Pathologic 2

Gameplay has been massively improved from the original Pathologic game. Combat feels much more evenly matched, while still managing to inherit Classic's difficulty. The infection mechanic actually makes sense now, and infected districts too have been improved. In this game you have a thirst bar, which means you must be careful how much water you're willing to trade for bandages, whereas in the original this was an easy source of healing items without caveat. It's also now much easier to know what you're supposed to do and where, however the game lost a lot with the removal of the letters system. Best of all, you can even run now! However, the game itself is optimized quite terribly, and doesn't run very very even on very good computers. The story and writing are also both major downgrades from Classic. Dialogue is much shallower, and whenever characters engage in their philosophical musings it just sounds like vague posturing made by a person trying to sound smart. The game also makes everything be about the Haruspex, characters don't seem to have their own internal motivations and only exist in relation to him. The prospect of the other character routes is dangled over the player's head at the expense of actually telling the Haruspex's story, and the game suffers as a result. This also somehow manages to be ten times more racist than the game (originally) released in 2005, which wasn't even that great in the first place. The portrayal of the Kin is godawful.

Although I never completed the first game, due to the great difficulty of the "survival" aspect, the universe, the characters and the music captivated me. In short, I had to play this re-imagined version and, hop!, I pre-ordered Pathologic 2. So what do we have with this remake? The same damn problems we had with Pathologic 1! *sighs*

 The plusses:
 - The universe is still as bewitching as ever.
 - Its excellent story, full of mystery.
 - The characters, always mysterious and endearing.
 
The neutral:
 - The dialogues are always abstract/imaginative and in English, but they are much easier to understand than those of the first Pathologic.
 - The graphics are classy, compared to those of the first game, but it's not "Wow! It's so beautiful! "either.
 - Pathologic 1 has the three main characters (Daniil, Artemy and Clara) and their scenarios. Pathologic 2 has only Artemy Burakh.

 The minus:
 - Moving around the city, although faster than in Pathologic 1, is still slow.
 - Survival. The f*cking survival. Especially the hunger bar. Damn hunger, you got Artemy by the ass! Seriously, he's never satisfied. Your worst enemy of the game, it's not the time limit (the 12 days), it's not the Sand Plague disease, oh nope, it's HUNGER!
 - Fighting. Still as rotten (terrible system) as ever.
 - Death and its "punishments". Every time Artemy dies, he gets a penalty at one of his stats. Ok, I get the concept that death is inevitable, that the world of Pathologic is dark and "artistic", but with the insurmountable survival, what's the point?
 - Did I ever tell you about survival? Yes. Because of it, you're going to spend all your time trying to keep Artemy alive instead of... I don't know... exploring the city, discovering its mysteries, getting to know the characters, and fighting the f*cking disease, the Sand Plague, as it's his duty as a healer!
 - Limited saves. You can only save to certain locations.
- To sum up: Slow moves (walking slow) + rotten (terrible) fighting system + survival (especially hunger) insurmountable + punitive death + limited saves = disaster!
 - Speaking of disaster, the game optimization. It crashes and lag on many PCs. On mine, I often get lag "jumps" (the image freezes and unfreezes). Very annoying.

In conclusion, I was more frustrated by this game than anything else. I have nothing against hardcore games, but here I don't recommend it.

This review is coming from someone playing on a PS4, I doubt the criticism I have is entirely applicable to PC players, so take this as you will. To start off positively, I love its dreadful atmosphere and how it effects my approach to playing it. The world building is great and I want to figure out what's going on. I can feel it getting under my skin and the anxiety it gives me is the type of unease I seek out in horror. The thing that frustrates me is how buggy it is. Textures and objects will take a moment to load in, but at least there's some appeal to that. I was walking down a road and saw two kids ahead. As I got closer, a barricade abruptly loaded in and that made me jump. It made me question if it was truly a glitch at all, so that gets a pass. What I don't like is the amount of waiting involved for the game to catch up with you. I started playing it today and it already corrupted a save file after crashing twice. The amount of loading is unbearable, I'll walk 10 paces after one loading screen just to be hit with another, every time I open a door to get inside a building, ANOTHER loading screen. I've heard so much praise for this game and I've been excited to give it a shot, but I'm a little disappointed. I'm glad I got it on sale, but it still feels a little overpriced with the state it's in. I don't mind if a game's mechanics are frustrating or a slow pace, but when there's immersion breaking bugs to this degree, it really tests my patience. I hope it can be patched in updates because I want to be able to fully experience it, but I don't know if some of these issues can be fixed. I will try to press on, but I'm not sure how much longer I'll be able to. 

UPDATE: I've pushed through a bit more and came to a conclusion that the buginess and unfinished translation is a part of the unbearable nature that the developers were trying to achieve. It's simultaneously great and shitty game design. It's immersion breaking, sure, but that disconnect really made me think of the game from a different perspective. I think the developers found a way to fit their shortcomings to suit the game's narrative, the lack of polish goes along with the themes. Frustration was intended. I still haven't finished, but I'm thinking about how I want to, among so much more. As a work of art, this game is phenomenal, so I've changed my rating from meh to exceptional. I don't think I would recommend this to just anybody, so that's why I wouldn't grade it as so. At the very least, some of the graphical issues could be fixed. Can't believe I'm gonna say this but the aggravating loading screens are fine. Though if they were to get fixed, either there needs to be less or they need to be shorter, time and health also shouldn't be affected.