I Hate This Place Review – A Unique Survival Horror Game

I Hate this place is an isometric survival horror game with crafting and base building that pits you against twisted monsters and where you will question your sanity. Track down your friend and uncover the mysteries of the game’s world in a unique blend of Stranger Things meets Darkwood with a sprinkling of David Lynch’s otherworldly vibes. There’s a lot to love about I Hate This Place if you’re a certain type of horror fan, but the game isn’t for everyone, so let’s dive deeper. 

Story and setting

*I Hate This Place* is inspired by Skybound’s Eisner Award-nominated comic book series created by writer Kyle Starks and artist Artyom Topilin.

Elena and her friend Lou are heading to a cabin in the woods that belongs to Elena’s family, but things quickly start going wrong when Lou disappears while camping on the way to the family ranch.

There’s a mysterious cult that worships the Horned Man, a deity that roams the forest, as well as military bunkers where scientists have been creating all kinds of Monsters that have inevitably escaped into the woods. 

Elena’s mother is also missing, and it turns out that the family ranch is haunted. So, your aim in the course of the game is to find your friend Lou, find out what happened to your missing mother, explore the eccentric and dreamlike world you find yourself in, meet new people and complete the side quests they give you, and of course survive.

I Hate This Place is traditional 80s sci-fi mashed up into a unique proposition. It’s part Stranger Things and part Darkwood but with Lynchian twists and turns that will have you questioning whether what you’re experiencing is actually real. 

For the most part, the story and setting keep you engaged. There’s a very otherworldly feel as you traipse around the game world, and how the enigmatic cult is tied into the strange lab experiments that roam the world will keep you guessing until the end.

I Hate This Place’s story does let itself down at the beginning, however, with pacing that is a little too quick. Elena and her friend begin the game already in the woods and before you know it crazy events are already happening, leading to you feeling a little lost as things progress very quickly until you get to the ranch and get your bearings. This doesn’t ruin the game, but it does make you question whether this was a deliberate decision to make the game feel more Twin Peaksy. Either way, A little more backstory before things blow up would allow the player to become more acquainted with Lou before you spend the rest of the game finding out what happened to her. 

Gameplay

I Hate This Place is unique in the way it blends traditional survival horror with crafting and an open world. 

The main quest is to find Lou and discover what happened to your mother, but what you’ll soon realise is that all of the so called “side quests” that you come across are actually intertwined with the main quest, and they will provide answers that help drive the main narrative. For example, helping one cultist find her brothers ends up leading you to a piece of information that’s crucial for you to progress in finding out what’s going on. 

The game takes place on a decent-sized open world map, and once you’ve completed the intro part and reached your family’s ranch, you can explore any direction at any time – it’s all completely up to you and how you want to tackle the game. 

Speaking of the family ranch, this serves as your home base and hub. You can craft new buildings and objects like water pumps, greenhouses, and work benches to give you resources and allow you to craft and upgrade items. This all happens in real time too, so you’ll be waiting 6 real minutes for your greenhouse to produce vegetables or water to collect in a bucket. There are tons of blueprints you can find around the game world to craft new buildings, and you can position them however you want on the ranch. You also upgrade your weapons by finding blueprints and refining these resources too. This is an absolutely genius move, because it helps with the survival horror aspect of the game not become too overwhelming. 

Example: Game like traditional resident evil ammo sparse and you can back yourself into a corner that is really difficult to get out of. In I hate this place, you can stockpile ammo and healing items so that if things get too difficult – and they will – you can overcome them without frustration. It adds an extra survival layer on top of the horror that allows you to plan your excursions, and it’s one of my favourite parts of the game. Because while the crafting is there, it’s also not overly relied upon. Essentially, you can find what you need around the world and the base building can give you the extra help you need when you run into monsters that require a specific ammo-type to kill. 

Full day-night cycle, some characters or monsters only appear at certain times. Fast travel points with boats along a river. 

You’ll fight all kinds of creatures and humans, each with specific weakness: it could be fire, electricity, or just two barrels of a shotgun. Choose how to play this game,example: there are blind enemies that you can sneak past, or you can craft like a madman and shoot your way past them. Either way, the atmosphere is tense, and the creatures can take you out in a couple of swings, so the tension is real. 

You can only save at specific save spots, which are television in the world. It is a survival horror after all, and that really ramps up the tension. Luckily, these are all well placed and I never got annoyed at dying and having to retry from too far back. Some of the more complex facilities you’ll visit even have metroid-like shortcuts that unlock and loop back around to save points. 

So, with all of this in mind, the general gameplay loop is to craft, head out on a quest, and find answers that intertwine with other quests and eventually loop back around to the central mystery. And this all takes place in a tight 8-14 hours. 

How long it will take you to complete I Hate This Place will depend on how much time you spend exploring and pursuing side content, but the game doesn’t overstay its welcome and I found the pacing generally good all around. In true survival horror style,  the game doesn’t hold your hand or explain mechanics to you. This can lead to some instances of running around and experimenting until things finally click, but it’s never too much and there are generally clues as to how to solve particular puzzles. For instance, you just found a taser and there are some electrical boxes that need to be turned on but you can’t get to them – HMMMMM. 

Graphics and controls

Beautiful comic book style. You’ll see words like “thud” appear as you run around, and its somewhat muted but vibrant 1980s palette really brings this game to life. If that sounds like a contradiction, just look at some 80s comic book settings, like Paper Girls to see what I mean. Regardless, there’s nothing bad to say about I Hate This Place’s graphics, and they really suit the type of game it is. You play the game from an isometric, 2.5d camera angle, and it really brings back those old-school vibes without the problems that, say, Resident Evil had with fixed camera angles and tank controls. 

I Hate This Place works well with both mouse and keyboard and a controller, and the controls are simple but slick. I never felt like they didn’t respond, and inventory management on controller has shortcuts to quickly pick up or quickly stash all of your crafting materials so you don’t need to mess around with clunk controls. 

Audio

Audio and music is fantastic. Tense 80s synth background music ramps up combat and sneaking, and you’ll find yourself on the edge of your seat. The whole audio gives Stranger Things vibes, but in a good way. It’s original. 

Voice acting is one place where I hate this place falls down a tad. It’s a mixed bag, with some voice actors sounding fine and others being a little rough around the edges. It’s not bad but it’s not top-tier either, but it fits with the game and it’s more AA nature. This is not a full priced game by a AAA developer with a huge budget, so you shouldn’t expect it to be. However, it is serviceable and good enough considering how the rest of the game punches above its weight.

Final Verdict: Is it worth your time and money, and who is this game for?

I Hate This Place is a fantastic game that fans of survival horror who yearn for a more traditional gameplay style but without all of the annoying mechanics that come with it will really enjoy. The story is interesting for the most part but moves too quickly at the beginning to really allow players to get to grips with the world before crazy events start coming thick and fast. 

However, gameplay is where I Hate This Place truly shines. It blends traditional survival horror with crafting and a tension-laden open world. It has somewhat difficult combat and all of the puzzles you’d want from a game of this genre, and combined with the base building and crafting, pushes the idea of what a survival horror game should be forward. 

It’s voice acting can be rough around the edges, and there is an air of AA as opposed to a mainstream game with a huge budget, but I Hate This Place shows why this can be a very good thing these days, because I doubt a AAA mainstream company would take the risks with crafting and base building that Rock Square Thunder has. 

But who is this game for, and should you be now, wait for a sale, or skip entirely?

I Hate This Place retails at full price for $30, and if you’re a survival horror fan who has been disappointed with the lack of good survival horror games lately, then I can recommend picking this up at full price, as long as you’re prepared for some aspects of the game to be more budget because, hey, this isn’t a $70 game. If you’re on the fence after reading this review, then stick it on your Wishlist and wait for a sale. I only recommend skipping I Hate This Place entirely, however, if you think that traditional survival horror gameplay isn’t for you, because this game does rely on brains as well as just brawn.