Ode to the Beast. Game Review with a Departure into the Astral. 0_o

Inside each of us, beneath the thin veneer of humanity, lies the Beast. Its nature is as murky as the nature of humankind. There is an opinion among learned men that people are fundamentally animals, descended from them, and only differ from beasts in that, through evolution, they somehow learned to think. Religious figures adhere to the theory of divine intervention, claiming that we are all 'in His image and likeness,' while, from invisible planes, winged angels and horned demons keep a watchful eye on us. No matter how a person comes into this world, their inner Beast is part of the same process. The Beast is part of the nature of every human being, or part of their spirit... The Beast is a hungry wolf or a malevolent demon... Although, that is not why we have gathered today at this abandoned cemetery, children, to philosophize about the essence of creation, but to get acquainted with the video game 'The Suffering,' which is somehow related to all this nonsense I just wrote.

We should probably start the narrative about The Suffering with a description of the ambiguous personality of the main character – the fellow whose game is at our full disposal. In this specific case, our mouse click commands a guy with a short but succinct name, Torq – a silent muscle man in a snow-white tank top, with a gorilla-like appearance and a perpetually disgruntled expression.

Such people are often said to have 'Life has beaten him!' Torq's childhood was spent in a nightmarish orphanage, and his adolescence on equally nightmarish streets. As it is known – 'When you live with wolves, you howl like a wolf.' So, Torq raised his inner Beast to a level of a bloodthirsty creature. Torq’s inner Beast is huge, terrifying, mortally dangerous, and occasionally breaks free, and not always at the behest of its master.

Everything is doomed, Torq is airing out his socks!

So, it's no surprise that the guy ended up outside the walls of a correctional facility. The harsh Abbott prison, located on a distant island, embraced him in its welcoming arms. This prison, of course, is of a particularly strict regime with especially harsh treatment of prisoners. It is meant for the most 'distinguished' members of society. To be honest, Torq earned his place in this institution. He is not your typical pickpocket, not a robber, and, strangely enough, not even a rapist; he (ominous music) is a murderer. Yep, a cold-blooded, merciless killer. His victims were members of his own family – a beautiful wife and a pair of lovely kids. Why did sweet Torq do away with the only people he cared about? Well, come on, there could be any number of reasons! For instance, his wife had no business cooking such distasteful borscht and being so attractive in front of the neighbors. And the boys shouldn't have changed the channel from football to 'Sesame Street' when daddy was in a bad mood.

In reality, if we are to be a bit more serious, our subject discovered that his family was brutally murdered upon regaining consciousness after yet another episode of being possessed by the Beast. The convict doesn’t remember the details of the murder, and the police didn’t especially try to investigate the incident. So, the story of Torq's family's death is far more complicated than it may seem at first glance, and the true details of the incident are shrouded in darkness. Whether Torq killed his own relatives or was simply framed will only become clear at the game's end.

A striking example of local puzzles: fire, water tower, tap... What to do?

When it comes to Torq's very image, there is a colossal gap – a psychopath, like a good hundred game characters, is utterly voiceless. The vow of silence, in this specific case, completely castrates Torq emotionally. The hero seems soulless and dead, while the muscleman’s torment would have added some spice to the game. Not even the fact that, in his rare moments of rest, Torq looks longingly at photos of his deceased family – fidgeting with them in his hands, his face still grumpy and devoid of expression, his eyes a ringing emptiness and boundless indifference, and at times it seems even filled with hatred – revives the character. Although, all this is probably just a result of poor animation.

Torq won’t have long to rest in his cell; as soon as the bars close behind our hero, some madness will commence in the prison. After a brief earthquake, from all the cracks and dark corners of the cursed Abbott prison, malevolent demon-shits of various kinds and forms will emerge. Literally right here, in the first minutes of the game, begins what The Suffering is famous for – a meat grinder. Bloodthirsty demons with limbs replaced by stabbing-slashing-chopping-skewering objects puncture, cut, chop, and stab the inhabitants of the state’s house.

Friendly corridors of Abbott.

What is regrettable is that despite the fact that Torq witnessed the beginning of the cataclysm, as he progresses through the game, the feeling that this masquerade of death has been raging in the prison for more than just a week never leaves. The picture is too apocalyptic. The first thing you think when you set out to explore the dark corridors of Abbott is – 'Oh, how organically dismembered bodies blend with puddles of blood!'

Look to the left – a half-alive, still resisting guard is being dragged into a ventilation shaft by some lovely monster. Look to the right – a small group of prisoners is fighting off demons assailing them, and seems to be losing. Let’s step into the next room and see what surprise awaits us here – the corpses of guards amusingly seated on chairs! They look just like they’re alive!

What are you staring at? This isn't a theatre!

Despite the fact that as the game progresses, the splattering red goo on the floors and walls increases, by the middle of the game, you stop paying attention to blood and death. Boredom doesn't relent even when we unexpectedly discover a prison guard, just stripped of all four limbs, dancing in a pool of blood on his stumps behind one of the open doors. Yet exploring this world of despair remains interesting. If you rush straight ahead, hurrying through the levels, you might miss a dark corner or a secret room hiding a puzzle piece – a small fragment of Torq's or the island's dramatic, albeit very mundane story. It could be a phone call from the deceased wife or a sudden impressive flashback that returns Torq to the murder scene – a bloodstained bathtub, the torn bodies.

The deceased sons and wife also don’t let him forget about themselves, regularly appearing before the father, tugging at his beastly heart. It feels like the cursed island itself generates their shadows. The appearance of ghosts is never a good sign; usually, after an emotional chat with the late wife or the kids, you have to pacify a couple of hostile entities that have sprung up from who-knows-where, and sometimes they try to trap Torq.

What’s up, Nyrka, why did you arrive for a date at such an inconvenient time?

We will also take tours of all the main attractions of Abbott prison. We’ll be shown the gas chamber, the electric chair, and the mental hospital situated on the other side of the damn island. In such places, the psychedelic counter goes off the charts.

Occasionally, we’ll have the chance to travel through the dark corners of the agonizing prison in the company of companions. And although our companions are merely as dull as a cork NPCs, time spent with them is much more fun. The peculiarities of our accompanying characters play a big role – sometimes we drag a cowardly guard to the nearest radio shack who screams like a stuck pig at the first sign of danger and curls into corners, or we fight our way through demon-infested blocks with a desperate convict, who is not intimidated by the devil himself. Each companion has a pair of enlightening stories and practical advice, along with a good dozen of strong expressions that describe the lethally dangerous surrounding reality in detail.

I’m not afraid of needles; if needed, I’ll inject myself!

One of the less colorful examples of companions is an old convict who spent twenty years preparing for escape. He dug a tunnel, built a raft, and crawled through the sewage pipes, as if from the damn Shawshank, choking on excrement all night, and then suddenly – a local judgment day in a correctional facility. One little detail remains for the freedom-loving pensioner’s dream to come true – to set sail from the wretched island, but one problem stands in the way of his makeshift vessel – demon-shits rising from the coastal waters. So, he asks any passerby for help, out of desperation. He’s had it rough, the poor fellow; how can you not help someone in such a situation? Torq would jump to plug the cannon's mouth with his chest or his rear in a breach in the rotten ship's hull, but alas, our charge isn't Gordon at all, but Torq, who has learned to weigh everything carefully before foolishly jumping into action based on the instructions of unfamiliar individuals. Coming to a simple 'Yes' or 'No' isn't easy for Torq; in his battered mind, a classic debate between an angel and a devil begins over every serious matter.

- Just kill the old man; he’s worthless anyway - says the annoying voice of the inner Beast.

- Torq, without your help, this old fart will kick the bucket! Somewhere in the depths of your soul... or whatever you have... you’re not such a bad guy! Help him, darling! - contradicts the inner voice of his deceased wife.

After a brief quarrel, the voices quiet down, leaving a ringing silence in his head, signaling that it’s time to make a choice. Torq freezes in anticipation - Hey, there behind the monitor, make your decision quickly...

Guys, why are you hanging around here?

Oh yes, putting up with annoying companions, who sometimes cause a lot of trouble, is not necessary at all. Just think about it, how hard must one’s patience be to drag along a chattering simpleton who sometimes dazzles with his curious and stupid death, or just gets stuck in rooms or on staircases. You could easily shut the annoying one up and enjoy the silence. However, at the same time, the second inner voice, belonging to his deceased wife, will be indignant, saying - 'Oh dear, naughty Torq! You’ve always been a cursed maniac, and you remain one!'

However, the consequences of your choice will not be limited to just a momentary moral dilemma. Know this, little sadists, every innocent soul you kill will echo loudly in the game's finale. Yes, yes, you heard that right; the game has several endings that depend on your choices, towards gooey goodness or cosmic evil.

For instance, executing a guard locked in a gas chamber will be considered a bad deed and negatively affect your karma.

While finishing him off when he’s already suffocating will be seen as a good deed.

The bestiary of The Suffering is not grand, it won’t surprise a seasoned player, yet it's varied and amusing enough. All the baddies are fitting, and the origins of each mischief are explained almost finger-by-finger. The thing is, of course, a damn prison located on (an old Indian graveyard) cursed island. They say, those who died from lethal injections came back in the form of scrunched-up wretches spewing syringes, and prisoners buried alive in the mines became worm-like underground creeping crawlers, while those 'executed in the open, lined up against the wall, and shot through the forehead' turned into something resembling walking machine guns. And so on and so forth, similar tales. The execution of prisoners in various ways, sometimes exotic, has been practiced in Abbott since olden times, thus accumulating a plethora of suffering souls on the island, and they have now risen and thirst for blood.

You'll have to obliterate this hellish upchuck in significant amounts. Regrettably, there's no need to search for special approaches to destroying each type of scumbag; you simply have to go mercilessly slaughter all this beastly lot with whatever means are available. However, when it comes to boss battles, you will need to apply a little cunning, albeit just a touch.

So, sicko, don’t scratch your 'Mantoux' and don’t soak it!

Let's pause on the bosses for a moment. Just look at their profiles, their faces! A celebration of perfect evil. Among them shines, for example, the smoke man – resurrected in the form of poisonous gas, the executioner who has killed hundreds of death row inmates, as well as the deranged block chief who believes that the prisoners are to blame for the calamities that have befallen the prison, and thus is wholesale sending them off to the other side. Each one is charismatic, each one unique, but the champion in the charm discipline is undoubtedly the vile psychiatrist, a certain Doctor Killjoy, projected into light by a film projector. Oh, that insane laughter of the maniac de-brainwasher, his stirring speeches about learning through pain, and if necessary, through death.

Doctor, it seems I have cognitive dissonance.

By the way, speaking of the means to eradicate godforsaken filth, we won't discover anything particularly interesting for ourselves. Ironically, weapons created for killing humans perform adequately against the undead, so the game is dominated by dull firearms and various types of grenades. A dreary yet effective flamethrower can be assembled from several parts scattered throughout the game world. Nevertheless, knowledgeable folks say something non-trivial awaits us – closer to the game's finale, in a hidden niche of the prison basements, lurks a super-secret super-weapon – the Gonzo Gun. They say it resembles a chicken that fires deadly eggs; however, I never found it myself.

Just a pretty screenshot. :P

Another weapon to consider is Torq's inner Beast; wish for it, and the convict transforms into a gigantic, powerful creature – his second self takes the stage in the theater of madness, the possible murderer of his family - the inner Beast. Once, it broke free of its own accord; now it functions under Torq's command, exterminating his enemies, thirsting to survive, and wishing for the one who birthed it to survive as well.

All I’ve described above looks good and excellent individually, but how does it look in the grand photo? Yes, I mean the gameplay. It starts quite briskly – the shootouts are entertaining, silly puzzles slow down the swift pace through linear, monotonous locations. Problems begin as you approach the middle, when blood becomes tedious and a heavy realization dawns – the game won’t surprise anymore. Boredom sets in.

Oh, how many butterflies!!!

Another downside of the game is its finale. It disappoints with its vagueness in all its endings. Playing as the good Torq, literally dragging a couple of dummies behind you, at the end, you anticipate some kind of coherent reward for it, just as you wait for an appropriate punishment for the evil Torq. Unfortunately, these expectations are not met. This can be simply explained – just a year after the game’s release, its sequel – The Suffering: Ties That Bind – came to light, which evidently 'prepared the ground' for the original Suffering.

The Suffering: Ties That Bind – became a pale shadow of its predecessor, almost mirroring its gameplay detail by detail while losing a significant portion of its charm. The only value of the sequel was that it was thematically connected to the first game, which contained numerous points of intersection. For example, the game has several different narrative kick-offs corresponding to the endings of the original The Suffering. Moreover, the sequel provides some form of closure to the storyline of the game.

Torq's inner Beast.

In conclusion, it should be said that The Suffering is, overall, a solid bloody action game, with a dark, oppressive atmosphere, dense and unique. The interesting enemies and companions are a plus, while the silent, indifferent hero is a minus. The game receives a giant plus for the ability to choose between good and evil, a significant minus for monotonous gameplay, which becomes tiresome by mid-game. The excessive brutality and bloodiness of the game may be either a plus or a minus, depending on the gaming preferences of the player. It should also be noted, with a heavy heart, that The Suffering is not scary at all. Sometimes it is nauseating, repulsive, may be a tad creepy at times, but not scary, which is a pity. The story is mediocre but presented in an engaging way, and the graphics are bearable even at this stage. Based on the aforementioned, fans of the genre who, for some unclear reasons, have missed out on The Suffering should catch up on what they have missed.

Thank you for your attention, walking through the dark corridors of Abbott with you was Exstas. Special thanks to Mr. Ganondorf for proofreading the text and fixing the ugly spelling. That’s all.

Other works by the author in the same vein:

1. To execute or to pardon – a review of The Punisher game

2. Review of the horror-action game Cold Fear, crawling out from behind the stove.