Review: Lone Survivor PS4 Edition

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There will be no shortage of new horror games on PS4 this Halloween. Alien: Isolation has had even the toughest gamers hiding in lockers and peeing their pants, The Evil Within is currently making players squirm with its particular brand of bloody grimness, and now it’s the turn of Jasper Byrne’s Lone Survivor: Director’s Cut.

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Previously released on PC, PS3 and PS Vita, this Director’s Cut sees you play as a nameless survivor of an unknown disease. A disease that turns people into monsters. In this side-scrolling, pixellated psychological horror, you’ll question everything you see and hear – and don’t be fooled by the pixel art, you’ll still be pooping every which way when confronted by horrors that wouldn’t be out of place in Silent Hill.

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And Lone Survivor is very much a love letter to Konami’s iconic series. From the haunting, acoustic theme tune, to the disgusting, disturbing creatures and the strange NPCs, everything in Lone Survivor harks back to the best of Silent Hill’s original trilogy.

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You’ll have to survive in the darkness, using rotten meat to lure creatures so you can sneak by them, or just shoot them if you can spare the ammo. Shooting will attract others nearby though, and may affect other things within the game, such as which ending you receive. Clocking in at around 3-5 hours in length, depending on how you play, the multiple endings and secrets will keep you going back for more. Lone Survivor is a game made for multiple playthroughs.

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Now on PS4, complete with trophies (for all you hunters out there) but unfortunately not part of the Cross Buy scheme for owners of the PS3/Vita bundle, there’s no real difference between this version and every other version out there. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, as it means there are no arguments over which version is best – they’re all identical.

 

That said, as with the PS3 version, stretching the picture to a 720p/1080p TV screen does distort some of the game’s text. It doesn’t become unreadable, but it can be a little more difficult to make out.

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Controls are also unchanged from the PS3 version, only with the slightest difference of using the Dualshock 4’s touchpad to bring up the menu to change gamma and upload saves to the cloud. However, the PS4’s share function always adds a nice little bonus to ports like this.


And as far as ports go, Lone Survivor on PS4 is as fantastic and terrifying as ever.

Jim Smale

Gaming since the Atari 2600, I enjoy the weirdness in games counting Densha De Go and RC De Go as my favourite titles of all time. I prefer gaming of old where buying games from a shop was a thing, Being social in person was a thing. Join me as I attempt to adapt to this new digital age!