The Outlast Trials expands on the series' most daring and tense horror survival adventure with four-player CO-OP.
It's the unmasked stench of death at the hands of the nefarious Murkoff Corporation that fans of the Outlast series will remember as the entity who completely mismanaged Outlast 1's Mount Massive Asylum and built Outlast 2's eerie radio towers. A scary survival simulation low experiments continue in the game. They find the best ways to make you uneasy. You can have an extremely tense experience playing the tutorial and level one on an ultra-wide monitor in a dark room. But if you don't want to go alone, you can now take three of your friends with you. As such, Trials is potentially the biggest CO-OP horror survival game to come.
The first two Outlast games revolved around the evolving story of an investigative journalist uncovering a dark mystery, but in this Cold War era, you play as a prisoner racing for your life in a Squid Game-like race to survive in a few tries. This is why the game sees you as you try to outwit your fellow prisoners, who are often violent and severely disfigured, to act as detectives and outwit them. That makes them even more terrifying when they jump out of lockers and nail you to the floor in classic jumpscare fashion.
The Outlast Trials – Gamescom 2022
These fears are certainly more in line with American chainsaw horrors than some of the darker, more psychological horrors one might expect from a Silent Hill game, for example. However, the beloved horror game promises horror with excellent sound and level design that radiates eerie even if you can't hear the screams. Fields are often difficult to differentiate without using your night vision goggles, which can run out quickly and can only be recharged with a scarce battery supply. This makes it convenient to use night vision when absolutely necessary. On the other hand, outdoor lighting is both a blessing and a curse as long as you can only hide effectively in dark areas, and since you'll never be able to fight your opponents head-on, using stealth to your advantage is an absolute must.
Using privacy to your advantage is an absolute must.
It's great that you're given a very limited amount of inventory space (three slots in total) which means you'll have to constantly think about what items to carry to support your playstyle. The game competently balances its inventory and equipment customization system, which can change the scale of your own playstyle in a certain direction, changing your relationship with the items you choose to prioritize in your inventory.
From the IGN team Gabriel Moss He comments on his own preview.
In my own preview, I experienced the Police Station level in Easy mode, which meant that the map was strewn with healing and anti-psychotic items, batteries, and locks. In more challenging modes, these items will likely be less, making everything much more of a battle for survival.
The good news is that there are many ways to get rid of it all, if you're smart. You'll never be able to swing a weapon against your greedy attackers, but as mentioned earlier, you can use Dead By Daylight's familiar perk system for a multitude of different abilities and traits to give yourself an edge, contrary to what fans might think. For example, you can choose X-Ray gear that temporarily gives you the ability to see through walls and see in the dark without draining the night vision battery in Trials' first level.
I'm excited to see how deep the strategic engagement of The Outlast Trials is.
Once you've finished surviving - or if you don't - you can always return to the center area. This seems to depend heavily on the progression of the story, but it's also where you'll meet other players and enter Trials' multiplayer CO-OP mode. According to developer Red Barrels, fans of the series can meet returning characters in this central area, but the distinguishing feature here is the ability to customize your character with special loot and gear you unlock throughout the game. You can even decorate your personal cell to show off to your friends, or you can sit and enjoy casual arm wrestling between sessions. So everything looks like it's going to be a lot of fun. I can't wait..