This was probably the most fun I've had playing a horror game in a good while, which surprised me because I really wasn't expecting much out of this one. Jump scares are definitely not the only things that will give you the chills, this game has strong atmosphere, and lurking around to avoid being seen by enemies can be some of the creepiest parts of the game, and can be terrifying when you're being chased.

The game also has enough meat to it to put all of it's mechanics to good use without ever feeling underplayed or gimmicky. I also feel that the game does a good job of making you care about the main character's well being, he goes through so much crap in this game that it makes it all the more motivating to keep going and see what happens next. I wont say more, overall I highly recommend this to horror fans, it's pretty awesome.

Definitely not the scariest horror game ever, but scary enough to make you cry like a schoolgirl. Tense gameplay with both dynamic chases and thrilling stealth experience, atmospheric soundtrack, and story perfectly short for one dreadful evening.
It's dangerous to go alone, take your camera.

First of all, this game isn't optimized for 32bit systems and requires some unorthodox system tuning to make it work properly (or at all!). Why is it this way, when it uses now really dated Unreal engine, is a question for the devs.

The game is not as nearly as scary as the hype made it out to be. A lot of horror is derived from gore, which is, in my opinion, always a cheap trick. There are some jump scares too, but they are not overused. The main terror factor is that you are completely helpless when confronted with anybody/anything that wants to hurt you and have to rely or running fast to a hiding place. This, combined with the camera's night vision mode provides the same effect as one we already seen in Amnesia: A Dark Descent. - player is left feeling vulnerable and helpless, the feeling that is only strenghtened by main characters unwilling sobs and heavy breathing. On the other hand, the fact that it takes several hits for enemies to end your life (at least on normal difficulty) diminishes the overall feeling and could have been made harder on the player.

Music, environmental sounds and animation have all been done beautifully and with much detail and serve to enrich the environment and the atmosphere. Graphics are solid, even rough at places (some textures look like from a 10 year old game), so it only adds weight to the question of unusual system requirements.

The story is told via documents you find while roaming through the asylum, notes that the protagonist makes and, on a rare occasion, by NPC characters you interact with in some way. This is a formula used by many games, but it has not been done well. It's both hard to follow and uninteresting (several cliches jumbled one atop another), so you'll probably stop caring somewhere along the way, which kinda defeats the purpose of you playing as a journalist who wants to expose what has been happening behind the walls of the asylum.

There are some interesting moments to the story though, but they revolve around things that concern the player and not the 'big picture'.

Overall, even though not a masterpiece of horror, Outlast is still quite enjoyable and is bound to send more than a couple of chills down your spine.

7/10

If Amnesia: The Dark Descent and the Penumbra games had a baby, that baby would be Outlast. This is classic survival horror - a creepy setting, no weapons, and no way to survive except to hide. You play as a journalist investigating an abandoned insane asylum, based on an anonymous tip of shady goings-on there. The only tool you have at your disposal is a video camera. The main hook of the game is using the camera's IR (night vision) mode to see just what the hell is going around you. It makes for some very effective moments of terror. Imagine knowing something scary and nasty is out there stalking you, but not being able to see what's 3 feet in front of you... yeah, that's the experience in a nutshell. Those moments are what makes this game effective. But unfortunately the whole game is not just those moments. Some parts I found to be somewhat tedious. For example, in one section, you have to explore an area to collect 3 fuses to restore power to something, all the while being stalked by crazy people. It's tense, to be sure, but also makes you realize that you're playing a game with a lame "collect x things" mechanic. It kind of brings you out of the experience a bit. The final section of the game is also sort of hit or miss, as it changes direction in a big way (reminds me sort of how Amnesia fell apart a little bit towards the end). But it's not necessarily bad... just different (I don't really want to get into spoilers at all), so it's one of those things where you might like it or you might not. But the majority of the game leading up to the end is pretty much consistently good. The environment is creepy as hell, the atmosphere is dark, and the "enemies" (mostly disfigured inmates) serve their purpose well. There are a few jump-scares, and the aforementioned fetch-quest sections where you're being chased, but mostly, the horror of the game comes from the combination of atmosphere and having to rely on a camera (whose batteries drain quickly when using IR) to be able to see. On the downside, you sort of get used to things after a while, so the scare factor wears off a bit towards the end. So it's ultimately a good thing that the game only lasts around 4-5 hours. Any more would have been too much. Despite the flaws, there's still lots of good things to experience here, so if you're a fan of this genre, you pretty much have to play this at some point. I think the price is probably fair, but if you can wait, it's definitely worth picking up in a sale.

Technical notes: I ran into a major bug towards the beginning of the game that prevented any further progress (it involves shaking the mouse during a quick-time event). The issue has supposedly been fixed in a patch, but it didn't work for me. There is a pinned post in the Steam discussions explaining how to work around this if it doesn't work for you either.

A first person survival horror game utilizing player helplessness very familiar to that of Amnesia: The Dark Descent. Tasked with uncovering the horrors within the mysterious walls of a re-opened mental asylum, you are a lone reporter armed with only a video camcorder to reveal to the world what not even the military could. The graphics and lighting in the game are superb, the sound assets are impressively detailed in most places and the horror is just as effective as Amnesia without the use of a sanity meter. Where it falls short is the lack of puzzles beyond the repetative objective of "find two switches while an ugly ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ patrols the area" and the only things to find in the game are memos, notes and spare batteries to keep your cameras nightvision function going to see in the dark. The story isn't all that good and there's only one rather lousy ending, but when it comes to scaring the ♥♥♥♥ out of you, it still accomplishes this in spades, which no talent, cockbag Let's Players have exploited as yet another mere springboard to bounce their obnoxious personality off of. Also, ♥♥♥♥ Let's Players.