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GAME: The Evil Within


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Themaster20000



Joined: 05 Aug 2014
Posts: 863
PostPosted: Wed Oct 22, 2014 11:14 am Reply with quote
Really looking forward to getting this at some point. Not surprised that the story sucks since his games have always been gameplay first.
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DKL



Joined: 08 May 2005
Posts: 1932
Location: California, USA
PostPosted: Wed Oct 22, 2014 12:09 pm Reply with quote
I think it needs to be said: the game is not balanced around Akumu difficulty (it's this difficulty setting where spoiler[you only take one hit to die]).

(I've already gotten through the infamous chapter 6 sequence... not looking forward to stuff in chapter 11)

Anything below that is fine >_>
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Ambimunch



Joined: 30 Aug 2012
Posts: 2012
PostPosted: Wed Oct 22, 2014 12:56 pm Reply with quote
I don't understand complaints that a horror game has "guts and gore". I know there are a few games that don't have any of it, but the majority do. It's like saying a racing game has too much driving
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relyat08



Joined: 20 Mar 2013
Posts: 4125
Location: Northern Virginia
PostPosted: Wed Oct 22, 2014 12:58 pm Reply with quote
Ambimunch wrote:
I don't understand complaints that a horror game has "guts and gore". I know there are a few games that don't have any of it, but the majority do. It's like saying a racing game has too much driving


I generally think a complaint like that is basically saying "This game was great, but I have to come up with some kind of complaint, so here you go."

Since I personally consider that a positive, it works for me. So far, I have been really enjoying this game. Unfortunately, I just haven't had much time to play it. Crying or Very sad
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mdo7



Joined: 23 May 2007
Posts: 6244
Location: Katy, Texas, USA
PostPosted: Wed Oct 22, 2014 12:59 pm Reply with quote
Yeah, I read the reviews from other sites. This game looks very promising judging from the trailers and the gameplay videos. Will get this game when I have a chance.
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lizardking461





PostPosted: Wed Oct 22, 2014 1:24 pm Reply with quote
Ambimunch wrote:
I don't understand complaints that a horror game has "guts and gore". I know there are a few games that don't have any of it, but the majority do. It's like saying a racing game has too much driving


Somewhat, though, as with film, there are plenty who would prefer such games to be "terrifying" and aren't particularly bothered about being "horrified".
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enurtsol



Joined: 01 May 2007
Posts: 14744
PostPosted: Wed Oct 22, 2014 2:10 pm Reply with quote
Ambimunch wrote:

I don't understand complaints that a horror game has "guts and gore". I know there are a few games that don't have any of it, but the majority do. It's like saying a racing game has too much driving


Even Japan think it's too gory:

The Evil Within Edited In Japan, Gore Mode DLC Let’s Players Get The Western Version

How The Evil Within Looks With Japan’s Gore Mode On And Off

  • In Japan, by default The Evil Within is edited to be a CERO D game. However, if you reserve The Evil Within and are 18 or over, you’ll get a DLC code for Gore Mode which restores elements in the Western release that were cut to keep the rating in Japan 17+ instead of adults only.

    Director Shinji Mikami explained, the reason why The Evil Within has two modes is the game would have been rated CERO Z and he wanted The Evil Within to have broader distribution.

    When a bomb detonates in the edited CERO D version of The Evil Within enemies stay in one piece…

    … but in the Western version and with Gore Mode DLC explosions are more graphic.

    If you take out an enemy with a headshot their head stays on in the edited version of The Evil Within…

    … but in the Western version or if Gore Mode is on headshots are more graphic.

    Another change is corpses are covered in the edited version of The Evil Within while the Western version and in Gore Mode corpse are exposed.
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GVman



Joined: 14 Jul 2010
Posts: 729
PostPosted: Wed Oct 22, 2014 5:35 pm Reply with quote
enurtsol wrote:
Ambimunch wrote:

I don't understand complaints that a horror game has "guts and gore". I know there are a few games that don't have any of it, but the majority do. It's like saying a racing game has too much driving


Even Japan think it's too gory:


Japan's been a bit more squeemish about violence in games for a while now.

Ambimunch wrote:
I don't understand complaints that a horror game has "guts and gore". I know there are a few games that don't have any of it, but the majority do. It's like saying a racing game has too much driving


Dave Riley (the guy who wrote the review), according to what he's said on his podcast, never like gore beyond what was common in the PS1 era. To each their own; I personally love tons of violence.
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doctordoom85



Joined: 12 Jun 2008
Posts: 2091
PostPosted: Wed Oct 22, 2014 6:18 pm Reply with quote
Man, I was really enjoying this game (up to Ch. 6), and then my PS3 has begun automatically going out after being on for a minute. Sad I'm going to have Geek Squad look at it, but if they can't fix it I won't be able to replace it for a few months. Really sucks.
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aoi yuuki fanboy



Joined: 19 Dec 2012
Posts: 51
PostPosted: Wed Oct 22, 2014 7:31 pm Reply with quote
It's not that blood and gore are wrong in horror games, it's just that when playing The Evil Within I was more grossed out than I was scared.
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Beatdigga



Joined: 26 Oct 2003
Posts: 4342
Location: New York
PostPosted: Wed Oct 22, 2014 7:39 pm Reply with quote
aoi yuuki fanboy wrote:
It's not that blood and gore are wrong in horror games, it's just that when playing The Evil Within I was more grossed out than I was scared.


Yeah, there's a difference between gross outs and genuine scares. Dead Space 1 was a master at both.

Still. Will likely buy once price drops.
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daveriley



Joined: 12 Aug 2003
Posts: 117
Location: Philadelphia
PostPosted: Thu Oct 23, 2014 9:33 am Reply with quote
GVman wrote:
Dave Riley (the guy who wrote the review), according to what he's said on his podcast, never like gore beyond what was common in the PS1 era. To each their own; I personally love tons of violence.
I prefer some level of abstraction to the violence, yeah, and I feel the technology of the PS1 and PS2 survival horror left more to the imagination or required the designers work harder at atmospheres that conveyed dread and danger rather than using a pile of bloody organs as a scary crutch. I get a lot more out of the intimation of gore and violence than I do by having it in my face. Whenever I see gore like in The Evil Within I think back to Doom 3, where every time you shot a zombie's head their brain popped out like a pez dispenser. It's trying so hard it becomes silly, and that sometimes takes me out of the moment.
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residentgrigo



Joined: 23 Dec 2007
Posts: 2398
Location: Germany
PostPosted: Thu Oct 23, 2014 11:36 am Reply with quote
If you care about old school survival horror at all you need to at least try the game out for a few hours. So many callbacks to my youth. My heart approves. And the gore IS crazy. In a good way. Like Wolfenstein but more out there. The story is just a functioning alibi there agree. A-
Yapan is very hard on censorship. Just look at their Resident Evil versions or Ninja Gaiden. Modern Warfare a Z. Wtf ?
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mdo7



Joined: 23 May 2007
Posts: 6244
Location: Katy, Texas, USA
PostPosted: Thu Oct 23, 2014 12:29 pm Reply with quote
residentgrigo wrote:

Japan is very hard on censorship. Just look at their Resident Evil versions or Ninja Gaiden. Modern Warfare a Z. Wtf ?


Even a Z-rated game can get censored too. Fallout 3 was rated Z in Japan but Bethesda/Zenimax still have to censor the game, a interview with Zenimax Asia's Tetsu Takahashi explained the censorship of Fallout 3:

Game Career Guide wrote:
GCG: That’s a fair statement. In terms of actually altering content, how much have you had to do? I can imagine... Well, didn’t Fallout 3 get a Z rating in Japan? (Considered more extreme than the ESRB’s M rating, because many stores won’t carry games with a Z.)

TT: Yeah, it got a Z rating. We almost didn't get rated. [laughs]

Right, because you can kill civilians and stuff like that.

TT: Well, you still can. But the biggest issue was the "Power of the Atom" mission. You blow up the bomb, and blow up the whole town. That part, we had to cut.

So, you had to cut it entirely?

TT: Yeah. The mission is still there, but there are always two routes to the missions. We had to close that part of the mission. But we kept a lot of the decapitations in. The only alterations we made was that part and also humans... Human decapitations we had to cut. Mutants and ghouls and all that are still there.

What other kinds of things have you had to change in your past titles?

TT: It really depends from game to game. And actually, it sort of depends on your strategy for the title. Fallout, we chose to take the Z rating and try not to alter the content as much as possible. But for another title, you may decide to take out decapitations, make it a D and make it more accessible to the market.

For example, for Oblivion, we changed nothing. It's exactly the same. For the earlier GTAs, it was stuff that you probably couldn't even notice. We had to take down a poster from a room, stuff like that. When you first talk to the rating board and also to the platform holder, you usually start with these huge lists. And obviously, during negotiations, you're going to have to give up one or two.

But we try to not necessarily fight it but to make them understand why all these things are necessary in the context of the game. I don't think the rating board or the first parties are unreasonable. I think you just have to work a little bit harder to get them to understand. There are cultural differences...


A lot of other western game titles that got Z-rating from CERO got censored too. Far Cry 3 (which is also rated Z in Japan) got censored for the violent, and sex scene (yep, the same Japan that make all those visual novel with sex scene in them, irony isn't it??) Maybe if Ubisoft had tentacle rape in Far Cry 3 for the Japanese version, then no need for those censorship. Even GTA 5 (also rated Z in Japan) got censored in Japan for that same reason (including the torture scene being removed for the JPN version). I'm not sure about Modern Warfare 2 being censored (OK, I heard that the airport massacre may have been cut out from the JPN version). But both COD: Black Ops (both rated CERO Z in Japan) have also been censored:

Black Ops censored in Japan

Black Ops 2 won't be so gross in Japan
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Joe Carpenter



Joined: 29 Oct 2011
Posts: 503
PostPosted: Thu Oct 23, 2014 11:29 pm Reply with quote
this was a great review, every other review of this game I've read only talks about "dated" mechanics, which pisses me off, this is just what survival horror is, people! don't like that? that's fair enough, it may not be a genre for everybody, just like Madden football is not for everybody, but for those of us that do like it let us have our fun and don't go calling games "broken" or "flawed" just because they don't suit your taste, it's exactly that kind of nonsense that killed survival horror for years and I'm very pleased to hear The Evil Within brings it back

too many people don't realize that horror in video games is more than a superficial thing, it's more than scary looking enemies and gore, for a game to be truly scary it has to have gameplay specifically designed to un-empower the player, because if you can kill anything with ease, you're not scared, enemies have to put up more of a threat than they would in an average game for them to be scary

it seems like such an obvious thing and yet for so many years too many critics just don't get it.
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