First, talk to the elephant in your room. As a series, Hello Neighbor has yet to keep up as a critical beloved. The first two releases of the Peterson-centric puzzle/horror/adventure/platformer/escaping room franchise are undoubtedly loved by a group of passionate fans, but The game has not yet invaded the true industry acclaim.
Previous review scores aside, I’m still the first to tell you that Hello Neighbor is really under the surface than you would expect to get into it. No, this is really not just a game about hiding from a crazy, murderous neighbor.
The game has appeared quite a bit and also focuses on surprising topics such as childhood trauma, loss, and regret The on-screen actions are slow, creepy and more distorted throughout..
Because of all this, I’d like to know what future Hello Neighbor3 can do to make use of the topics that eventually had in some circles. This time, it seems that if this latest title can package all the positive positives of the series into something fresh and interesting, then IP can ultimately make a big mark.
I recently started demoing a second prototype build of Hello Neighbor 3 to see what the team is doing. This prototype was still a very in-progress work, but you can definitely see the direction HN3 wants to go.
Stuck in the forest
The prototype build completely drops a new portrayal of what Raven Brooks looks like this time around. I know that the final build isn’t like that actually It looks like a game I’ve experienced, but the somewhat unfinished vibe really brings back to playing Slenderman from the time for the first time.
I think it’s appropriate Hello Neighbor 3 is shaped to be a more survival horror type game than any of the previous two games I deliberately try to experiment. Armed with a flashlight and binoculars, my only instruction was to have no belongings so strangely I was about to call the bus to leave town.
Surrounded by trees, I followed the path to town and saw where I was placed. There are several devastated homes in the area and I was able to explore them and find items that could be used to destroy, repair and reach new areas on the building and roof, such as clovers, drivers, plungers, ladders and more.
Other buildings on the outskirts of town also had items that I could collect and add to stock, like abandoned gas stations. There was none Ton I was able to do these things with the current build of this game, Learning all the arrangements was still interesting So I knew where to pick them up on the next run attempt just in case.
what I did it The DO used weapons like the Crowbar against locked doors, windows and security cameras mounted on the mower to access new rooms in the home and to free themselves from danger.
The building’s security system will lock the facility in case it gets caught in a camera. This results in locking doors, windows being prohibited, and stairs rising. This allowed me to be creative on my escape routes, and I was able to find secret passages under my bed or in the cabinets, and I was free to cra.
Hello Neighbor 3 is cool All of the objectives and puzzles have multiple ways to solve themallowing players to become creative about how they tackle all the problems they face in the game.
It seems like a more freer direction towards game development. More player agency for solutions rather than specific choices And actions to make progress.
The prototype ultimately had multiple ways to get mobile phone services and call the bus to leave town. One example was to find lightning bolts, power the Ferris wheel, and then ride on top to make a call at this higher elevation. We had to eat a cake to get to the theme park where Ferris Wheel was.
This is cool and it means The final version of the game also includes several solutions that require creative critical thinking He escapes from danger and returns to a safe place far from anything more than Mr. Peterson. It was definitely fun to learn how to solve puzzles using a few different items in stock and reach safely when needed.
Peterson is not yet… yet
Without Mr. Peterson it’s not a hello neighbor, but I still couldn’t meet him with this prototype. But that doesn’t mean Raven Brooks was completely empty. My first encounter was the figure of a humanoid with street signs on the face that charged me straight at me. It’s not the welcoming party I’d like to have.
All the gear I collected before this strange encounter was missing, but getting caught by him simply caused a respawn. I tried to attack him with Clover but couldn’t do any damage to him. I’m not sure if Combat will one day become a feature in the full version of Hello Neighbor 3but it seemed like the game sometimes hinted at it at this moment.
I also learned that if I go too far into the woods from the beaten path, I will simply be attacked by a creature wearing a traffic cone called “Forest Dweller.” Was there a human head under that cone? There’s no real way to know, but it definitely gave off the vibe This may be another strange depiction of distorted reality, as we saw in previous games.
Meeting a forest inhabitant, unlike other enemies’ encounters, ends my run completely. This put the forest exploration a great risk as the forest inhabitants jumped out of nowhere and seemed to capture me as soon as I left the trail.
It was fun to know that this creature seemed to be on an exact timer before capturing me. I was grateful that there was a thoughtful workaround to this issue and felt wise when I realized this.
Apart from these hostile creatures, there were also two human characters around the town. One was a popular woman with blue hair, and the other was a man who was in a car and crashed it, attacked in the forest by forest residents and never seen again.
These NPCs almost follow the set route, follow them and observe their routines. I think this will be a feature that will be seen in the final game as well. According to the game’s Steam page, The town’s residents “act based on their character and circumstances,” It implies to me that the actions we take in Hello Neighbor 3 can affect the outcome of the game’s loop. This assumes that this is a more execution-based experience than the franchise’s previous installments.
Each NPC I encountered was on a metre above my head, specifying whether they were enemies, strangers, neutrals, or friends. These classifications appear to take into account the stealth necessary to interact/avoid them. As you can imagine, the enemy attacks me completely, while strangers give me my space in the open world, but if I break through the window or disable the security system, I will drive me out of the house. Honestly, that’s a reasonable response.
I need more
What I find particularly interesting about the latest entry into the franchise is that it appears to have a more sandbox-like design than its previous title. Certainly, the original Hello neighbors were quite limited in scope in terms of their actual presence within Mr. Peterson’s home, as vast and eccentric as they would eventually exist.
Hello Neighbor 2 expanded the game into a collection of locations around Raven Brooks, with Quentin, the main character of the investigation, spending much of his time at the town’s museum. It was a cool idea to expand the range of the series like this, but by the end of the day it was still quite silent.
So it’s cool that Hello Neighbor 3 appears to be open to the game. There you can roam freely around much larger areas. If the game is a run-based experience that you can really learn and adapt to in new endeavors, then I think that will also lead to an interesting experience.
I think this game is also intriguing to explore more of the themes of survival horror. As developers continue to build HN3, you will see how deep everything will become. The series was always about collecting random items and using them to solve some environmental puzzles and unlocking new paths, but that aspect seems likely to be pushed further in 3.
And of course, it’s fun to see how Mr. Peterson, the glorious mustache and others presented themselves in this latest entry in the franchise. He doesn’t appear in this second prototype at all and wants to know how he works on the story. And the overall scope of this game.
If you’re interested in keeping up with upcoming information about Hello Neighbor 3, Devs has done a great job posting regular and thoughtful updates to the game’s Steam page. You can also want a title or get to know the first thing you want to know about future updates.
