The almost perfect atmosphere, sound design, writing, characters, and the jaw-dropping visuals are JUST enough to make this a recommendation.

The optimization is SOOOO bad the game itself being so flawless and again, almost completely perfect, is actually what will make you hate playing it because it really just deserves full immersion and dedication, to the point of losing your entire day just playing the game, then going to bed dizzy and having nightmares about Silent Hill all night!

But that immersion is instead ruined when you have to keep fiddling with the settings to optimize your frames (even on top of the line RTX 40 series models and WITHOUT raytracing!!!) that it keeps taking you out.

Worse is when you think you've finally perfected your frame-rate, except... oh, it's Unreal Engine 5!
Of course you're gonna have traversal stutters every 10 seconds when you step into a new room, even tho it's pitch-black and completely closed off!

If you're having doubts, wait for a while longer and see if Bloober pulls a miracle with the optimization like they did with the actual game design.

If not, go ahead and buy it but be ready to spend just as much time playing on optimizing and mix-maxing your settings both in and out of the game.
Oh, and hey, IT CURRENTLY DOESN'T EVEN RUN AFTER INSTALLATION!

That's right, Unreal Engine just crashes as soon as you run the game.
It's almost like the act of simply running the game is an in-game puzzle itself!
You can get it to run with a quick googling and some file manipulation tho.

Lastly to give you perspective, the stutters related to the engine are here to stay.
Let's face it, games that have come out on Unreal YEARS ago have not even been fixed and remain a stutter-fest to this day.

It's literally how the engine functions and that balding bastard Timmy Sweeney is too busy hoarding cash and making enemies to do anything about it.

Maybe they'll fix it by 2077, maybe some kind of class action lawsuit somehow hits them back to remind Timmy that karma is truly a ♥♥♥♥♥ and push them to actually spend a few days fixing their broken ♥♥♥♥ they've been putting out for years now, who knows!?

Writing all of this and going through all these feelings makes me almost want to change my review to a thumbs down, ALMOST...
But I'll leave my recommendation up.

It's your money!
No one gets to tell you what to do with it!

UPDATE on the 40th hour:

Yeah, nah, just buy it!
You'll thank me later!

The almost perfect atmosphere, sound design, writing, characters, and the jaw-dropping visuals are JUST enough to make this a recommendation. The optimization is SOOOO bad the game itself being so flawless and again, almost completely perfect, is actually what will make you hate playing it because it really just deserves full immersion and dedication, to the point of losing your entire day just playing the game, then going to bed dizzy and having nightmares about Silent Hill all night! But that immersion is instead ruined when you have to keep fiddling with the settings to optimize your frames (even on top of the line RTX 40 series models and WITHOUT raytracing!!!) that it keeps taking you out. Worse is when you think you've finally perfected your frame-rate, except... oh, it's Unreal Engine 5! Of course you're gonna have traversal stutters every 10 seconds when you step into a new room, even tho it's pitch-black and completely closed off! If you're having doubts, wait for a while longer and see if Bloober pulls a miracle with the optimization like they did with the actual game design. If not, go ahead and buy it but be ready to spend just as much time playing on optimizing and mix-maxing your settings both in and out of the game. Oh, and hey, IT CURRENTLY DOESN'T EVEN RUN AFTER INSTALLATION! That's right, Unreal Engine just crashes as soon as you run the game. It's almost like the act of simply running the game is an in-game puzzle itself! You can get it to run with a quick googling and some file manipulation tho. Lastly to give you perspective, the stutters related to the engine are here to stay. Let's face it, games that have come out on Unreal YEARS ago have not even been fixed and remain a stutter-fest to this day. It's literally how the engine functions and that balding bastard Timmy Sweeney is too busy hoarding cash and making enemies to do anything about it. Maybe they'll fix it by 2077, maybe some kind of class action lawsuit somehow hits them back to remind Timmy that karma is truly a bitch and push them to actually spend a few days fixing their broken shit they've been putting out for years now, who knows!? Writing all of this and going through all these feelings makes me almost want to change my review to a thumbs down, ALMOST... But I'll leave my recommendation up. It's your money! No one gets to tell you what to do with it! UPDATE on the 40th hour: Yeah, nah, just buy it! You'll thank me later!