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The Broadside

The Student News Site of Central Oregon Community College

The Broadside

The Student News Site of Central Oregon Community College

The Broadside

Horror videogame disappoints on all levels

The 8-year-old title character in the new survival horror stealth video game “Amy,” developed by VectorCell and published by Lexis Numérique.

Isaac Newby
The Broadside

“Amy” punishes you for playing. The story is boring, the controls seem to be based on ten-year-old game technology and the utter lack of objectives for guidance make this one of the single worst downloads released for this generation.
Amy, set in the year 2034, begins on a train and immediately exposes you to the poor quality of the cut scenes and voice acting. The back story revolves around Amy, an autistic child being taken to a better medical facility for treatment. This is explained via a telephone call between Lana, Amy’s caretaker, and her new doctor. After this, the story kicks in: A meteor strikes Silver City, somehow causing a zombie apocalypse. Lana is then knocked unconscious, because zombies know never to attack and kill the protagonist this early in the story. None of these events draw you in; all the cutscenes that tell the story are completely skippable.
After leaving the train, Lana begins her search for Amy, who apparently is able to navigate through zombies, burning rubble and electrified fences with an uncanny ease. Calling the combat and camera angles poor seems almost too nice as they seem to want to personally cause you psychological pain. Lana cannot survive on her own without being destroyed by a poisonous puddle (yes, that happens) or mobbed by zombies, which you generally won’t notice because the camera angle is too busy giving a close up of Lana’s shoulder. You temporarily receive a helper to assist in the search for Amy and the escape from the train station. The names of any of these side characters are unimportant: they invariably end up dead, offer no further clarity on what objectives you have and primarily offer the view that just recently retired career criminals will survive the zombie apocalypse longer than decent folks.
This game falls flat on all fronts. Even at times that offer what seems to be a decent moment, the frustrating controls, dialogue and any potentially unique gameplay elements crush any glimmer of goodness. No one should play this game, even extreme fans of horror/zombie games will be disappointed. All things considered, even the low price of $9.99 seems too steep a price to pay for something that shows such an incompetent design.

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