Agony Reviews
There's a disturbing and horrifying atmosphere that can't be beat with Agony, although game suffers from enough problems that the real Hell is just surviving the bugs.
Agony is, true to its name and intentions, a hellish experience. My excitement for the game was quickly quashed behind bugs, crashes and unbalanced gameplay, failing to live up to the potential of the game's core ideas and outstanding visual design. I hope that I can travel back to Hell following some substantial patching but, as things stand, Agony is torture in all the wrong ways.
Being a tormented soul which travels between bodies to escape Hell is a great idea. And there are some good design choices made in Agony, but everything falls apart because of its mediocre graphics, poor controls and unpredictable IA.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
Controversial, blasphemous, sexualized and generator of agony in the user. Agony can be all these things, as well as an excellent recreation of a particular hell, but quite poor graphics and the simplicity of its game mechanics do not stand out as much as we expected, not even to be considered a horror game.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
All of the problems above spoil what little Agony does right, and as a result, it's hard to recommend Agony to anyone. The only people who should consider Agony are people that want a truly hardcore, even at the expense of enjoyment, survival horror game that will put your patience to the test.
Overall Agony is a good game, though it lacks a really scare factor after the first few scares it makes for some unique gameplay in a well-designed environment. I like the fact that it’s not linear, you can explore loads of different areas and do different things from what the main story is offering.
Agony shows us what hell might look like, but unfortunately that's all it has going for it. Every other aspect of the game, from gameplay to graphics, isn't good.
Review in Slovak | Read full review
Inconsistent enemy A.I., a bad story, and lackluster environments come together to create a grueling slog of a game
A depiction of hell that hasn't really been fully realised before, Agony is marred by frustrating stealth sections and some poorly explained mechanics. The horrifying imagery is generally effective and the overall presentation manages to survive some glaring technical issues, but this is very much an acquired taste in every sense of the word.
Agony is a mediocre survival horror: the dull gameplay and many controversial game design choices are the two responsibles of an unexpected result.
Review in Italian | Read full review
In reality, poorly developed mechanics are your enemies in Agony, not the demons you're supposed to be afraid of.
Despite some glorious and gruesome horror imagery, Agony doesn't have much else to offer.
Agony proves that, like beauty, horror can be only skin deep. With gratuitous amounts of violence and masochistic overtones, this blood-soaked adventure is not for the faint of heart. But while its bold and detailed environments depict Hell in the most nightmarish ways possible, even the fantastically obscene sights and creepy sounds become mundane and dull by the end of its series of repetitious mazes, unimaginative item hunts, and weak stealth gameplay.
Agony. It's a pretty fitting name.
The vision of hell introduced in Agony rivals the excellent final level of Painkiller. Unfortunately the game set in this wonderfully warped world isn’t very interesting. For each upside there's at least one serious shortcoming. This controversial and ambitious game turned out to be dull and rather boring.
Review in Polish | Read full review
The best-case scenario for Agony is that patches fix the many technical problems plaguing this game right now.
Agony is obsessed with getting the atmosphere right at the expense of gameplay. From the bones and viscera adorning every the world to the torture and writhing bodies, the developer has certainly succeeded at creating a place that is disturbing and fascinating. Once you get over the edgy environment, you'll recognize that there are many issues with the game: broken tutorials, inept stealth elements, a possession system that isn't explained, poor checkpoint placement, gamma issues, and mediocre voice acting. In a way, the experience you'll have with the game matches its name perfectly, so unless you're desperate for a masochistic experience, Agony gets a hard pass.
Agony proves that setting is only one component needed to make an excellent horror game.
Agony is a game that is better left in the deepest part of hell, or at very least, the discount bin.
Bellow its subversive appearance, Agony is just a mediocre title. It fails to capture the very essence of a successful survival horror game : an experience that combine a terrifying setting and interesting gameplay mechanics.
Review in French | Read full review