If you already find moving around the claustrophobic confines of Amnesia: The Bunker difficult, brace yourself – horror master Frictional is introducing a new Shell Shocked mode, and it's about to make an already unsettling experience even more terrifying.
Releasing just in time for Halloween – because of course it is – Frictional's creative lead Fredrik Olsson has been drip-feeding teasers about Shell Shocked mode on social media, confirming that "vacations are over" and the team is "working on a bunch of cool stuff for the upcoming Halloween update of Amnesia: The Bunker".
The first example Olsson shares is that some of the lockers in Mission Storage – lockers that usually tease and tantalize, keeping key items hidden in plain sight of players – have been placed at random locations throughout the sub-levels, and the Admin Office – a rare sanctum of safety for our wounded soldier – will be safe no more thanks to the decision to replace its sturdy steel door with a wooden one.
But there's more. As spotted by Rock Paper Shotgun, there'll now be "sweet rewards" secreted in boxes around the place, so we'll have to weigh up the risks of a noisy break-in with the threat of the monster hearing us, and for one particularly extreme challenge, the gun is stowed away in one of the lockers from the off. Corpses, dog tags, and bunker rats will spawn in new and randomized locations, too.
👀 pic.twitter.com/7dlO6EiUeRSeptember 16, 2023
"None of these features will be exclusive to the Shell Shocked difficulty since these are also available in what we call Custom Mode," Olsson explained. "That mode basically let you customize your experience with tons of different options where most of these features will be available.
"Some features and improvements will, however, be part of the basic game as well as new game+. So I guess it's a mix of things but with focus on letting players choose their poison."
We thought Amnesia: The Bunker was "an incredibly well-made and entertaining game with excellent world-building, narrative, and atmospheric audio that is sadly let down by psychological horror that borders on harassing".
Adding that it was "not for the faint of heart", we praised the horror game's impeccable voice acting, atmospheric audio, and thorough world-building, but thought the "frustrating physics" and "overstepped the mark" horror held it back. Nonetheless, Frictional's latest horror secured four out of five stars in our Amnesia: The Bunker review.
Horror isn't just for Halloween, you know – here's our list of the very best horror games.
