to learn more about the story. However, the storytelling and weaving are not the greatest. I often find myself somewhat confused, especially since the dead do not have distinct features to tell them apart. They are just white humanoid entity and if I didn’t have the character name in the subtitles I wouldn’t know who was talking.

The split screen is cool but not practical. It is a nice way to show off the power of the console. Rendering two different worlds at the same time is an amazing feat. But I can only focus on one perspective and can not focus on both. It gives me a headache and brain farts. Later on, this is fixed by being able to transition into both worlds whole instead of split.

Exploring is not satisfying enough. When you arrive at Niwa Worker’s Resort, you walking around a giant parking lot. Now I like to see everything the game has to offer and usually go off the beaten path. So I walked around the whole parking lot trying to find something. I got nothing except an item in a car, might be the only car in the parking lot, that was needed to enter the hotel. A big area with a whole lot of nothing and this pattern continues throughout the game.

The puzzles are not really puzzles and act more like obstacles. Turn the power on, use insight, and fetch items to gain power. And this is also used over and over again. There is a puzzle-ish part in the game where you try to figure out people’s names to help them move on. But, you as the player are not solving anything. You can just look around the room mash the inspect button and Marianne will tell you that we figured it out, let’s go.

Overall, this is not a game that I would buy personally. Luckily I didn’t have to, thanks to Xbox Game Pass Ultimate. It is a really great deal and I highly recommend it.