Amnesia: The Bunker Reviews
In its best moments, Amnesia: The Bunker joins Outlast and Alien: Isolation at the pinnacle of this style of horror, but this is a game with a split identity. Combat feels out of place and mostly ends up being a navigation tool, while I would have liked to see better use of light as a defence against the creature. The story is somewhat predictable, but Amnesia: The Bunker excels with its atmosphere and the kind of tense gameplay that will thrill genre fans.
Not even an intermittent crash or clunky load screen can minimize what Amnesia: The Bunker does so well. The intimate world, wonderfully interwoven mechanics, and semi-random nature make The Bunker a nerve-racking experience that’s a natural evolution of its landmark first entry. On a surface level, it’s still about creeping through a dimly lit hellhole and evading unspeakable horrors, but Frictional has spent the last decade advancing that formula to create the best version of it so far.
Can you survive through the madness?
These moments rival those of the best stealth games, when the slightest noise can mean revealing your position to much more powerful foes. Frictional has made a name for itself by creating these moments out of elegant yet terrifying systems. The Bunker’s standout achievement, then, is creating a nonlinear sandbox where you’re constantly learning from your own bad habits. I’ve never been so conscious of how much noise everything makes around me in a digital space, cautiously entering rooms to avoid kicking an empty wine bottle or activating the flashlight intermittently when I knew the monster was near. As McKee described, it’s your mundane actions, in conjunction with the crude and hostile setting, that create a solid ceiling of sound — one that only grows thicker the longer you inhabit the bunker.
The best way I think I can describe The Bunker is that it is an exceptional proof of concept. There's immense potential here, and the first couple of hours or so are genuinely great horror, but the game doesn't have enough tricks up its sleeve to maintain momentum.
Frictional Games have finally abandoned their “walking-sim” style horror games with Amnesia: The Bunker. The experience is unrelenting white-knuckle terror where the player’s actions and choices are critical. Fans of Alien: Isolation and classic horror will get a lot of enjoyment from this.
Amnesia: The Bunker is an unnerving experience that’ll both terrify and enthral players in equal measure thanks to its gripping gameplay. I loved exploring the bunker, finding clever ways to progress, and carefully evading the wrath of the creature, whilst the moments where it was on my back were always exciting as I fought for survival. And sure, the open-world design of the game isn’t always executed perfectly, but the sense of progress you feel as you open new pathways and complete objectives is always satisfying. It’s just a really fun direction for the Amnesia series to take, with Amnesia: The Bunker delivering the scares that the series is known for in a very different way. Its individual components of gameplay may not necessarily do anything you wouldn’t have seen before, but put together? They make for a really good (and really spooky) time.
Playing Amnesia: The Bunker was a great horror experience that scratched a long-time itch I’ve had for a while. The game ran smoothly, only stuttering when entering a new area like the Arsenal zone. The notes found around left me wanting to learn more about what happened in the bunker.
Amnesia: The Bunker is the fourth installment in the star franchise from Frictional Games. We return to survival horror with more classic elements such as in The Dark Descent and we add significant innovations such as the use of some weapons to defend ourselves or help us advance or that the action takes place in a semi-open mapping that will allow us to explore as we see fit. assuming the risks of it. The result is quite solid and The Bunker's proposal fulfills its purpose, and the beast will make us feel constant tension and terror.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
The Bunker is a great addition to the Amnesia series and shows that Frictional Games is on the right path, and even though it doesn't offer as much quality as the very first game, it's still an atmospheric survival horror and is the best in the genre this year.
Review in Persian | Read full review
Amnesia: The Bunker is a pleasant step up from its predecessor Rebirth, but it all too often falls into the problem many horror games have - resource management and monstrous harassment are balanced in such a way as to inspire annoyance more readily than fear. For much of its campaign, The Bunker is an absorbingly gloomy experience with a nice sense of rhythm to its progress and an effective illusion of dynamism in both its monster and environment. This is somewhat offset by enforced backtracking, a piddling inventory, and an embarrassingly rubbish flashlight. If it had expanded its promising ideas and balanced its threat-to-tedium ratio better, this could have been a fantastic experience. But, y’know, it didn’t do that.
Amnesia: The Bunker’s engaging gameplay loop effortlessly blends in immersive sim elements, creating an absolute survival horror gem.
Easily the weakest game in the series.
Amnesia: The Bunker lacks the story-telling and emotional heft of the previous games in the series. But, if you are in the mood for a scary and tense game of cat and mouse, this game will satisfy your needs.
A classic entry in the series, a new flavor and a constant sense of suspense. Don't expect anything revolutionary.
Review in Turkish | Read full review
Amnesia: The Bunker is honestly a great horror experience that will get your heart racing. It’s a great self contained story in a horrific world of WWII.
Amnesia: The Bunker is a fantastic return to form for the developers behind The Dark Descent. If you want to experience terror locked in a dark cupboard underground, this is the game that will get you there. (Review Policy)
Previous Amnesia games have repeatedly fallen behind the horror that haunted the castle in the original game, but Amnesia: The Bunker is already showing potential in this regard. Bunker still feels like an exciting and increasingly important step forward for the Amnesia series. Players will love the change in the scale of the gameplay and the bigger storytelling and the new ways to interact with the world our hero is in. Having weapons and all the explosions you will bring back can change the atmosphere a lot but I will say they are not endless, and what will happen when you are left alone with the monster?
The Bunker does many things right, from its intricate level design to its rich atmosphere, but the overbearing adherence to horror eventually makes it wear on the senses. Being isolated in a pitch-black bunker with only a murderous beast as company can run you down quickly, and The Bunker never lets up. It is soaked in tension, worships at the altar of making you squirm, and does it with a smile. While this is appealing, it is a lot to manage, and this is a game for horror fans with a masochistic streak. Find the best pair of headphones, sit in the dark, and get your creative thinking cap on, because The Bunker is a survival horror experience to rival the best in recent memory. When it all comes together, when your back is against the wall, gun drawn with a single bullet left, and the beast is bearing at you down a dark hallway, that is when this game sings. In those moments, it reaches the heights of the genre greats and its progenitor.
Amnesia: The Bunker mostly sticks to the horror game basics, but it uses those basics to the fullest, creating a massively terrifying game.