Published by Digerati Distribution
Developed by Devespresso Games
Reviewed on PlayStation 4 (also available on Xbox One and PC)
The Coma: Recut is a remastered version of the Korean survival horror game classic, The Coma: Cutting Class. Not much has been changed from the original only that it is now on consoles with minor tweaks to make the change to console a little easier. I’ve not played the original on PC, but I found it was quite easy to pick up and play seamlessly on the PS4. The Coma: Recut felt like I was playing through a manga complete with pop up bubbles for text dialogue and even in the art design for the characters. I loved the images for each character and how they come to life throughout the story.
The Coma: Recut starts you off as a high school student, Youngho, who has been up all night studying for finals. He makes it to class late, only to find that a student has committed suicide. After meeting a girl on the way to school and listening to kids gossip about what happened you make it to class. Youngho’s teacher Ms. Song is waiting to talk to you; you later find out Youngho has a huge crush on Ms. Song. After some words of encouragement and a date set after class to talk to Ms. Song, you go to seat to start your exams. Yungho stares at his exam and is all of sudden taken into a deep sleep as he blames himself for staying up all night.
This is where The Coma: Recut starts as you wake up in an empty, dark school. As you take control of Youngho in side scroller like fashion you can search backpacks and desks for items and notes. Finding them all can help fill in the backstory. This is also where Ms. Song has now become the psycho killer with a knife who will continue to chase you now throughout the entirety of the game. As you take control of Youngho, you can use closets and bathroom stalls to hide and avoid the murderous Ms. Song. The player from here can go at this stealth mode and just either hide every time or dodge her attacks and make a run for it.
The mechanics of The Coma: Recut are pretty easy and simple to learn. You will find coins that you can use to buy items from vending machines or discover items in places you search. Each item will do different things such as heal you, give you everlasting stamina for awhile, cure you of poison, or stop you from bleeding. The enemies in The Coma: Recut are quite cool, diverse, and are well placed in areas to make you stop to check your surroundings in every new area. I found myself just casually walking into a new room and then SWIPE! I got scratched by a dead girl hiding under the bed.
The sound design is most terrifying in a good way. It’s complimented by a soundtrack created by Hyunho Kim. Each time I walked down the high school hallway, heard a blood curling shriek, and saw Ms. Song chasing me, my heart would start pounding. The music gets super intense as you run like hell to find some place to hide. The atmosphere and ambiance are the most prevalent in each room when there’s either a death trap or some kind of new horror awaiting you. My only gripe with The Coma: Recut is that it’s too short and seems rushed at the end. Nonetheless, it was a very fun story and had a couple good scares.
