Developer: Woodland Games
Publisher: Team17
Platform: PC
Tested on: PC
Autopsy Simulator – Review
Autopsy Simulator is a pretty straightforward title for a game, so when you buy it, you probably think you know exactly what you’re getting into. This might not be entirely true, though. This creation by Woodland Games describes itself as a horror-sim hybrid. Since morgues are pretty scary, that makes sense. But don’t think you’re going to get a first-person horror experience like some other horror games disguised as fake simulators have done in the past, this really will be a scientifically accurate autopsy game too. Be sure to put on those gloves before you start!
Story
The story revolves around a young man named Jack. After the tragic death of his wife, Jack struggles with depression and paranoia. It probably doesn’t help that Jack is a forensic pathologist, meaning he performs autopsies on corpses when the cause of death is suspicious or unclear. His work hours happen at night, when the morgue is almost completely empty and Jack is alone with his thoughts (and a horribly disfigured dead body). While how Jack’s wife died is a mystery at the start of the game, slowly strange things start happening around Jack and we uncover a grim tale with predictable but fun twists. The game keeps you guessing whether the explanation is supernatural or mundane. There was nothing groundbreaking here for the genre but it was interesting enough to keep us playing. Every corpse you examine also has a unique story behind it that you get to reveal through science, which is a fun addition.
The story is mainly told through dialogue and cutscenes. However, you can discover a lot of additional information and background lore by exploring your surroundings and finding various documents and newspapers.
Graphics
Autopsy Simulator does look amazing, though you need to have some tolerance for gore if you want to play this game. The developers worked together with real-life professionals to give the corpses and the autopsy segments as much realism as possible. In other words: things get gross. The graphics are stunning and run smoothly though. While you only really get to explore two places – the morgue itself and Jack’s apartment – both of them are pretty sizable and loaded with nice details in their designs. We also appreciate the creepy lighting of the entire game.
Sound
To further drive home that spine-chilling atmosphere, you have a tense soundtrack that knows how to not overstay its welcome. The music is always rather subtle, and we personally were grateful there weren’t any ridiculous jumpscare noises. This choice might also have been made because the game does have constant voice acting. Every line of dialogue is voiced, and while the voice acting is fine, it gets kind of annoying how Jack keeps talking to himself without pause. It even gets bad enough that it’s easy for the player to accidentally make Jack interrupt himself because moving too quickly makes him go into his next voice line. This had a negative effect on the game’s pacing, especially since some story beats are tied to the dialogue.
Gameplay
As mentioned above, Autopsy Simulator is a horror-sim hybrid, though the emphasis is definitely on the simulator part. Though the game does have a very creepy and tense atmosphere which we appreciated, there are not many real frights. If you want an actual horror game, this isn’t for you. It feels more like a walking simulator with a dark edge and maybe a jumpscare once or twice. The majority of the time, you’ll just be running through the basic checklists of doing autopsies on the corpses you were delivered. The actions you need to perform are very easy, and you’ll be doing stuff like taking pictures from different angles and moving a UV light over the body parts to examine them.
The game makes things incredibly easy by basically constantly telling you what to do, with every action being explained in minute detail. Even for actions you’ll be repeating a lot, the game gives you a mini-tutorial each time. This, combined with the fact that you do need to backtrack through the morgue a lot, makes the game feel even more like a walking simulator. Sometimes, you’ll have a quick-time event to break the monotony. This is not necessarily a bad thing, depending on the player. Maybe you enjoy tense walking simulators with a focus on narration, but it just means you need to know what you’re in for. The game spans a meager five hours of gameplay, so it’s not super long either. And there’s not a lot of replayability.
Conclusion
Autopsy Simulator is a bit underwhelming. It doesn’t deliver on being a horror game, since it’s not very scary and the frightening bits are few and far between. It sadly never blossoms into a proper simulation title either since it’s rather short and every action feels over-explained. The corpses are cool, we just expected a lot more of this title after being in development for this long.
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