Terror at sea.
I absolutely loved Until Dawn. I experienced it a lot like many did, with a room full of people passing the controller around trying not to jump too much when the scares started rolling in. It was an adventure game that I could really get behind, and while it never did anything complex mechanically, it was well acted and very enjoyable. Supermassive Games is back with the “spiritual successor” to Until Dawn, an anthology series know as The Dark Pictures Anthology. This series is planned to have multiple stories that will release every six months or so, each with their own unique story, setting, and characters. Think of it like The Twilight Zone or Black Mirror. The first of these stories is Man of Medan. Let’s get down to it.
Multiple friends along with their ship captain go on a diving expedition out in the South Pacific Ocean looking for some adventure and possibly treasure from a shipwreck. Unfortunately, their fun times are short lived as they find themselves stuck on an old abandoned World War II carrier that seems to be occupied by some paranormal entities. The task here is to obviously survive and escape the notorious ghost ship known as the SS Ourang Medan.
Platforms: XB1, PS4, PC
MSRP: $29.99
Price I’d pay: $29.99
Taking pretty much every cue from Until Dawn, Man of Medan plays exactly like Supermassive’s first foray into the horror adventure genre. Players take control of a certain character at different times in the story where they will navigate areas, look at clues and notes, and have to perform quick time events during certain sections. Much like Until Dawn, at any given time, a character can potentially die, and when they do, the story continues on without them, and while some quick time events and choices can mean the death of a character, not every fail means the big sleep for our heroes. Players tend to get a few chances before messing up royally.
Man of Medan seems to offer more choices and branching paths than Until Dawn did, which is quite the feat considering Man of Medan is about four to five hours while Until Dawn could end up being a nine hour game. Along with that, the multiplayer in Man of Medan allows players to see other sides of the story during their playthough.
Multiplayer is handled either online or couch play. The online play has one player going through the standard cut of the story while another sees the events in real time as their co-op partner but through the eyes of the other characters in the game. Don’t worry, solo players, this other side of the story can be played via the Curator’s Cut that unlocks after finishing the game for the first time.
Visually, the game is stunning at times. There were so many times I thought I was looking at a real movie when it was still CGI characters on screen. The music and sound design is superb as well, and while there were a few characters I thought felt a bit flat in their performances, the voice acting in general was fantastic.
If I had to bring up some issues I had with the game, it would be the controls and some stuttering issues here and there. Since I’m writing this review a little late, a patch has been released that has significantly fixed the stuttering problems with a few exceptions, but the controls still feel wonky at times. The fixed camera angles don’t help matters when switching cameras and controls change to work with the new camera angle. While none of this happened during action sequences, it was still annoying when trying to just walk through a door and my very detailed character would just walk into a wall.
Man of Medan shows a lot of promise for The Dark Pictures Anthology. I never thought it was too difficult, and the scares really did get me a few times as well as my friends. Some may say it is too short, but I think it was the perfect length for the story and the great thing is, we’re getting a new story and game in less than a year. Fans of horror and adventure games will have a blast here. Any fan of Until Dawn should not worry, this one lives up to the hype.
Review copy of game provided by publisher.
