Disappointed with The Bunker and Concerned for the Future of Amnesia
I played Amnesia: The Bunker a while ago now and have been developing these thoughts for some time, but only just now am getting around to posting about it! I have mixed feelings on The Bunker but overall, I am not happy with it. This review is negative but I’m guessing not for the same reasons that are commonly seen as I do not often see people that share my viewpoint on this. Prepare for a mega rant.
On one hand I think Frictional largely has achieved what they are going for with excellence and aplomb. What we have is a short but intense, nightmarish resource gauntlet akin to Alien: Isolation or even certain Resident Evil games. The twisting, dark level design littered with all manner of traps, obstacles, and puzzles while a creature stalks you 24/7 is a tried and true formula that I would say Frictional has pulled off very well here while also telling a serviceably concise story. The audio design also particularly stood out to me as being very well done. You can hear every footstep, item rolling on the ground, and creature snarl as it echoes hauntingly throughout the empty and ruined bunker. All in all, Frictional certainly proved that they know how to make this type of game.
On the other hand, this is a game that I would say departures heavily from Frictional’s previous catalog, and unfortunately, I mean that in the worst way possible. To back up a little bit, Frictional’s games occupy (or at least, used to occupy) a space within the gaming sphere that is truly unique. Whereas 95% of games’ stories in the industry are designed to serve the gameplay and that’s it, Frictional would tell real stories. Penumbra, Amnesia: The Dark Descent, Soma, Amnesia: Rebirth, I would argue all of these games have stories as good as any sci-fi or horror novel, movie, game, you name it that you have ever experienced. Soma I would argue is Frictional’s true magnum opus but basically all of these games are masterpieces in their own right featuring dynamically and realistically written characters, fully realized fantasy worlds, and theming that is tastefully grounded in deeply introspective philosophical concepts. They used to be so effective and influential at what they do that, with their release of The Dark Descent they invented and kicked off their own sub genre of horror game as well as created a giant YouTube fad that never really stopped. Indeed, they are masters of the Lovecraftian nightmare and while there is always some hide-n-seek type gameplay with some light resource management, etc it’s clear that these were narrative first games in an industry where that is seldomly the case. Now that’s not to say there was no gameplay or that the gameplay that was there wasn’t very important, to the contrary, I found the gameplay they came up with largely served to thoughtfully enhance the story, theming, and characters, thereby justifying these works of arts’ existence in the interactive format of video games. That being said, sadly if there is a flaw with any of these games, it is usually certain elements of the gameplay and I do tend to agree with the community in a lot of areas where the gameplay presents as simply half-baked chores or cumbersome stealth sequences.
Moving on, reception for Amnesia: Rebirth seems to have been very poor, though I personally loved it. Ultimately, I think Amnesia: The Dark Descent is the better story, but I saw Rebirth as an outstanding follow up to a title that was always going to be difficult to follow up. Did it have it’s moments of trying gameplay? Absolutely, but the core of what makes Amnesia games, and Frictional games incredible is so clearly there. Anyways, having such a fondness for these games, you can imagine my dismay when Rebirth flopped with critics and Frictional’s solution was… Amnesia: The Bunker.
Turned around less than three years after Rebirth and clearly consisting of many reused assets from Rebirth, they created this title that completely discards almost everything I’ve come to love about these games. The characters and story are straight forward and one note, serviceable, but not really doing much to contribute to the overall world or themes of Amnesia. There are notes scattered throughout the game like normal, but not as many of them, and they tend to be very practically placed and written. By that I mean, they are giving practical gameplay info to the player and providing expositional bones to the story, but very few of them felt to me like they were working hard to develop the world or support the series’ themes. And the voice acted segments and cutscenes were greatly reduced as well compared to what I’ve come to expect from Frictional games. The introduction of procedural and “systems-based” gameplay elements was also a rather large let down for me. In fact, more than any other element, it’s with this I feel that Frictional is going out of their way to say that gone is the heavy story scripting, gone are the tightly configured levels and linearity, instead favoring replayable, run-based randomness and developmentally cheap padding tactics. This is a player-centric world, not a storyteller-centric world. This may be your cup tea, but understand that the more power you give to the player, the less you give to the storyteller; that’s simply the nature of player agency.
Furthermore, the overall situation of The Bunker’s sales success, reception, and Frictional’s response to these things have me deeply concerned for the future of Frictional’s games. It sounds like due to it’s critical success, The Bunker is going to be the new framework for all of their games for the foreseeable future. All I can say here is that it is such a sadness to see these people who are true masters of their craft, go and trade this great legacy they have of interactive horror masterpieces for a type of game that is essentially Alien: Isolation but Amnesia. I can only assume that choosing to create these more streamlined, more broad appeal type experiences is just about all they can do to stay afloat in this topsy-turvy industry of ours…
So to try to wrap things up here, Amnesia: The Bunker is indeed a well made game that stands strong on it’s own merits. I would say it’s well worth your time and money, but with a huge asterisk of don’t expect this to be a normal Frictional game. I am curious to see how they will evolve the formula from here, but if it’s very similar to The Bunker, I probably won’t be buying it.
Does anyone else here have similar thoughts on The Bunker or am I just old man yelling at cloud? Let me know!