The Outlast Trials Review

It’s been more than ten years since the first Outlast game released on PC, followed by that of consoles a bit later.

That original game played as a first-person horror adventure that took away your combat abilities and put you in a scary ex-hospital as a journalist armed with just a camera, making the most of night vision and light. It was one of those games that was very well received by critics and audiences alike. In fact, it became a fan favourite for the streaming market where people would scream through a whole live stream. 

Now we have The Outlast Trials, a mostly multiplayer experience that you can still play on your own. Will we still be screaming?

The series story is set in 1950’s America, in Cold War times. The opening cut scenes set up the premise whereby homeless, down-on-their-luck folk in run-down cities find leaflets offering work in a science experiment. The thing is, that experiment is awful and people who know the Outlast franchise won’t be surprised at the horror from the beginning. Each person or applicant has night vision googles painfully grafted onto their head, before being thrown into trial arenas to complete tasks, all while being stalked by all sorts of evil. 

After the tutorial, which shows you all the gameplay and gives a twisted story of a family unit, we are introduced to a terrifying character, puppet in hand, happily killing. It’s there when we’re thrown into the main game. And what a main game; brilliantly created by the developers who have crafted horrific worlds of torture, a decaying society that is thoroughly warped. The Outlast Trials doesn’t disappoint and whilst it may not be as satisfying story-wise as other single-player experiences, it does a great job of creating a world visually and atmospherically. 

After the tutorial, you are placed in a central hub, with your own room and a waiting area in a hospital. In your own room, you can customise as you progress, whilst in the waiting area you’ll find other unfortunates, hanging around the online world, waiting for the next trial. As you wait you can buy upgrades or buffs for the trials, partaking in a mini-game of arm wrestling or chess. 

You can pick a trial from the ones on offer, as you and three other friends or strangers in your party go and try to complete it. In the trial, you have a different overall objective, but what that means is that you will be completing a whole load of mini objectives in order to tick off your main goal. It’s a long trial without any aggro, but aggro you will get in terms of a human monster hunting you down and someone spraying you with halogenic drugs to make things worse. There isn’t any combat, apart from pushing the enemy away or throwing a brick at them to distract, but there are a ton of puzzle elements, crouching and hiding in lockers. 

You can play The Outlast Trials in single player, but playing with friends or strangers is where the game will come alive. In single player, I was forever crouching, slowly exploring the world before running and hiding, repeating until bored. In multiplayer, things are much more chaotic with players needing reviving, monsters causing chaos, and trying to work together to solve puzzles and objectives. This is where the longevity of the game lies, I feel. 

In terms of the visual aspect, there are some brilliant lighting effects going on in The Outlast Trials, especially going from the normal state to the night vision goggles; something which the Outlast games do so well. But it’s the design of everything, from the rooms where the trials are set to the Saw film vibes that excite. The monsters and deranged humans are an amazing piece of horror, a terror that will put a chill into your bones.

And further, the soundtrack is menacing, frightening and complete with a terribly horrific, yet well-performed, voice over to match. 

You may miss the straightforward single-player experience of previous Outlast games, but in The Outlast Trials the cooperative multiplayer experience feels original and well thought out. Fun to play with friends, it can be as scary as hell, but should things all get too much, at least you can take a break and play some chess through those night vision goggles that are screwed into your head.