The Dark Pictures Anthology: House of Ashes (2021)

Played this with a friend and had a lot of fun. The gameplay is fairly janky and awkward most of the time, but the characters and set pieces were enjoyable enough to warrant a second playthrough to try and save everyone (which we didn't manage, haha). Much better than Man of Medan.

If you approach this as a trashy-fun coop experience you'll probably enjoy yourself a lot. For a "serious" single player campaign I'd probably rather spend my time on another game. If I could I'd give it 3.5 out of 5.

Edit: Also, if you care about achievements: The only way we could get online coop to work was by both using the friend pass version of the game, which does not give any achievements.

INTERACTIVE HORROR - Trapped in an ancient Sumerian temple, these 5 individuals must work together in order to escape the nightmarish monsters awaiting them.

PROS:

++ Visuals. For the most part, the graphics are great and most characters look good.

++ Solid cast. Despite their character flaws, you wanted to keep the main 5 alive. The best of the bunch are by far and away, Jason and Salim.

++ Interesting premise.

++ The monsters. They were intimidating and had a cool origin story and design. They're "vampires" who were really extraterrestrial beings that were annihilated by a parasite.

++ Plot twists. Game always introduced new twists and revelations that kept the player hooked.

++ Replayable.

++ Co-Op Mode. Co-op was handled well, making this game perfect for a group gathering.

CONS:

-- Stiff expressions. Some facial animations and character movement looked stiff and unnatural, especially Ashley Tisdale's character.

-- Texture pop-In. Some textures took a while to load, in one instance not even loading at all.

-- Sluggish movement.

"I can't really focus on games enough to do marathonian play sessions" I say, before finishing this one in like a day and half of playing as much as I could.

An incredible game. Sure, the gameplay is a bit on the low side, it's more of an interactive movie than a game per se, but is is an excellent interactive movie. A great cast, beautiful graphics, very well written plot and great plot twists.

Ok so spoilers ahead.

But like, to go from the Iraq War, to Sumerian temple, to vampires, to ALIENS!?!?? Like just pulling off that kind of plot and connecting it all together to keep you guessing had me not knowing what was coming next!! Not too scary of a game but definitely creepy, but just trying to solve the story as you play made this game great. Better than Man of Medan and Little Hope in my opinion. Now just to play the next game Devil In Me!!

If i played this alone, I'd rate this 4/5.
But I really liked how they handled online coop.
The characters are split between 2 players. Sometimes you and your friend play 2 characters that are together at the moment. Other times each player is playing a character that's in the different place, so each one of you gets to see different parts of the story.

This is interesting, because: You get to know only 70% of the story, from the perspective of your characters and the rest is a mystery to you. And your friend knows the other 30% of the story but didn't see something that you did.
This allows you to make unbiased choices, and I do believe it's different experience from singleplayer.

*Keep in mind that couch coop is just singleplayer with taking turns. While online coop is synchronous storytelling and this is the best way to play IMO.
We're going to switch roles now and play it through once again with my friend.