Originally posted by Impediment
So far this game isn't blowing my skirt up. I just started Chapter 4 and I'm not very enveloped with the story. It's slow and not very scary.Does it pick up?
I'm about to start chapter 7.
From what I've read, the story does pick up as you go on. At the moment, I'm still not sure wtf is going on though. Just a bunch of random, gruesome happenings. It feels like classic Mikami though. The basic story is some cops showing up as backup to some horror setting, something causes them to split up, and random shit ensues. Pretty much the same as RE1.
I've spent a fair amount of time lurking the Evil Within forums, and a lot of the people there believe the game hits its stride chapter 5 and 6. A lot of them seemed to be blown away by chapters 9 and 10, so I'm looking forward to that. Everyone who beat the game considers it to be one of Mikami's best. Then again, it is a forum dedicated to the Evil Within, so take that with a grain of salt.
Chapter 4, IMO, was alright. Chapter 5 is better than everything that came before it. Play that entire chapter straight. I was pretty exhausted by the end. Chapter 6 was pretty meh. Chapter 7 is shaping up to be promising though, since I know the title, and it had some set up in previous chapters as well as all the promotion for the game.
I will say that the game does a good job of keeping you on your toes with new enemy types. It constantly switches up to something new, so you never really get too used to the enemies you encounter. It does seem to improve with every chapter too. Chapters 1-2 were alright, chapter 3 I enjoyed, and it only gets better as you go on.
As far as fear goes, it hasn't had me up to Silent Hill levels yet. There are a few moments here and there that had me wide-eyed, but this game seems to replicate the tense stressfulness of RE4, and variety/weirdness of RE1 more than the fear factor of SH. It does do atmosphere well though, I'll give it that. I like the level design, and it will make you go WTF more than a few times.
Kind of a long answer to a question, but in short, yes it picks up.