Past Cure Reviews
Past Cure starts off as a promising and ambitious shooter/thriller combo whose ideas are brought undone by inexperience
So awful yet so boring that one can neither get too mad nor fall asleep, Past Cure is simply a Frankenstein of poorly implemented, cliched ideas and story beats.
Without a central idea to fall back on, Past Cure is just an unorganized mess.
Past Cure is a prime example of the adage “never judge a book by its cover”. The trailer had me interested enough to play it so that you don't have to.
Past Cure is many things: technically infuriating, a slog, and thematically inconsistent. While one can appreciate the effort of a small team trying to craft a game that does many things, it can't seem to do any of them well enough to warrant any attention. With a glut of better games that tackle similar elements on the platform, it's very difficult to recommend Past Cure to people, even as a quick diversion.
A flawed production that, despite a few interesting ideas, fails to engage the player with a boring campaign and one of the worst uses of the Unreal Engine that we've seen in this generation.
Review in Italian | Read full review
I've read scarier issues of the Beano in this clunky, buggy mess of a wanna be Deadly Premonition.
We were promised a unique, "award"-winning storytelling experience. Instead, we received a convoluted mess that isn't sure what game it wants to be.
Past Cure is a game that seems to be excellent, but ends up being bellow average. If you start playing it, you will want to play it until the end as fast as possible in order to give your suffering a quick end.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
Past Cure is too busy trying to figure out what genre it is, failing to execute the simplest mechanics that would've made the game far more enjoyable.
There are many games that Past Cure draws from and it's a pale imitation of them all. Less Heavy Rain and more Light Drizzle. Less Evil Within and more Crap Within. The developers were ambitious, but overambitious, and they have delivered an absolute turkey. Completely unenjoyable and comes with very few redeeming features. It's an awful, awful game.
The team at Phantom 8 should be proud of what it has achieved in terms of atmosphere and core gameplay. Past Cure, similarly to Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice before it, is a testament to the idea that small indie developers can produce a quality of content matching that created by blockbuster studios. However, the excellence of these aspects makes the flaws in design, audio, and storytelling more glaring. What looks like a sterling experience feels amateur. Past Cure is ambitious, which can be a fantastic quality, but the developer's effort is misplaced, leaving the game incapable of surviving its own confusion.
Past Cure really wanted to present itself in the best possible light, but the opposite happened. An interesting idea, but many technical imperfections pull the game down.
Review in Slovak | Read full review
Past Cure isn't going to be for everyone. It's a budget title from a group of first-time game developers and that's prevalent throughout the game. From odd mechanic changes and tone shifts between Ian's nightmares and reality, to the often confusing story, it feels like Phantom-8 had a lot of different ideas for how they wanted the game to shake out. It just didn't quite weave them together as seamlessly as they had hoped. On the flip side, they definitely have the potential to crank out an amazing horror game as their blend of puzzle-based gameplay and environmental work made for some both satisfying and eerie moments. Navigating through Ian’s nightmares were some of the most enjoyable experiences I’ve had with a horror game since Resident Evil 5. There’s a delicate balance of tension that many horror games can't seem to find, but Past Cure felt just right in this regard to me. I just wish there were more of this aspect throughout the game. If you don't come in expecting The Evil Within or Resident Evil and keep your expectations in check, you’ll likely find something about this budget psychological action flick that you'll like.
Don’t think that Past Cure will become the next cult classic, like Deadly Premonition. This is a whole different level of bad. Past Cure attempts to be too many things at once. The developer’s ambition outweighs their ability to execute it effectively. The game’s lofty aspirations are commendable and, at the very least, it is playable. Still, it is a shame that Past Cure doesn’t amount to the titles from which it poorly borrows so many of its ideas.
It's not the worst game of the year because it's not broken, it all works fine and there is an interesting concept of a show here, even though we may have trodden these boards before. I found the combat sluggish and uninspiring, and some of the nightmare levels can be very generic compared to other games in these genres. But I think Past Cure is probably worth a punt as long as you can grab it in a sale and fancy trying something a bit unusual.
As you progress through the game, there are so many twists and turns in Past Cure that you never really know what’s going to happen next. It’s also fair to say some of these twists and the settings they are based within, are a lot better than others. Past Cure has some fantastic ideas, although it’s almost as if developer Phantom 8 Studio is trying to settle on a genre it feels most comfortable with so has used Past Cure as a way to throw a whole load of them into one game and see which it likes best.
At best, Past Cure plays like a prototype for a better and more focused game.
A psychological thriller with stealth seemed right up my alley, which made it all the more disappointing that it wound up primarily a mediocre cover-based shooter. But hey, my achievement progress for the game is at 69%, and it’s going to stay that way. Nice.
Past Cure is a broken and generic third-person shooter that lets its hints of originality drown in its cliché, unexplained story and its painfully glitchy gameplay.