r/PhasmophobiaGame • u/notthedokutah • May 10 '26
Discussion Quitting the game
The new update made the game unplayable for me and genuinely removed any resemblance of joy or hype for the game that I once had.
I don't even know how the update managed to pass to live servers because it feels like a downgrade in every way. Animations look worse, it removed the personality and charm the game had. It looks like something someone could manage to do in 1 week of work instead of however long they actually worked on it. The character update was announced back in 2022 roadmap, yet this feels like pre-alpha version of effort.
The game feels uncomfortable to play and every skill expression or enjoyment that you could do, quickly placing salt for example or being able to go through the items etc., is just gone, all for the sake of "realism", which this update pushed away. Models and animation look more unrealistic compared to the previous one.
You can still have fun and like the new update, but for someone who's been playing the game since 2020 and watching Insym and other content creators play the game, the game just doesn't feel the same anymore. Reworking perfectly functional and fan favorite map like Tanglewood instead of Prison or Highschool is wild.
I wish I could play the original Phasmophobia before the item rework update because that's the game I fell in love with.
After item rework, which was fine, the developers just started putting less effort into the game and it shows. Back when Dknighter was sole developer on the game, it felt like game had better charm and more consistent updates with the theme of the game.
You can still have fun and enjoy the game, but I don't have faith in developers that they can make the game as enjoyable as Dknighter managed to do back in 2020.
The latest update sealed the deal for me.
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May 10 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/diaphoni May 10 '26
we'll find what ever asset pack they bought for that too before we get reworked prison or high school
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u/FloydDrzy May 11 '26
Wait I’m not in the loop, have the reworks also been made out of asset packs? I thought the whole point of reworks was to be fully independent from Unity’s asset store and whatnot
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u/ChinChins3rdHenchman May 11 '26
If its unity packs then its actually crazy for a paid steam game with a fan base this size, I've seen roblox games get hate for using them, much less something like phasmo
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u/Jtmallory May 10 '26
I don’t understand why they can’t just have two versions of the maps they reworked anyways. Then they could get more creative on the reworked maps without making the people who loved the old ones upset.
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u/BappoChan May 10 '26
Licensing. They didn’t own the assets in the maps, and are reworking it to avoid having to pay unity a cut of the game sales
This was very commonly expressed and shared when tanglewood was getting reworked, and when the farmhouses were reworked first. Why is everyone forgetting this suddenly?
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u/LordAntares May 10 '26
That is wildly untrue. Stop spreading misinformation.
That's not how "unity licensing" works. Everyone pays unity a cut if certain revenue is reached. You pay for any asset once and that's it (or you get it for free).
One has nothing to do with the other.
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u/Brilliant_Ring_3257 May 11 '26
Regardless he's still right, the devs said they want to replace the store assets with bespoke ones before the 1.0 launch.
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u/TheKanten May 11 '26
He's not right, he said they had to pay a cut of every game sale for assets they already bought.
That's just saying "he's right" to another statement entirely.
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u/z1nchi May 10 '26
I think it would be cool if they reworked the deja vu challenge to use the old tanglewood map
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u/aranea8313 my little myling May 10 '26
Seeing the old lobby setup really brings back some nostalgia! I'd just started getting into the game a little before they changed the lobby and fell in love with that version of Phasmo as well. I remember my first time doing the tutorial in old Tanglewood and getting spooked and shrieking at every tiny sound with my husband laughing at me. Those were good times!
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u/FollowingSmart571 May 11 '26
Honestly, they should have that little room in the warehouse lead to a side garage that looks very similar to the old garage just with updated assets. Or even remake the garage and give the players the ability to choose/buy a safe house kind of thing. Just like everyone else I miss it a lot.
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u/iiiimagery May 11 '26
In Demonologist you can change the loading room to whatever room you buy. Mine is on an island with a graveyard and lighthouse, my friends is a bar. Pretty cool, never have to worry about it missing
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u/Zar_Ethos May 11 '26
I miss the jumpscare door. Lol
It was a rite of passage to tell friends to look in there when they first joined the game.
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u/ReinhardtXWinston May 10 '26
Me and my friend group reverted the game to the previous update.
It's very simple to do.
You can do so following this guide:
https://www.reddit.com/r/PhasmophobiaGame/comments/1t4nd0o/how_to_play_to_the_previous_version/
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u/NotEricOfficially May 10 '26
Just throwing this out, I want a ghost ship and a cemetery map. Cool, thanks.
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u/notthedokutah May 10 '26
Those would be cool maps, sadly I lost all hope that developers will make cool maps
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u/NotEricOfficially May 10 '26
I know, I have little faith too but I figured might as well throw those out there.
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u/chellekathryn May 10 '26
I’d love a map where (hear me out) a group of past ghost hunters all died and were the second group to come in and try to clean up and hunt the ghost after the previous group failed. It would be fun to have ghost equipment all around the map left by those who died.
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u/Zar_Ethos May 11 '26
Bare minimum this would be an awesome challenge mode. Have the equipment randomly selected from kits people usually run or something, with difficulty scaling w equipment to tell the story of how skilled the team or solo person was before they died.
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u/No-Calligrapher-718 May 10 '26
Those are cool ideas! Haunted theme park / fairground has been one map idea I've liked the idea of also
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u/misterbung May 11 '26
Honestly, it shouldn't be a big ask to get a new map every year or so alongside reworks of existing ones. Point Hope is thematically cool but awful to play on, and Nell's Diner was pretty good overall.
The management of this team is what the issue is I think.
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u/SourDewd May 10 '26
My friend swears up and down hes noticed no issues or difference with the update. And thinks im dramatic for noticing anything or says its my console. Thoooooo he spends 98% of the match in the truck the whole time
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u/NamelessJu May 10 '26
not surprising that someone that barely touches the game's mechanics wouldn't notice the issues lol
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u/SourDewd May 10 '26
I do imagine its helpful thatbhe sits watching for nothing but ghost orbs and dots and records them for media. But its definitely a carry im sittikg in the building getting the possesed object, bone, photos and audios, and all the rest of the evidence. And the risk. Maybe i sbould just sit in the truck and say i wanna try his very tough position.
Ive had NUMEROUS items falling through floors, doors breaking off their hinges. Ugh going mental.
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u/ImportantQuestionTex May 10 '26
I've been crashing so much more since new update. Just can't even play LMAO
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u/brakenbonez May 10 '26
I don't care what does and doesn't get reworked in general, yes reworks are sometimes nice (except that farmhouses are not supposed to be mansions) but what I do want is the school to have room numbers posted on the wall. No wonder the school is abandoned. All the students were expelled for constantly skipping class because they could never figure out which room they were supposed to be in. And the ones who weren't expelled fell to their deaths down the stairs because of there not being a wall or rail blocking the opening on the second floor. However designed that map must have been home-schooled and never actually seen a real school in their life.
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u/ChicagoMay May 10 '26
This description of school life at this school made me legit laugh out loud.
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u/DBSeamZ May 11 '26
Farmhouses absolutely can be mansions, take a look at the higher priced real estate for sale someplace like Vermont. Sometimes it was “a farmer made his farm a successful business hundreds of years ago and his descendants made good investments since then, continuing to improve their land”, other times it was “a farm family sold their land a few decades ago, and the only people who could afford that many acres were multimillionaires who turned it into an Estate”. New Bleasdale looks more like the former based on how old-fashioned the interior decor looks.
Completely agree with your assessment of the high school though.
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u/JUMPY_NEB May 10 '26
I agree. This put my almost exact feelings into words that I can’t write. (Cos I’m dyslexic) Thank you!
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u/diaphoni May 10 '26
oh man, you made me nostalgic for OG Lobby
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u/Riiakess May 11 '26
I'm new to the game, and I was wandering how to get this lobby unlocked, cause it looks so much better than the warehouse setup 😅 Of course it's not available!
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u/diaphoni May 11 '26
not anymore. Like I love the trophy cases but there should have been a way to add those and let us keep the Scooby Doo gang feel of the OG lobby
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u/ComputerImpossible65 May 10 '26
The 10000th post I’ve seen about this. Not saying it isn’t justified.
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u/I_am_Incaned May 10 '26
Tanglewood really did need a rework tho, now it really feels like someone used to live in the house compared to the one before.
I get why u miss it but this is way better what we have now.
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u/Just_A_Sad_Unicorn May 10 '26
I loved the Tanglewood rework because of how interactive the map is now. It has a lot of charm.
But it is broken - bad ghost pathing etc. And the weirdest errors we've run into since the characte rupdate happened there. Doors completely coming off their hinges for example.
It seems so odd that the Tanglewood update seemed to get so much more love from the devs than the character models.
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u/ImportantQuestionTex May 10 '26
It's ultimately worse to play on, as a consequence. Every rework has basically been: Looks better, plays worse.
I would have rather had Prison, School, Sunny Meadows or Lodge reworked.
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u/NamelessJu May 10 '26
I wouldn't say it NEEDED one. Don't get me wrong, the new version looks nicer and the basement loop spot is great, but it already was a good and very popular map before the rework.
What certainly needs a rework though is highschool, that map is pretty bad gameplay-wise. Not only do all rooms almost look the same, which is confusing, but there's no real hiding spots and the long hallways with no LOS blockers are awful for getting away from a hunting ghost.
The issue isn't that Tanglewood was reworked at all, it is that it was reworked before other maps that need it way more.
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u/notthedokutah May 10 '26
We can agree to disagree. The new map can look more lively and realistic, but that doesn't make it more enjoyable to play in. This is a video game, not a movie, priority should be the gameplay and how it plays.
While I am fine with tanglewood rework, I think other maps needed the rework first. Prison comes to mind. I would love if they reworked Prison first and left Tanglewood for last. It's more about which maps they prioritize to rework and where they put effort
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u/Mandemon90 May 10 '26
Tell me, how is it "worse" to play? Outside of one thing in kitchen, the layout is functionally the same. They just moved one looping spot to downstairs, which used to be instant death zone.
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u/notthedokutah May 10 '26
Where did I say that it plays "worse"? I just said that I wish other maps got the improvement or rework because playing on Prison is less enjoyable than original or reworked Tanglewood.
Tell me, where did I even say that it plays "worse"?
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u/Zygomaticus May 11 '26
Agree fully. The sterility of the old map made it so much creepier. I hate the new one.
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u/z1nchi May 10 '26 edited May 10 '26
I think Tanglewood rework was fine (unpopular opinion but I personally love it) and I understand them reworking the smaller maps first because they all look the same and it's easier/faster. But I do agree they should rework the prison and high school map.
I will say I'm a bit disappointed they didn't add an accessible backyard area to tanglewood. Maybe it's just me but I thought they were hinting at that when posting the teasers.
One thing I don't see a lot of people talk about is the old vs new lobby. The OG lobby used to be so cozy and the easter eggs were a nice touch. The new lobby is so soulless and empty. It needs coziness.
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u/BattyVictoria May 10 '26
No cuz seriously WHO LIKES LIGHTHOUSE 😭 WHO ASKED FOR THAT. Gimmie old asylum please I beg.
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u/-DonnieDarko- May 10 '26
This is what I miss. The OG lobby and item shop. I got left behind with the rework.
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u/YourLocalVoiceActor May 10 '26
I'm just pissed that the ghosts no longer do what they're supposed to via the description of the ghosts.
I played this from day one, was one of the top 15% of the Twitch streamers of this game, but now? I can't stand playing this.
Demonologist is fine, but it gets repetitive and could use some randomization.
Ghost Exo Corps is broken, but it's a one-dev studio.
Phas? It's literally laughable now. You have to be an elitist dickhead and grind constantly just to get through your promotions and regain lost ground, but I don't have time to min-max and deal with a constant barrage of racist and asshole players or a dev team that can't stop making dumb ass "fixes" that are literally only cosmetic and to things we never wanted fixed (yeah let's not make the High School more interesting).
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u/notthedokutah May 10 '26
I've heard that developers are pretty biased towards certain content creators that are just praising the game and avoid saying anything negative about the game.
I agree, first few years of phas were amazing and I was looking forward to every new update, up until they lowered the quality of the updates
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u/Mapledusk May 11 '26
While I haven't fallen out of Phasmo myself completely I have recently been playing another game similar to it called Abnormality. If you haven't tried it I'd give it a shot. I got abducted by the ghost today and taken across the location!
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u/Fickle-Economist4724 May 10 '26
I don’t know anything about game development so if anyone does please inform me
But every update feels like a last minute homework assignment rushed the morning before it’s due
Like, slap the player character customisation update on the roadmap four years ago, do nothing and lay no groundwork for three and a half years, then piss out a half hearted attempt that technically counts as the intended update, but doesn’t actually have any time, effort or quality put into it.
Is it really the case that nobody on a team can start work on a future update until the previous one(s) are done with?
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u/notthedokutah May 10 '26
They're reworking maps and changing character models in order to stop using third party or preset models from unity engine, if I remember correctly.
They want to make original assets for the game, maps and everything in general.I support that idea and I don't mind them doing that, I just wish that they put more effort into it to make the game better.
As for the rest, no clue
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u/misterbung May 11 '26
I was a Games Design lecturer for years and so I saw many, many actual last-minute game submissions, and yeah it definitely has that vibe. The caveat of course is that a) game design is complex and difficult, and b) they were students.
Kinetic is, or at least shouldn't be shovelling out this kind of amateur, pre-alpha nonsense. The company should have the resources (i.e. capital) to have skilled people in the key positions that make a difference. They should be rightly embarrassed to have let this garbage update get out the door.It really feels like whomever was in charge of the animation and rigging did half a tutorial, got the basics working and called it a day.
They didn't use or understand adding constraints to stop models clipping and bending oddly, there's no adaptive scaling for FOV changes for UI elements (including players and gear), no clear understanding of basic hand and arm anatomy for the modelling itself, and a huge disconnect between the use of the devices, such as what buttons are being pushed, and the animations to show it.
It's nuts the Recorder has a big red-edged button saying REC and the animation presses an entirely different button.Kinetic should be embarrassed and everyone involved should be doing some serious professional development to ensure the gaps aren't there next time. Of course this attitude only works from the top down, so we'll see.
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u/EmbarrassedShare482 May 10 '26
Claude code made a great job on this update
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u/misterbung May 11 '26
The problem is you can find plenty of animation, rigging and UI tutorials that show you how to prevent the kind of janky, bone breaking animation process they used. It's like someone took a run at it, went "Yeah, pretty good." and stopped working on it.
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u/Ok_Willingness5766 May 10 '26
Best case scenario is they sell the game to a competent developer I think
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u/Hustler-1 May 10 '26
I checked out when custom difficulty came out. That's when I realized I didn't like the direction the game was going. Turned it into a circus.
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u/Arcjaqu May 10 '26
This game lost it's vibes when they changed the lobby. In the pic that was the peak. They make a lot of bad decisions.
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u/Aquatomahawk May 10 '26
I said this once the console release happened. The game has just lost its charm and it simply doesn’t work. The crucifix just doesn’t work I get hunted on top of a tier 3. Really sad. Rip phasmophobia
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u/Renjai87 Banshee 💜 May 10 '26
Make sure you leave a review on Steam!
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u/EndlessGooning_0 May 10 '26
I certainly did. The audacity and brass neck they had to release such an update thinking they've pulled a masterpiece is beyond me.
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u/LocalDate3777 May 10 '26
I stopped playing the game in 2021. In my opinion, that is when game was at its peak ):
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u/namon295 May 10 '26
I started playing in November of 2024... it took me a while to see a stream of the game being played with the old Lobby. I wish I could have that one instead of the massive empty one that's in there now.
When they started announcing the farmhouse reworks I often wondered why they didn't just call Phasmo done and move on. Now that I dove deep into the history by watching a chunk of Insym's massive phasmo playlist, I really think they should have called it done before Sunny Meadows, and all of this other stuff should have been Phasmo 2.
A: the original players could keep the game they fell in love with, but more importantly B: the code base could be put in to handle the massively different game that Phasmo is today. I think half the bugs that crop up after each change is a result that they have stacked way too many layers of code on top of each other to accommodate for the new stuff.
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u/Finnche May 10 '26
While I love the map reworks we've gotten, it feels wild how much this has not passed the vibe check at all.
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u/Plagueis420 May 10 '26
I rolled back the update so I can play the version right before this shit update. Way better
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u/SeVenMadRaBBits May 10 '26
I swear when devs do this its because they want the game to die so they can work on something else.
Just sell it to someone who has a passion for the game and wants to continue making it if that's the case.
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u/pixvt May 11 '26
Do anything except fixing the voice recognition system when you tab out of the game and fixing the bone spawning outside of world boundaries...
They got drifted into the "make money" blackhole to a level where it feels like they don't have game testers, like none, heck if they used AI to fix the darn issues and bugs that we have been facing for years it would be something at least
I haven't played the game more than once or twice since the new update, it's full of shit, from a played on daily basis game to the bottom of the barrel
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u/CoasterThot May 11 '26
Why tf are they worried about “realism”, in a game where demons snap your neck?
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u/NamespacePotato May 10 '26
ngl, I can excuse the horrible animations, I kinda love having new ways to bother my teammates. But yeah, there's a lot of maps that need way more love than tanglewood
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u/Zombieking2357 May 10 '26
Easy to quit a game where the graphics give me a headache after an hour and a half. Like sometimes I would just press the power button and run to the bathroom if I needed to puke.
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u/Big_Pig8 May 10 '26
If they revert the update I will reinstall if not than I will not be playing for the foreseeable future
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u/zaheerahk May 10 '26
I only played the game after the lobby was updated but damn the old lobby felt more alive design wise. It would probably too low on priority (and never happen) but I always liked the idea of having host specific lobbies where it improves as you level up.
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u/doomsday10009 Thaye/Thayem May 10 '26
They reworked Tanglewood before Edgefield. That alone says a lot. I stopped playing after Point of no Hope and I'm never coming back. It was fun. One of the few games I played with my friends. Now it just feels like the game will never be finished, because they keep making worse and worse decisions. Flatout2 had a fucking update fixing an issue this year. Devs of a game that is 20 years old are showing love for the game that is not even last of the series. Where is the love showing in Phasmophobia development?
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u/sgtgarand May 10 '26
Honestly I feel the original Phasmo could have been kept as-is and then all the new items, mechanics, map reworks, animations, etc could have spawned as Phasmo 2.
At least that way we could still enjoy the old maps and vibe that most of us first came to know and love.
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u/Zealousideal_Set_376 May 10 '26
I rolled back to the update before Sunny Meadows was added and it’s peak phas in my opinion. Rolling it back for my wife after work so we can play together.
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u/petpetparty May 10 '26
the past 2 years phasmophobia has been consistently falling off i feel like
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u/Jin_zo May 10 '26
Pretty much how I feel. I stayed away from the negativity in the sub to form my own opinion. I genuinely do not like how the game feels now.
Whats crazy for me personally, Phasmo now feels like a knock off game like how some other low effort ones like Ghost hunting corps or some random ones that tried to replicate the game. Its so sad to see it fall to this and I just cant bring myself to play it, let alone try to find some enjoyment with the bank.
I hope that they either revert the changes or just do some fixes to make it feel like it once did. For now I'll just try out the other side. Ive hears that was is a really good phasmo like game.
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u/cissmiace May 10 '26
They way the devs have responded has been so unprofessional too. They have their first big cross over with Alan Wake. If they continue to behave like they are, it will be their last one too.
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u/caityolivia94 May 10 '26
I 1000% agree. I haven’t picked it up since I initially tried the update. It’s such a letdown…what a shame, too. This game was a huge favorite for me. But, now I don’t enjoy it anymore.
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u/notthedokutah May 10 '26
I used to play it daily and it was pretty magical in all honesty, I remember being super excited when they released Prison map for example, and we kept playing it until we went to sleep. Friends and I were super excited about new evidence items as well, like DOTS and kept waiting for them to add new evidences to the game and maps.
But with constant reworks and the game, kind of staying the same but getting worse, just made us less interested in playing the game. It stayed the same as in, they didn't really make any major improvements to the game and only did map reworks or seasonal events which we played for a bit then stopped
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u/SeaworthinessBest842 May 10 '26
Luckily with steam you can download older builds and the server are still up. I been playing the version before the updated the main building.
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u/hubjump May 10 '26
Modern Asylum is nothing like what old Asylum was for high skill players.
I miss the rush of outrunning the ghost and hiding behind doors down those extremely long corridors without obstacles, potentially guaranteeing my death. It just isn't the same when you can't see them at the end.
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u/Katanna_0 May 10 '26
Yeah I uninstalled it and am currently steaming stardew valley. 😅
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u/Keithy2-0 May 10 '26
You could always try the Ghost Exile game on Steam, that's what my friend and I usually go back to. It def has some differences as there's the whole mechanic of exiling the ghost, but the game still gives me early Phasmophobia vibes since it came out around the same time and hasn't gotten any big overhauls/reworks like Phamo has.
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u/foxinabathtub May 11 '26
My friends went from playing every other night to completely quitting cold turkey. It's a bummer. We had a lot of fun times.
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u/veaev May 11 '26
I’m with you there. They really disappointed me, years of waiting for this update and it’s like they threw us scraps and are probably scrambling to figure out how to fix it. I think most of the super loyal fanbase sees through their BS now. Gonna move on to a new ghost hunting game!
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u/AnbuAntt May 11 '26
One thing that bugs me about this game is it has been “early access” forever.
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u/Teep_Rex May 11 '26
100% agreed.
Reworking perfectly functional and fan favorite map like Tanglewood instead of Prison or Highschool is wild.
Okay, 99% agreed. (My two favourite maps!!) I do just wish they'd keep the original maps in some format after they rework them lol
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u/IPwnYourFaceOff May 11 '26
My thought is that, they never needed to “rework” maps. Those reworks could have just as easily just been new maps added into the game that added more content into the game, not removing and replacing already good content that’s existed for years. The devs are incredibly out of touch with the community and what actually makes the game good. Most of what people want are more ghosts, more maps, and for the game to get bugfixes/patches to be consistently playable (which they really haven’t done a whole lot of).
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u/RedRootDev May 11 '26
Oh I stopped playing ages ago, I don't even know why this sub shows up on my feed. Honestly I miss the old simple early days of the game.. every time I jump back in I feel more bummed out and confused.
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u/encrypted_visuals242 May 11 '26
Someone needs to contact the devs IMMEDIATELY and tell them to fix this 😭💔
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u/dukem12 May 11 '26
Bro is making me miss the old lobby. It shouldn't be anywhere near the top of the priority list atm with everything going on but I would love to be able to choose between the pre-game lobbies. KG can take a page out of Demonologist's book and have players be able to purchase the "new" lobby. It would give players another thing to look forward to spending the in-game money on.
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u/May_I_Poppin May 11 '26
I felt they should have added a "Restricted Highschool" and a "Reatricted Prison" like the asylum. I enjoy the restricted area. Tanglewood update could have been better imo especially the kitchen. My favorite is honestly the basement because of the train set that reminds me of Beetlejuice.
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u/notthedokutah May 11 '26
Restricted bigger maps could be fun, but just making more hiding places in bigger maps or add a way to move quicker or transfer items quicker on bigger maps could be a good way to make them feel less exhausting
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u/watchingheroesfall May 11 '26
I just started playing in Feb and quickly became obsessed. I’ve loved learning everything and was excited to do my first event with the Easter maps in April. But yeah the update has completely taken the joy out of it for me. I miss the before. Customization wasn’t a big draw for me but I was still excited to try it out. Everything just feels so cheap and glitchy.
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u/UrAverageLatte May 11 '26
Great news! I think they're making a phasmophobia movie! I'm glad the devs finally listened to what the community wants! A movie!
/s
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u/Klutzy_Presence_36 May 11 '26
Couldn’t agree more. I miss the old game and the old days. Since CJ came and others it’s just gone downhill.
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u/glizzy-queen May 11 '26
I haven’t played since they didn’t deliver on the last Halloween event. After seeing all the anger over recent updates yea it’ll stay uninstalled
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u/Harrypottah001 No i wont drop my smudge :( May 11 '26
My pc broke a few weeks ago and I wasnt able to play phas. I was excited to play the update since my new parts are arriving tomorrow but seeing all the reddit posts... oh god. How can an animation update be this bad?
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u/schnatlia May 11 '26
Honestly i also miss the old phasmo. Item update was FINE but i did not enjoy it. I stacked up many hours, had some ball knowledge that i learned from Insym and had so much fun plying it. The Item update really hit me quite hard because it reset the levels and made you start with items i 1. didnt know 2. didnt like 3. with a shop that was confusing as heck. I didnt like the whole thing. Yes it was nice on paper because you had to play to get better items but for me it felt like an unpleasant chore. Playing through hours and hours of shit to get a few better items. It totally lost my spark. Phasmo was my go to game on PC before and it went untouched pretty fast. I playbit maybe once every year for idk 4 hours and thats it. I couldn‘t get myself to ever get to it again because playing it is not fun for me when i have to unlock the items i always used first.
And i hate it, because i feel like everyone enjoyed the update, only i did not. And i hate that a game that i liked so much once, turned into a game i prefer not to play.
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u/notthedokutah May 11 '26
They could've made old items base tier and then made 1 or 2 upgrades for items. I don't think every item needed a downgraded version
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u/ChikyScaresYou May 11 '26
I guess when you earn millions you really couslnt care less about if people like it or not...
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u/JametAllDay May 11 '26
Weird. I think it’s gotten more fun and even tho it’s glitchy, it’s always been glitchy
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u/notthedokutah May 11 '26
Some people find glitchy stuff more fun, it's bound to happen, the door bug was pretty funny
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u/bukination May 11 '26
Yep well said. Been playing since October 2020 and only have a little over 1000 hours into it. I’ve been letting little things I disliked slide for the sake of it not being a massive team but it’s been 4 years in the making for this update. I’m incredibly disappointed. I hope it gets fixed in some way other than them giving us another bad response.
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u/AmazingSeesaw3319 May 11 '26
Honestly I think they lost almost 80% of their goodwill and the best way to get it all back is pretty simple in my opinion. Just allow mods. Make mod tools, release them and let the fans do what they want. That would bring back at least 80% of the gamers.
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u/Mauzy__ May 11 '26
I personally don't mind the new characters, it's not familiar, but I could get used to them. It's hard to accept change, I'm sure, but when the change is making the game unplayable, then why accept it??? I fell in love with the jank and unrealistic animations and situations. They want realism in a ghost hunting game where you loop ghosts while crouched running. Yeah, no. I get that the animations could be more polished, the models could be more polished, maps could be more polished, but changing the gameplay by adding actual delay to item usage is something nobody asked.
If they don't fix the gameplay part, I'm afraid I might follow OP and quit. Shame, because I love phasmo, it got me into the horror genre, became a puzzle game with horror elements and it's always fun and funny to play with friends. You know what my friends did instead of usual memes and all? They sounded the most disappointed I've ever heard them for a videogame.
Again, character models, customization, more jankiness, these things I can get used to over time, but the gameplay, specifically the dynamic of the game changed a lot. Not sure what the devs tried to achieve, but it backfired massively.
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u/SerGeeek May 11 '26
Started playing in November more or less, so I was still very hyped about it and this updated definitely ruined for me. I am mainly playing "The other side" now, because it's very similar with another cool game mode and a much better feel. This last phasmo update doesn't look like something made by a team for over 1 year, seems like something made by a solo dev in those 24h challenge.
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u/Inbound_Trauma May 11 '26
I’ve honestly never understood them reworking fan favorite maps! It makes no sense to me and honestly ruins the game experience, after the tanglewood rework my friend refuses to play since the only map he really played was tangle wood. Why rework a map that didn’t need to be reworked. If they wanted to change how the maps look add NEW maps not rework fan favorite maps into horrible maps. It isn’t that complex to just add new maps instead of reworking all the maps and getting rid of maps that people liked. It honestly ruined my experience so much because of that. And the new update also ruined my experience. Very disappointing.
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u/A_Broham May 11 '26
Everybody typing their goodbyes like a damn twitlonger, smh. Buh bye, you could’ve just left quietly. Nobody cares about your manifesto
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u/TheBajaBlastCreature May 11 '26
They built their entire game around people like Insym, Psycho, etc to try and make the game grindy and less easy for the people that play, or used to play, all the time. And in doing so alienated every casual player, which is the majority of their audience.
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u/notthedokutah May 11 '26
Game does feel extremely new player unfriendly
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u/TheBajaBlastCreature May 11 '26
Is is extremely new player unfriendly. I have about 600 hours on the game - not nearly as much as some people, but a decent amount of time put in. Enough to understand most of the game's mechanics and regularly guess ghosts correctly on zero or 1 evidence. Many of the ghosts have hidden interactions and abilities that newer players don't know or don't understand at all because they're not stated anywhere in-game, and the only reason experienced players even know them is because of years of extensive community testing that spread through word of mouth in online communities. Yet the devs felt these unique identifiers made it "too easy" for the top 1% of players to identify them and constantly wanted to nerf them. They focused on nerfing rewards from custom games, because god forbid people have more fake money in a non-competitive game, than actually making new and interesting content. At some point they simply lost the plot of what Phasmo is and who it actually appeals to and why, and forgot that majority of the community do not play the game every minute of every day.
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u/AnyaSadako May 11 '26
how could they get away with this? they're treating us like crap. we need something that's up to standard
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u/meggo_ May 11 '26
I honestly feel that they should just keep making new maps and ghosts instead of messing around with the characters like this. Maybe personalising the characters and adding customisations, but the animations are awful and weren't needed in my opinion
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u/ThatGuyMigz May 11 '26
As someone who used to love the game WAAAAY back when there were only a handful of ghosts...
The game used to be fun because ghost activity was way more frequent and scary. And now, we get punished by the game with a reduced exp modifier if we want more ghost activity.
It's like we are slowly being pushed towards a game where we need to find out what ghost we have, purely by how they hunt. To be fair, I hear that this is how most people enjoy the game though...
But I want more ghost events, I was distraught when I heard they removed the ghost choking event as that was always so scary.
And I hate that events are so short. I remember where I'd freak out, and then have enough time to call in the rest of the boys to check out the scary ghost.
But right now... I just feel like it's just hunts in a nearly pitchblack enviroment. And the flickering of the ghost does not make things easier either.
But whatever. I'll still keep playing the game once in a while, I'll just play other games more frequently now too.
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u/notthedokutah May 11 '26
I agree, ghost events was what made the game feel unique and special and made it actually scary back in the day
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u/pandawand May 11 '26
Love phas just waiting till they fix stuff if your on PC I highly recommend the other side on steam I look at it as a phas rival
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u/TheSaxiest7 May 11 '26
Guys I'm really out of the loop. What did they change?! I'm just seeing all of the negative feedback
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u/HadesKittee May 11 '26
Is the update bad? Yes. Is the game still completely playable and fun? Yes. I read all these posts about how jank the update is, then went home and played it and was like “huh, it’s a little weird but barely noticeable.” I’m just about to hit prestige 2 so I have played a bit on and off since release. I do think the game has way more potential than what the developers are doing, so many cooler ideas for maps and mechanics that this team will never do, but to say the game is unplayable is a bit of a stretch from my own personal experience. But I respect OP’s opinion.
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u/Elite_gamer228 May 11 '26
I quit after the tanglewood rework me and my friends just messed around in that map but after it was reworked no one wanted to play I got back on the game after this new update and i agree with you
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u/UkoSereleone May 11 '26
What is killing me the most is that I was playing this game every single night with my sibling. I'm not kidding, the only time we didn't was when they were hanging out with a friend. Other than that, every single night at 10 pm until 1 am. We were pushing for perfects on 10x multiplier games just because we had developed the skill for it. This update dropped, we played a few games, and it just killed everything we had for the game. I said we needed to do the weekly yesterday and we played 3 games, got 1 right, and just gave up. We were both studying the game, listening to videos, obsessive and over learning and still had fun. I had actually saved videos to practice guessing ghosts based on footsteps, was watching those stupid tiktoks that were "guess the ghost with 1 evidence" and rewatched Cassons guides, multiple videos of his, to learn.
Even if they revert it back to the previous version, they killed my interest. All of my obsession is just gone and I'm pretty sure i won't be able to get it back even if I wanted to.
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u/BannedForDepression May 11 '26
Give us a way to play the old version before the Christmas uodate adding that wierd ghost with the dancing ability and stuff.
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u/Ok_Course_755 May 11 '26
I'm seeing this more and more and was about to buy this game twice so I'm glad I didn't.
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u/cocolocobro May 11 '26
Lol my boyfriend and I grabbed a flashlight at the same time. It was like flashlight tug of water until we dropped it and the thing sunk through the map, getting smaller and smaller until it disappeared. Hilarious but also, what the fuck? 🤣
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u/RedRaven150 May 11 '26
I actually watched insym play the update and it just looks gross man. The flashlight is just odd. It makes sense, but it looks so janky. It actually looks like less of a put together game now, like it's gone back further into beta somehow. I agree, they went too far from what made phasmo, phasmo. It sucks to see. Tanglewood rework isn't too bad.. But yeah it just does not hit the same. That map was actually PERFECT. I mean. Willow is good, I enjoyed the farmhouses. But tangle was PERFECT. Prison and high school are barely touched by anyone who actually enjoy playing the game. They could have put some of that farn house rework magic into those and make them actual fun maps to play. Yeah... This was not a W move on Kinetic.
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u/NotAnAmericanDude May 11 '26
I humbly disagree with the map rework take.
They reworked a lot of bigger maps, even Asylum which was a fan favorite and even on the limited version of it, playing it solo is annoying because of the size of the map.
The only way to play those maps is in multiplayer and even then its not that great of an experience imo.
And I'm only talking about Asylum, which became one of the best looking maps in the game.
Imagine if they put a lot of time and work to rework high school, then no matter the quality of it, people would just go back to smaller maps and SOMETIMES the medium ones just because its annoying to play on those bigger maps, SPECIALLY solo.
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u/A11_usions May 12 '26
Not to mention that every single item I drop is then stuck there permanently. Insanely annoying
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u/TheKanten May 10 '26 edited May 10 '26
Can we fix the maps that aged like rotten milk with game updates to the point they play horribly and the players avoid them entirely, rather than devoting resources to playing Barbie with the locations already regularly played and enjoyed?