Outlast is a 2013 first-person survival horror video game created and published by Red Barrels, a Canadian independent game studio. The story follows Miles Upshur, an independent reporter who investigates Mount Massive Asylum, a remote psychiatric hospital located in the mountains of Lake County, Colorado, United States.
The game was released for Microsoft Windows on September 4, 2013, for PlayStation 4 on February 4, 2014, and for Xbox One on June 19, 2014. Versions for Linux and OS X were released on March 31, 2015, and a Nintendo Switch version was released on February 27, 2018. Critics praised the game for its atmosphere, horror elements, and gameplay. As of October 2024, the game has 37 million players.
A sequel, Outlast 2, was released on April 25, 2017, and a prequel, The Outlast Trials, was released on March 5, 2024. A comic book series called The Murkoff Account, set between Outlast and Outlast 2, was published from July 2016 to November 2017. A second comic series, The Murkoff Collections, was released in October 2024. A film adaptation of the game is also being developed.
Gameplay
In the video game Outlast, the player controls a freelance reporter named Miles Upshur as he explores Mount Massive Asylum, an old and run-down mental hospital in the mountains of Lake County, Colorado, United States. The hospital is filled with violent patients. The game is played from the player's point of view, and it includes stealth actions such as hiding, sneaking, and moving quietly. The player can walk, run, crouch, jump, climb ladders, and vault over objects. Unlike many games, the player does not have a visible health indicator and cannot attack enemies. To survive, the player must hide in lockers, stay in the shadows, or avoid being seen. If the player is caught, they can try to run away. If the player dies, the game restarts from the last saved point.
Most areas of the hospital are dark, and the only way to see is through a camera with night vision. Using the night vision uses up batteries, and there are only a few available. Players must search the hospital for more batteries. The game uses sudden scary moments and sounds to warn the player if an enemy spots them. If the player records events with the camera, Miles leaves notes explaining his thoughts. Players can find documents that provide background information about the hospital, such as pages from patient diaries and staff reports.
The game’s creators, Red Barrels, said that Amnesia: The Dark Descent (2010), a game focused on surviving scary situations, influenced Outlast’s story without fighting. Movies like Quarantine (2008) and Rec (2007), which use footage that looks like real events, also inspired the game.
Plot
A freelance reporter named Miles Upshur receives an anonymous email about cruel experiments at Mount Massive Asylum, a remote psychiatric hospital owned by the unethical Murkoff Corporation. When he enters, he finds the hospital in chaos, with staff members' bodies badly injured. A dying officer from Murkoff's private military unit tells Miles that the hospital's disturbed patients, called "variants," have escaped and are wandering the grounds. The officer urges Miles to leave and explains that the main entrance can be unlocked from the hospital's security control room.
As Miles moves through the hospital, he is suddenly attacked by Chris Walker, a large variant who knocks him unconscious. While unconscious, Miles meets Father Martin Archimbaud, a man who claims to be a priest but has a mental disorder. Father Martin says Miles is his "apostle" and stops him from escaping by cutting off power to the entrance. Miles restores power in the control room, but Father Martin gives him an anesthetic. He also shows Miles video of the "Walrider," a ghost-like creature that kills people, which he claims caused the hospital to fall into disrepair.
After waking up, Miles finds himself trapped in a broken section of the hospital filled with patients who are either unresponsive or mentally disturbed. He escapes through the sewers to the main part of the hospital, but is caught by Richard Trager, a former Murkoff executive who has gone mad. Trager cuts off two of Miles' fingers and prepares to harm him further. However, Miles escapes to an elevator and accidentally crushes Trager to death when he attacks him. Miles then meets Father Martin again, who tells him to go to the hospital's chapel.
Miles reaches an auditorium and learns that the Walrider was created by Rudolf Wernicke, a German scientist brought to the United States during Operation Paperclip. Wernicke believed that using intense dream therapy on patients could connect tiny machines called nanites into a single harmful being. Miles also learns that the experiments were part of the MKUltra program. In the chapel, Miles finds Father Martin crucified, who gives him a key to an elevator that he claims will lead to freedom. Father Martin then sets himself on fire. Miles takes the elevator, which takes him to a hidden laboratory below the hospital.
Walker attacks Miles but is killed by the Walrider. Miles meets an older Wernicke, who says the Walrider is controlled by Billy Hope, a patient in a coma. Wernicke tells Miles to stop Billy's life support, hoping this will destroy the Walrider. Miles does this, but just before Billy dies, the Walrider attacks and takes control of Miles' body. As Miles leaves the laboratory, he is shot by Murkoff's military unit led by Wernicke.
While Wernicke realizes Miles has become the Walrider's new host, the screen goes black as screams, gunfire, and sounds of violence are heard.
An expansion called Outlast: Whistleblower was released for Microsoft Windows and PlayStation 4 on May 6, 2014, and for Xbox One on June 18, 2014. Versions for Linux and OS X were released on March 31, 2015. This story happens before and after the original game and follows Waylon Park, the person who sent the anonymous email to Miles.
Waylon Park is a software engineer at Mount Massive Asylum, where he works on the "Morphogenic Engine," a system that lets Murkoff scientists control the dreams of comatose patients. After seeing the system's harmful effects on patients, Waylon sends an anonymous email to Miles to expose Murkoff's cruel experiments. Soon after, Waylon is taken to the laboratory's control room to fix a monitoring system.
When Waylon returns to his office, his boss, Jeremy Blaire, has him restrained and exposed to the engine after finding his email. However, Waylon escapes when the Walrider is released. He moves through the increasingly broken hospital as guards and medical staff flee from the escaped variants, searching for a shortwave radio to call for help. He avoids a cannibal variant named Frank Manera, who uses an electric bone saw.
Waylon finds a working radio but is stopped by Blaire, who destroys it and tries to suffocate him. Blaire is forced to flee by Chris Walker. Waylon enters the hospital's vocational block, where he is captured by Eddie Gluskin, a killer who harms patients to find his "perfect bride." Gluskin tries to hang Waylon in the gymnasium with his other victims, but Gluskin gets tangled in a pulley system and is killed by a loose piece of metal.
As dawn breaks, Murkoff's military unit arrives to eliminate the variants. Waylon escapes them and finds Blaire, who is badly injured. Blaire stabs Waylon and tells him not to reveal the truth before the Walrider kills him. Waylon leaves the hospital and finds Miles' jeep near the entrance. He drives away as Miles, now controlled by the Walrider, exits the hospital.
In the end, Waylon sits at a computer, ready to upload his camcorder footage to expose the hospital's experiments. An associate tells him the footage will damage Murkoff's reputation but warns that Murkoff will retaliate against him and his family. After hesitating, Waylon uploads the footage.
Development and release
Outlast was the first game created by Red Barrels. The team that made the game was part of Ubisoft and had worked on major games like Prince of Persia, Assassin's Creed, and Splinter Cell. The game took 14 months to make with a team of 10 people. In 2018, Red Barrels' CEO, Philippe Morin, said that the team had trouble finding investors for 18 months. However, they later received a CA$1,000,000 investment from the Canada Media Fund.
Outlast was released on September 4, 2013, for download through Steam. It was also released on February 4, 2014, for the PlayStation 4 as the free monthly title for PlayStation Plus users. In December 2017, Red Barrels announced that Outlast, including the Whistleblower DLC and Outlast 2, would be released on the Nintendo Switch in early 2018. The game was released unexpectedly on February 27, 2018, under the title Outlast: Bundle of Terror via Nintendo eShop.
Reception
Outlast received mostly positive reviews from critics. The website Metacritic, which collects reviews, gave the Xbox One version a score of 80 out of 100 based on 6 reviews, the Microsoft Windows version a score of 80 out of 100 based on 59 reviews, and the PlayStation 4 version a score of 78 out of 100 based on 33 reviews. The game won many awards and honors at E3 2013, including the "Most Likely to Make you Faint" award and one of the "Best of E3" honors.
The PC gaming website Rock, Paper, Shotgun gave Outlast a very positive review, saying, "Outlast is not an experiment in how games can be scary, it's an exemplification." Marty Sliva of IGN gave the game a score of 7.8, praising the horror elements and gameplay but criticizing the environments and character designs.
GameSpot also gave the game a positive review, stating, "Outlast isn't really a game of skill, and as it turns out, that makes sense. You're not a cop or a soldier or a genetically enhanced superhero. You're just a reporter. And as a reporter, you don't possess many skills with which you can fend off the hulking brutes, knife-wielding stalkers, and other homicidal maniacs who lurk in the halls of the dilapidated Mount Massive Asylum. You can't shoot them, or punch them, or rip pipes from the walls to clobber them with. You can only run and hide."
Sequel and prequel
On October 23, 2014, Red Barrels announced that a sequel to Outlast was being developed because the first game was successful. The sequel was first planned for late 2016, but development problems caused it to be delayed until early 2017. Later, the release date was moved again to the second quarter of 2017, even though it was originally meant for the first quarter. On March 6, 2017, Red Barrels announced that a physical version of the game, called Outlast Trinity, would be released for Xbox One and PlayStation 4 on April 25.
The sequel, named Outlast 2, became available digitally for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One on April 25, 2017. It was later released for Nintendo Switch alongside the original Outlast game in February 2018. The game takes place in the same universe as the first game but includes a new story with different characters set in the Sonoran desert in Arizona, United States.
Outlast 3 was announced in December 2017, but no release date or platforms were confirmed at that time. Red Barrels stated that they could not easily add downloadable content for Outlast 2, so they planned a smaller project related to Outlast that would be released before Outlast 3. This project, first mentioned in October 2019, is a prequel called The Outlast Trials. It is set during the Cold War. The game was released in early access for Microsoft Windows on May 18, 2023, and officially launched on March 5, 2024, for Windows, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, and PlayStation 5.
Film adaptation
On October 30, 2024, Lionsgate Films announced that they are making a movie based on a popular video game. Roy Lee is producing the film, and J.T. Petty, who created the original game, is writing the story for the movie.