Amnesia: Rebirth

 PlayStation 4
User Score
6.4

Mixed or average reviews- based on 60 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 25 out of 60
  2. Mixed: 22 out of 60
  3. Negative: 13 out of 60

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  1. JimmieReview
    Nov 6, 2020
    6
    Slow start but gets better as you get a bit further into the game.

    The first 25-30% feelt very draged out and boring. But it did pick up later on as more interesting environments and story comes to light. I did not enjoy the mechanics of opening doors and such, the whole "click and drag" thing is over used and it just feels cumbersome. The "darkness causes fear" mechanic is fine,    Slow start but gets better as you get a bit further into the game.

    The first 25-30% feelt very draged out and boring. But it did pick up later on as more interesting environments and story comes to light.

    I did not enjoy the mechanics of opening doors and such, the whole "click and drag" thing is over used and it just feels cumbersome.
    The "darkness causes fear" mechanic is fine, but they rely way to much on this. Its used as an excuse to not have interesting actions taking part in the game. A big part of the game feels very static and dead.
    Hardly any characters in the game that you get to see walking around or doing anything either, feelt like they didn't budget for that and it hurts the experience.

    Lots and lots of puzzles. None of them were fun to do honestly, its just go here and find X then place it at location Y. Or pull these levers in some order. No big mechanical parts in the game moving around like in tomb raider for example - that is how you do interesting puzzles.

    An ok experience for the price, but could have been much better....    … Expand
  2. Aqua678
    Nov 15, 2020
    7
    Disappointing when compared to the likes of its predecessor. There are a few scary moments, but the monsters themselves feel very tame and incredibly slow. The story is okay, but it is very cryptic and quite hard to follow in some areas. In the end, Amnesia Rebirth is a pretty weak sequel to the Dark Descent which is thouroughly dispiriting as I was really hoping that Frictional GamesDisappointing when compared to the likes of its predecessor. There are a few scary moments, but the monsters themselves feel very tame and incredibly slow. The story is okay, but it is very cryptic and quite hard to follow in some areas. In the end, Amnesia Rebirth is a pretty weak sequel to the Dark Descent which is thouroughly dispiriting as I was really hoping that Frictional Games would succeed in their bid to create a terrifying experience. In the end, it's less petrifying and more forgettable.… Expand
  3. LadyAux
    Oct 26, 2020
    6
    I fully expected this game to be a direct sequel to the Dark Descent or for the subtitle of 'Rebirth' to mean it was Amnesia but brought into the current gen. How wrong I was. Not only does this game fail to capture the same terror and even horror of the past series, it adds mechanics in, that make the game essentially Easy Mode. Graphically the game looks terribly dated on the PS4. It's aI fully expected this game to be a direct sequel to the Dark Descent or for the subtitle of 'Rebirth' to mean it was Amnesia but brought into the current gen. How wrong I was. Not only does this game fail to capture the same terror and even horror of the past series, it adds mechanics in, that make the game essentially Easy Mode. Graphically the game looks terribly dated on the PS4. It's a cobbled together bunch of set pieces that flow badly and is disjointed by how often you aren't in control and actually playing the game. It even throws in this weird alien world garbage that would do better completely removed from the game as it disconnects from a perfectly good 1930's archaeological dig horror setting. Its boring, the story gets ruined by the future Aztec stuff and the worst thing, its not in the slightest bit scary. I even thought Machine for Pigs was much better than this game to be honest. Rebirth is very short and sadly disappointing. Watch my review here: https://youtu.be/LVZd94P7yrM… Expand
  4. Ekko
    Oct 24, 2020
    6
    Difficult. Not the game, rather my relationship with it. I'm a huge Dark Descent-fan and an even bigger, massive SOMA fan. I knew this was gonna be a tad different but I was hyped nevertheless. Frictional is one of the most promising developers out there and I really dig Thomas Grip and the endless thought and effort he and his team puts into their games. I just love the way they work andDifficult. Not the game, rather my relationship with it. I'm a huge Dark Descent-fan and an even bigger, massive SOMA fan. I knew this was gonna be a tad different but I was hyped nevertheless. Frictional is one of the most promising developers out there and I really dig Thomas Grip and the endless thought and effort he and his team puts into their games. I just love the way they work and think. I was really looking forward to Amnesia: Rebirth. I do think the graphics are improved over the original Amnesia (and Machine for Pigs), but only slightly. It seems to be the same (selfmade) engine, which really isn't a problem as it works totally fine. I didn't have any problems technically, not even any noticeable framerate drops or such. The sound is, like in SOMA and D.D. before, a perfect example of how to amalgamate audio and atmosphere. The guy that does the music (unfortunately I forgot his name) has a deep understanding of how to provoke a feeling that fits a theme and space of a work like this perfectly. Sound design is splendid just as well, voice work ranges from question of taste to very well, no shortcomings overall. The story is engaging. It's not as deeply thought provoking as SOMA's story, but then again, this is not a SOMA-type game. This game is about about deeply human reactions to extraordinary things, to panic, to wonder, to fear for ones own life and that of someone else. This is about emotions. I personally always prefer SOMA-style philosophical thought experiments over emotional content, but that doesn't mean this isn't well done. It is.
    Now to the reason I can't bring myself to rate this higher than 6/10:
    Whereas SOMA and Amnesia before weren't 'realistic' games per se, they sure didn't have illogical, silly moments that killed the immersion. Rebirth, unfortunately, is FULL of silliness. The type that breaks the magic. Our protagonist, Tasie, can only carry ten matches. Weird? Yes. But only slightly more silly than the resident evil soldiers and policemen who can't carry that ONE additional key anymore. There's absolutely NO way to just put it anywhere else, in their shoe, in their briefs, bra or between their arm and watch. It's the key that's needed for escape, for survival, for freeing someone they care about. It just absolutely cannot be carried though, because the inventory is full. Well. Silly, but it's a game and it needs to follow rules to work. It's fine. In Rebirth, you absolutely CANNOT carry an eleventh match. Even though Tasie will totally loose it in the dark, when she's out of light sources (and she's out of light sources pretty quick, thus going insane in dark areas). I get it, it's a question of game balancing. But: Why on earth can't she pick up a free standing, transportable candle, a torch hangin on the wall or sticking out of the ground, or any other small, carryable light source? She could pick up an oil lamp, before. Again: Balancing. Game design. I understand, it just feels SO silly in this game. There's no logical explanation for it, especially, when we, as the player, feel so strongly with Tasie and know that she can absolutely not stay in the dark for more than mere seconds because of her condition. For a game that puts all its horses on being immersive, this is a pretty big problem. I just don't believe it. It feels like a GAME here, it's the mechanics shining through, brightly and destructively. Whenever I pass a totally carryable candle on some table next to me, hearing how Tasie is close to loosing it in the dark, I just can not believe the setting and story and overall structure anymore. It's just too silly.
    Another thing I neither liked nor expected from a Frictional game, is the use of jump scares. I think they're cheap and kind of take the atmosphere someplace else. I loved being scared in D.
    D. and SOMA. It was existential. It was built, handmade. It was real and utterly relatable. I enjoyed being scared. Here, I'm constantly fearing another random jump scare (not gonna spoil what it consists of (even though it'd only be a mild spoiler)), which takes me out of that basic, that core emotion I wanted to feel: I want to listen to monster somewhere, I want to let the music soak in, to explore what I'm feeling after I've read another little note seconds ago, slowly piecing the story together.
    Frictional Games said they combined the best of SOMA and D.D. here, but me - personally, I think that didn't work. This game, as a whole, works neither as good as SOMA nor D.D.
    Another problem was that sometimes, especially in the beginning, I couldn't 'read' what spooked Tasie. Some little bit somewhere in the dark background that I missed? Some dead fella somewhere (looking at them raises Tasies fear) that was buried in the shadows? Was it just a random jump scare because her fear already was a little too high? It's not that big of a problem as the other things, but it makes the game guess work.    … Expand
  5. MacheteDontText
    Oct 25, 2020
    6
    Pretty disappointing from Frictional. TLDR its not immersive, stupid mechanics, constant framedrops.

    Game is full of annoying immersion breakers like flashbacks, main character commenting on something, mini cutscenes etc, ffs why? In Amnesia they didnt stop the game and they were infrequent enough that you barely noticed. Here? All the bloody time, its awful. Story is mixed imo, I    Pretty disappointing from Frictional. TLDR its not immersive, stupid mechanics, constant framedrops.

    Game is full of annoying immersion breakers like flashbacks, main character commenting on something, mini cutscenes etc, ffs why? In Amnesia they didnt stop the game and they were infrequent enough that you barely noticed. Here? All the bloody time, its awful.

    Story is mixed imo, I liked the non personal part, but found the whole baby thing pointless, moreover counterproductive. Trying to evoke warm, personal emotions dampens the fear factor, plus I just couldnt care about any of the characters, found myself wanting to skip those parts. On the other hand the - without spoilers - other aspect of the story is great, I highly enjoyed that, especially that the game does the same thing to the player that certain someones to another group, in the game.

    Darkness mechanic is a joke. I stand 2m away from a candle, perfectly lit and she starts panicking...plus it results in jumpscares, eh. The thing that happens when you die...it just makes we want to die, instead of avoiding it, yet again ruining the fear and immersion factors.

    Game is best when it lets you play it, a few areas have non scripted monsters with good atmoshere, if you can just forget about the story and immerse yourself in that, you can have fun. Considering the price its absolutely worth playing once, but its a huge letdown after SOMA.    … Expand
  6. SuperkenGaming
    Nov 8, 2020
    7
    Amnesia Rebirth
    A little too much anxiety
    Amnesia is back, and this time much like a machine for pigs, with an experience that feels very standalone.. the game starts with a plane crash, youre pregnant, your husbands missing, you set out to find him and the rest of everyone on this plane crash… Amnesia Rebirths 7 hour journey starts out really intriguing, I was glued to my seat during    Amnesia Rebirth
    A little too much anxiety
    Amnesia is back, and this time much like a machine for pigs, with an experience that feels very standalone.. the game starts with a plane crash, youre pregnant, your husbands missing, you set out to find him and the rest of everyone on this plane crash…
    Amnesia Rebirths 7 hour journey starts out really intriguing, I was glued to my seat during its I nitial moments, crawling through the dark, using your compass to travel through rifts… lighting candles so you don’t go crazy… rebirth does a great job of making your heart race, keeping you anxious.. I just wish the entire game was as great and intiruging as the first 2 hours were.. because Amnesia Rebirth sadly falls back into the first person horror tropes that have just become played out and annoying… I’m over aimlessly scrounging through the dark trying to find an item to progress.. im fine with it every once in a while, and again the first 2 hours of the game these moments were barely there.. and if they were it was in a way that didn’t make you feel like you were running around in circles just looking for something that hopefully is the thing you need to progress, but after the 2nd hour, the remaining 5 is constant solve this area youre in, and its just so overwhelming.. I felt anxious for all of the wrong reasons, not because its dark and my hearts racing and I have to calm myself by rubbing my tummy, ut because I just solved a stressful area ful of find this item and back tracking, and im instantly thrown into another one.. there is no breather with some straightforward story telling, its just one puzzle turning into another puzzle, turning into a fetch quest… amnesia rebirths biggest problem is absolutely its pacing… and it’s a shame because its shows so much potential, there were flashback moments that could’ve been made longer, I owuldve sacrificed a puzzle room or two for longer sections of these really allowing me to connect with my character more, really feeling her motives in my soul before the game makes me make my decision.. and it just doesn’t.. it sacrifices story for ooooo a battery is missing, you better go find it, just for you to find it, open a door and guess what? Oooo another one is missing. Im over it, missing batteries aren’t scary, they are annoying..
    constantly having to go find things and fix things is annoying, sure again.. give that to me here and there.. this is a puzzle game.. but just please let me breathe.. amnesia rebirth started out so enjoyable, but by the end it was a chore to get through..
    That being said this is a good horror game, my heart was racing for all of the right reasons, there are some clever puzzles here and great moments… while I don’t believe amnesia rebrith is a msut play horror game, you wont regret picking it up if you are a puzzle or horror game fan.. but only for those 2 types of players.. no one else…
    I give Amnesia Rebirth
    a 7/10    … Expand
  7. GamejournoSucks
    Nov 4, 2020
    7
    Despite my score I actually loved this game after my disappointment with SOMA it was refreshing to go back to a game from frictional that ACTUALLY scared me, my main problems is how poorly the game runs in comparison to SOMA on PS4 Pro its feels like I'm playing at 5fps at certain points in the game.

    Nonetheless I enjoyed my time with this game otherwise I wouldn't be recommending this    Despite my score I actually loved this game after my disappointment with SOMA it was refreshing to go back to a game from frictional that ACTUALLY scared me, my main problems is how poorly the game runs in comparison to SOMA on PS4 Pro its feels like I'm playing at 5fps at certain points in the game.

    Nonetheless I enjoyed my time with this game otherwise I wouldn't be recommending this title, a solid return from Frictional to making games that genuinely cause you unease and up the tension to painful levels.    … Expand
  8. Joellemm
    Jan 17, 2021
    5
    There are many reasons that the Penumbra games and Amnesia: A Dark Decent were so scary and compelling, but i think an important and overlooked factor might be the persistent player agency. Amnesia: Rebirth is surprisingly cinematic. This gets in the way of the gameplay, but most importantly, it gets in the way of the horror. The game doesn't include the same incredible story that SomaThere are many reasons that the Penumbra games and Amnesia: A Dark Decent were so scary and compelling, but i think an important and overlooked factor might be the persistent player agency. Amnesia: Rebirth is surprisingly cinematic. This gets in the way of the gameplay, but most importantly, it gets in the way of the horror. The game doesn't include the same incredible story that Soma has, which, significantly, is so successful because of player agency. Therefore, the cinematics are not even worthwhile, and just serve to break immersion.

    I'm being overly critical because i love the other Frictional Games I've listed here. This latest title has some truly scary moments. The enemies are horrific. The art style is unique and interesting. The sound design is impressive. The characters are voiced really well. The plot is fine enough.

    However, I really think the level design was poor. The puzzles were at their best when they were most grounded and away from the abstract, and yet, there were so many that weren't. This poses a problem because these puzzles were so easy. Also, more noticeable in this title, was the lack of consequence for failure. I must have failed an embarrassing number of times, but other than an ugly, jarring cut-scene, there is no repercussion. This dissipates any tension built up.

    Level design, immersion and pacing were all poorer than in previous titles. What you're left with as just another insignificant, mildly spooky, walking-simulator on the indie market. Not bad, just disappointing.    … Expand

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
75

Generally favorable reviews - based on 31 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 19 out of 31
  2. Mixed: 11 out of 31
  3. Negative: 1 out of 31
  1. WellPlayed
    Feb 11, 2021
    90
    Amnesia Rebirth is a cruel yet mesmerising experience that goes above and beyond in not only its existential horror but its intuitive puzzles and gripping story that goads you ever onwards.
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  2. Playstation Official Magazine UK
    Nov 15, 2020
    80
    Tasi’s story is a well-balanced nightmare littered with delicious scares. While, like her ill-fated aeroplane, it doesn’t quite stick the landing, it should still sate your desire for atmospheric terror. [Issue#182, p.150]
  3. Gamers' Temple
    Nov 5, 2020
    80
    The game suffers from a few minor problems, but this is not going to keep a fan of Frictional Games from enjoying it. Sadly, Rebirth has no replay value other than enjoying the story again. It does have three endings, which you can see all the endings from the final save point. Fans of The Dark Descent will most likely enjoy this release just as much since it continues the story from that game and it still feels very much like an Amnesia game.
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