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Tormented Souls has a surprisingly high user rating on Steam - apparently, gamers yearned for the old-school horror that delighted us two decades ago. And indeed - at first glance, this is a competent mix of classic Silent Hill and Resident Evil. However, it is worth taking a closer look at the game from an online game developer Friv2Online Studio, as its charm partially disappears. We tell in the review what delights and what annoys horror.

After receiving a photo of the long-missing twin sisters with a tip on where they might be, Carolina Walker immediately goes to the address - which leads her to an old gloomy mansion.

In the very first corridor, the girl gets hit on the back of the head, after which she wakes up in the bath - without clothes, without one eye, with a ventilator tube in her mouth. Having somehow freed herself, the heroine puts on a short dress and jacket, arm herself with a lighter and goes in search of the truth.

Although the key twist is read almost at the very beginning of the friv game, and some conventions, such as portals to the past, never find an explanation, the plot of Tormented Souls is interesting to follow. The script is naive, but not devoid of "soul" - like in a good B- movie , the authors of which a little bit lacked the fuse and budget.

It is noticeable that the writers and designers of Tormented Souls were inspired by many cult horror. A huge mansion with many halls and corridors and a fixed camera here are clearly from the Resident Evil series. Crazy cultists and the mechanics of the periodic transition to the other world came straight from the Silent Hill series , and Karolina herself is a bit like Heather, the heroine of the third part of the franchise. The design of the monsters reminded me of the old The Suffering. "Tank" management and the need to collect reels to be able to survive (and in strictly designated areas) are available.

This adds to the intensity of the gameplay: the enemies are tenacious, due to uncomfortable camera angles, they often cannot be seen immediately after entering the room, and the death of a character can set the player back a good half hour.

Karolina is very afraid of the dark, so she can only enter unlit places with a lighter, taking it in her hands, she puts away her weapon (a sudden reference to Doom 3). Which also brings a bit of hardcore: often here you have to run away from monsters in an attempt to find a saving island of light, where you can finally fight back.

And now everything seems to be fine, the immersion in the atmosphere is maximum, and the feeling of nostalgia pulls you to download a couple of old horror films , but, on the other hand, the question arises - why is this all? The game cannot scare: the story it tells does not shine with originality, the design of the monsters is, frankly, dull, and there are no scary episodes in Tormented Souls at all. Nasty, nasty - there are, but truly creepy - no.

The project tries to make the player uncomfortable with uncomfortable gameplay and artificial restrictions, and not, in fact, with elements of horror - and this is the most disappointing. Indeed, you can select control points, make the combat system deliberately complex, and make the camera give out the most uncomfortable angles. However, this is the laziest way to make you afraid - and not afraid for the character, but for your time, which will have to be spent over and over again passing through the game segments only because Karolina failed to avoid the clutches of the monster.

Yes, cult horrors were like that too, but not because the developers wanted it so much, but because of the technical limitations of the platforms and the peculiarities of the game design of that time. A lot has changed since then, and the best games in the genre don't have to be uncomfortable. Take a look at Resident Evil VII, Outlast, Alien: Isolation - these games are modern and they are scary as hell. The same features, such as rare saves, are implemented much more competently and conveniently, and therefore do not irritate.

However, I'm not saying that Tormented Souls is a weak game. It's just that her old-fashionedness doesn't do her any good. You have to come to terms with this, and then you manage to get pleasure from horror, especially since it also has positive features.

For example, puzzles , many of which are very difficult. The friv game gives clues to each of the challenges, but they can be so cleverly hidden in the dialogue and environment that only an attentive player can see and understand them. In addition, sometimes puzzle designers are simply merciless to the younger generation - well, tell me, how does a young gamer know what to do with a floppy disk and how to remove write protection from it?

There are often situations when an item picked up somewhere at the beginning of the campaign will come in handy closer to the final - when you forget about it. There are also illogical, at first glance, puzzles, over the solution of which you struggle for a long time. Worst of all - a non-interactive map, which does not display any character, or locked doors, or important objects. Go and remember where that damned pedestal with a curly cutout is, where you need to insert the found key! If we are to draw parallels with classic horror, then even in the ancient Silent Hill, marks were put on the map about visited places, locked doors, and puzzles important for moving along the plot.

The intricacy of the mansion is confusing at first, but in reality it turns out to be not too big, and very soon you manage to navigate inside almost without errors. The authors have prepared several convenient shortcuts that open as you progress, but sometimes Tormented Souls still makes you run - there is enough backtracking in the game.

While some areas of the game aren't quite as interesting as others (hello, sewers!), most of the old hospital -converted house is charming. The combination of artsy interiors with medical cabinets and gurneys is impressive, and at the best moments we seem to find ourselves in the same mansion from the first Resident Evil.