Cronos: The New Dawn

Cronos is Bloober Team’s first original survival horror IP, and as a new effort, it’s commendable. While it doesn’t push the genre forward, the gameplay keeps the tension high until the very end, showing that the developers know what makes survival horror tick. If only the story weren’t so disjointed and shallow.

Cronos: The New Dawn gets off to a slow start, with ammunition that is (too) scarce and melee attacks that are clunky and difficult to aim. After a few upgrades, you suddenly go from being a weakling to an elite soldier, after which there is little challenge left. Too difficult at the beginning, too easy after playing for a while. The balance is clearly off, and there are no options to adjust the difficulty level. And once you start noticing that they really do pull out all the tricks of the horror genre—a shadow flashing in the corner of your eye, a flashlight that suddenly starts to falter when things get exciting, an enemy that appears out of nowhere after you pick up an object—the fun quickly wears off. Unfortunately, the intriguing premise and atmospheric setting don't make up for these frustrating moments.

Without being scary, with mediocre storytelling and gameplay, an uninteresting protagonist, and cats as the main highlight, Cronos: The New Dawn is a basic and unremarkable survival horror game, but one that will entertain fans of the genre — and that's enough. Unfortunately, Bloober Team has not repeated the quality level of Silent Hill 2 Remake and returns to the level of forgettable games.

Blooper Team’s most ambitious original IP certainly lives up to that moniker in terms of mood and capturing that Soviet era feel, with an oppressive and challenging atmosphere, but unfortunately challenging and frustrating got conflated.

I don’t dislike Cronos: The New Dawn, but the minor frustrations coupled with the overall tedium wear on you. It’s a polished game that works well, but shooting zombie mutants gets old, and raiding boxes for batteries isn’t that exciting in the first place. A decently atmospheric horror for the Halloween season, but not quite the new era of Bloober Team that I was hoping for.

Cronos: The New Dawn is easily the most confident original game that Bloober Team has ever produced, but this unfettered ambition also brings with it teething issues that are awfully difficult to overlook. Combat is punchy yet clunky, exploration is atmospheric but predictable, while the central narrative is often held back by lacklustre performances and clumsy writing. There is a great survival horror game at the centre of Cronos, but it would have been much stronger if it had broken new ground rather than wondering tentatively on what came before.

Cronos: The New Dawn presents an intriguing mystery to unravel and a creepy sci-fi hellscape to explore, but its run-of-the-mill combat system prevents it from stepping out of the shadows cast by survival-horror heavyweights like Dead Space and Resident Evil 4. Its oppressively bleak environments are rich with interesting details to pore over, and a handful of its boss fights provoke a level of desperation that make them genuinely thrilling to survive, but elsewhere there’s clear padding that trips up the story’s momentum for considerable stretches at a time, and its predictable shock tactics are a step down from Silent Hill 2’s genuine scares. Like a Traveler’s corpse that’s trapped inside a temporal apocalypse, Cronos: The New Dawn contains the essence of survival horror, but there’s not quite enough spark in it to really bring it to life.

A merging of ideas offers little room for Cronos' identity to manifest and grow which is fitting for this survival horror. Cronos: The New Dawn is immersive for its atmosphere and mysterious narrative paired with excellent level and sound design that takes ahold of your curiosity and fuels your drive to press forward for humanity's sake. Has the makings of a true survival horror, but sadly doesn't offer much of a challenge. This title loses itself when answering its biggest questions and raises more by the time the credits roll because of its lacklustre conclusion.

Cronos: The New Dawn is an unabashed mash-up of survival horror's greatest hits, from Dead Space to Silent Hill, and its references make it a thrillingly familiar experience for fans of the horror genre. The only problem – which is, at times, significant – is a frustrating inventory system that can make combat feel more irritating than tense. Still, this is an atmospheric and uniquely introspective adventure for those who value a game's story as much as its action.

A brutal and unique atmosphere that is diluted by repetitive combat and an irregular pace.

Cronos: The New Dawn is an ambitious step by Bloober Team, combining horror, action, and survival in a devastated world. Mechanics such as enemy fusion and time manipulation are interesting, but technical flaws, repetitive combat, and an unsatisfactory ending limit its impact.

Cronos: The New Dawn is a game with a ton of potential, with an amazing atmosphere and interesting story, but the horror is undermined by poor balance, broken combat and technical issues.

All that being said, Bloober Team has clearly showcased its capabilities through the successful remake of Silent Hill 2. So, while Cronos: The New Dawn may not be the groundbreaking sci-fi horror that it or players were hoping for, there’s no denying that Bloober’s attempts to create something unique should still be celebrated, and personally, I’m still excited to see what comes next.

Cronos: The New Dawn does some great things, but going into it expecting the same level of polish and quality as the Silent Hill 2 remake is a mistake. Despite a rather unique story concept and a few clever ideas, Cronos: The New Dawn is a fairly run-of-the-mill survival-horror game with a few key flaws that hold it back from being as good as its inspirations or Bloober Team's own Silent Hill 2 remake.

Cronos: The New Dawn fails to deliver a well-rounded survival horror experience due to combat that doesn't measure up to the rest of the game. On the other hand, it also gives us a wonderful science fiction story that is fascinating both narratively and visually.