The Evil Within - The Consequence Review : Waking Nightmare

The Consequence is the second of the three-part DLC for The Evil Within, and it completes the behind-the-scenes tale of Juli Kidman from the original The Evil Within campaign. This second instalment attempts to build upon The Assignment with a greater emphasis on big cinematic set-pieces but struggles to keep the same level of flow and consistency. With the story to be concluded it has the crucial role of creating a satisfying ending to this interesting tale.

As The Assignment did a great job of introducing and developing the character of Ruvik after a very climactic ending, the sense of mystery is very much gone. At times it feels like the game is just forcing through the tiny necessary details to satisfactorily conclude the plot. Regardless, the gameplay still provides some exciting new battles with some very gripping conclusions.

The Evil Within - The Consequence continues directly on from the previous DLC, so as you’ve probably worked out, jumping into this requires you have played through the first DLC in order to make any sense of what’s going on. Returning players are able to import your previous save file to keep achievement progression across all the DLC packages.

Onto the expansion itself, and the level design still keeps you in a tight environment, but this time it's brought guns back into the equation. Juli isn’t so helpless anymore, which makes for some satisfying retribution on the creatures that follow her. Due to the nature of the plot, where being in a “dream world” means that you can instantly teleport to places, it makes for a disjointed but fun experience - The Evil Within personified, in truth.

The game also does an interesting job of introducing you to new mechanics, which are just as quickly taken away. The first level you play through the game provides you with new glow sticks to throw around and navigate a passage through a dark lab. This seemed like a great way to mix up the mechanics and it's enjoyable trawling through the environment and illuminating potential routes. The other side to this coin is that you don’t ever see the glow sticks again past the first level.

In fact, just after the glow stick scene you are then whisked away to a rooftop run as the city is crumbling beneath you. You are then told you can push mutant creatures off the edge as you sneak through this section, but Tango Gameworks provide just two opportunities to do this. Subsequently, the game gives you a gun and weapons to shoot yourself through the next section. It harks back heavily to the likes of Metal Gear Solid 4, but rather than giving you different options for how to approach each environment, The Consequence forces you to use specific mechanics at specific times

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It’s fair to say you'll be jumping around playstyles and mechanics at breakneck pace throughout this DLC, but that doesn’t diminish from the enjoyment. Specific fights such as the boss levels do what The Evil Within does best, forcing you to move quickly and work out your strategy. One wrong move means watching your insides get blown out from inside of you.

With the huge variety in gameplay, what was crucial to this instalment was keeping the narrative that tied everything together moving along at a pace that keeps the action contextual. With most of the characters already being revealed and motivations explained the story finds it difficult to create any additional sense of mystery. In fact it's more of a no-holds-barred blowout to kill all of the necessary people.

The action packed final shotgun rampage finally sees Juli get some revenge on the creatures that have been tormenting her throughout the campaign and the ending is one that provides a satisfying ending to a story, even if the the ending was visible a mile off.

The game took me just over two and a half hours to complete which brings a running total of five and a half hours to complete the game. If you're still after more when the credits roll, when you finish the game you're offered a “New Game” mode, which steps up the difficulty by turning off all the lights and forcing you to use your flashlight to see what’s going on. 

In conclusion this game is more of the same and a tiny bit more. It wouldn’t be fair to assess The Consequence on it’s individual elements because it’s not meant to enjoyed without having played through the first half. Ultimately it's a pedal-to-the-metal conclusion which wraps up the loose ends, but survival horror fans may be left wanting by its action-lite stylings.