{"id":488,"date":"2017-12-03T09:46:06","date_gmt":"2017-12-03T09:46:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/interwebadventurelog.com\/?p=488"},"modified":"2020-06-26T02:21:12","modified_gmt":"2020-06-26T02:21:12","slug":"survival-horror-gripes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/interwebadventurelog.com\/blog\/survival-horror-gripes\/","title":{"rendered":"Survival Horror Gripes"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/fSGv28pWS2g\" frameborder=\"0\" gesture=\"media\" allow=\"encrypted-media\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>I\u2019ve got a bone to pick with Survival Horror. I just started the Evil Within 2, which I bought during Black Friday because I am consumerist trash, and I can already feel the oh so familiar desire to check out. If you haven\u2019t realized by now, what you are watching is footage from my first couple hours of gameplay. Needless to say, light spoilers ahead. I know I\u2019ve said before that the terms \u201cSurvival Horror\u201d and \u201cAction Horror\u201d are too vague and I still believe that, but I also know they\u2019re firmly couched in the Gaming Zeitgeist and I will do my best to respect that.<\/p>\n<p>But I say that to say this: I\u2019ve noticed some traits shared between the games I\u2019ve played &#8211; games I feel safe assuming most would consider Survival Horror. These traits, in my opinion, are not good &#8211; they are on my shitlist and I fear they are what most who employ the term Survival Horror would consider defining characteristics of the genre. This would imply that I may not like Survival Horror as a whole. I\u2019d like to think otherwise.<\/p>\n<p>I can\u2019t shake the feeling that many wouldn\u2019t consider a game Survival Horror unless it\u2019s protagonist is moderately under equipped and, daresay, slightly incompetent at doing 30% to 50% of their job in a horror setting. I KNOW, I KNOW. I\u2019m being an asshole and I\u2019ll dial it back a bit. <\/p>\n<p>But in all seriousness, some of the design choices, feel like square movie horror, but also somewhat antithetical to game horror. So I&#8217;ll just get to it.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"SectionTitle\"> &#8220;You&#8217;re Too Slow&#8221;<\/h2>\n<p>Look at that. Just look at it. Why in the seven circles of hell, does anyone need to move this slow? I\u2019ll tell you why. So that when the monsters see you, AND THEY WILL, they can give chase and always be just a step or two behind you. This is only exacerbated by the sneaking mechanics that makes you move like cold molasses (as opposed to regular molasses) and take even longer to get into a good spot for that 1 sec backstab window. Good movie horror for when you want to get a character eaten, but not so much for game horror where you\u2019re trying not to get eaten, among other things.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"SectionTitle\">&#8220;Learn To Shoot, Ya Morons&#8221;<\/h2>\n<p>I\u2019m a little ambivalent about this next one as it involves a learning curve that\u2019s unique to each game. Or in other words, it\u2019s a forgone conclusion that it will naturally improve as the game changes and you adjust. Furthermore, at times it\u2019s hard to tell whether you\u2019re aim is bad or if the game is just fucking with you. When it comes to combat, I\u2019m a simple man &#8211; I don\u2019t want ease, I just want consistency. Give me a reasonable indicator of where my attacks will go and honor that. That\u2019s my baseline.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"SectionTitle\">&#8220;Extrapolation&#8221;<\/h2>\n<p>Now this is the crux of my annoyance. You know what made me stop playing the original Resident Evil a year or so ago? It wasn\u2019t the 3 zombie corridor where I became a six second snack. It was the 3 minute walk from the save room to get there. I didn\u2019t quit Bloodbourne because Wolfman Jack kept playing me the symphony of pain. It was the 4 minute trek there. You know what got my goat about The Last of Us? Sections started to feel bloated because all of the sneaking and hiding slowed progress to a crawl. I\u2019m not sitting here fuming because the games are too difficult, I\u2019m sitting here fuming because they get boring. It\u2019s not challenge, it\u2019s tedium.<\/p>\n<p>Everyone seems hellbent on taking the most banal elements of the game experience and extrapolating them out in the hopes of injecting tension and terror into it. It\u2019s meant to showcase and emphasize your vulnerability. But vulnerability is context sensitive and in a genre that\u2019s supposed to demphasize combat, elements meant to add vulnerability under duress just become a drag on the experience during the vastly greater number of calm moments in between. <\/p>\n<p>Furthermore, if you can extrapolate mobility, health and item systems, why not do the same for combat? I\u2019m sure this isn\u2019t a hot take: combat isn\u2019t inherently empowering. As such, a more robust combat system isn\u2019t necessarily antithetical to survival horror aesthetics. There\u2019s nothing wrong with taking combat and playing it for all it\u2019s worth: a grueling, involved experience that takes it\u2019s toll on a person. Your character makes the most accurate shots, hits the hardest and is most observant when they are cool, calm and collected. But being ambushed or having to tussle with whatever brand of eldritch abomination this particular universe has scares the hell out of them. Why not embrace that delirium? The longer they have to fight, the more they are hurt or even as the random creaking in the walls gets to them, the more they lose it. Their aim isn\u2019t so sharp anymore, they can\u2019t keep track of their ammo and items, their swings are shallow and frantic, their surroundings are out of focus and they\u2019re seeing things. Let it get bad enough and your character will have trouble reloading or running straight, much less fighting. At it\u2019s worse, they will lose themselves &#8211; they could become a blubbering mess on the floor or they could become a crazed animal running and swinging at whatever is (or isn\u2019t) in their path. <\/p>\n<p>In such a case, your protagonist is neither unwilling nor incapable of fighting &#8211; they just aren\u2019t prepared for how stressful it\u2019s going to be to them.<\/p>\n<p>I think I\u2019ve whined enough, but my point is simply that Survival Horror still seems beholden at times to a 20 year old philosophy of contrived incompetence. Giving me inferior, malformed  characters doesn\u2019t add tension because those limits feel artificial. Threats should be, well, threatening on merit of what they are and not so much by merit of what the player isn\u2019t.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I\u2019ve got a bone to pick with Survival Horror. I just started the Evil Within 2, which I bought during Black Friday because I am consumerist trash, and I can already feel the oh so familiar desire to check out. If you haven\u2019t realized by now, what you are watching is footage from my first [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":489,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[7,17,9,6,184],"tags":[27],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/interwebadventurelog.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/SurvivalHorrorGripesBanner.png","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7D5Jo-7S","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/interwebadventurelog.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/488"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/interwebadventurelog.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/interwebadventurelog.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/interwebadventurelog.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/interwebadventurelog.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=488"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/interwebadventurelog.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/488\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":559,"href":"http:\/\/interwebadventurelog.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/488\/revisions\/559"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/interwebadventurelog.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/489"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/interwebadventurelog.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=488"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/interwebadventurelog.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=488"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/interwebadventurelog.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=488"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}