4.5/5 ★ – MPT's review of Outlast: Whistleblower.

sitting near the PEAK of DLCs, Outlast’s Whistleblower expansion manages to be an even stronger horror experience than the base game. i’d fought with every fibre of my being through the original to get 100% with 3 full playthroughs and 7/8 Insane attempts and even after all of that (and still being set in the same location), it seems impossible Whistleblower feels as fresh as it does. the namesake of the DLC, Waylon Park, goes hand in hand with Miles as the dynamic duo protagonists of the series, totally outshining Blake from Outlast 2 without even speaking a word. like Miles, there’s more personality radiating from his notes than 90% of voiced characters in other games. while not as witty as Miles, reading the thoughts of a family man whose wife and child seem to be the only thing helping him push forward while experiencing the worst Mount Massive has to offer makes him very down to earth and relatable. there’s also the fact that what he actually does is extremely compelling. he isn’t just the catalyst for the events of Whistleblower but the base game, being the guy who sent Miles the email encouraging him to come and see the shady shit happening at the asylum. this along with the fact the DLC is a prequel/ sequel/ runs parallel to the base game means it’s infinitely interesting - Waylon’s experience weaves in and out of Miles’ as you visit places he’s visited/ is going to visit, see major events from the base game, visit familiar areas and run into familiar villains. i’m a huge huge fan of when this type of story is done effectively in media, and it’s incredibly rewarding to see how the pieces all fit. Whistleblower is an essential DLC because it feels like it was planned from the start. it justifies its existence even more because it ties up loose ends that may not have even seemed like they needed explored. total El Camino type shit. it’s safe to say that finding out who wrote the email to Miles wasn’t the biggest question on everyone’s minds during Outlast, but now that we know who it was and what happened to him, it makes the base game 10x more interesting with very valuable context. the ending where Walrider Miles saves Waylon and helps him escape is just so wild and peak too, it’s like watching Arnold and Carl Weathers dap eachother up in Predator. then finally hitting that satisfying X to upload the footage and snitch on Murkoff is the icing on the cake and cements Whistleblower’s writing as fully fleshed out, necessary and tight. tight is actually a great word to describe the DLC as a whole (pause). the mixture of its briefness and its constant stream of such high quality moments creates a consistency not seen in the original game and certainly not in Outlast 2. because of this its short length is obviously a strength considering how good the final result is, but my only real flaw with Whistleblower might be a bit of a cop out: i really wish it was longer. maybe a more substantial beginning Lab section or just another section in general and it would be a perfect experience. that being said, what’s here is still paced extremely well and is still undoubtedly horrifying (very safely even more so than the base game) with not just gore but much more psychologically disturbing imagery and some of the absolute best chases and encounters in the series. it has that shock factor sure but it’s done in a way that isn’t cheap or exploitative. this feeling is kept consistent with a high octane first third being pursued by a cannibal, then a slower, more dread-inducing middle section full of enemies obscured in darkness and fog, and a crazy increase in tension for the goated final section. and this section is peak Outlast, no questions asked. how unsettling the buildup of variants mentioning the “man downstairs”, “the Groom”, and a “very, very bad man” is before seeing that one image of a mutilated corpse followed by the “Darling!” jumpscare needs to be studied. the star of the show Eddie Gluskin is undoubtedly the series’ best villain, who doubles as not just a totally monstrous individual but one that’s undeniably interesting too. like Chris Walker, he’s extremely disturbed even before Murkoff’s shenanigans make him even more terrifying. to say they pushed him over the edge is a comedic joke, dude’s been thrown off a cliff into a bottomless pit. having previously been a serial killer of females, he’s quite literally been made in the Underground Lab to be as unsettling an adversary as possible. since there’s no women in Mount Massive, and the Morphogenic Engine has messed him up to an extreme degree, it leads to him brutally mutilating dozens of the male inmates to make a female “bride” for himself. how uncomfortable the twisted sexual nature of his character is, how it’s tied to his past and how it’s (again) directly Murkoff’s fault is impeccable, and proves (again again) that they’ve brought out the absolute worst of what some of these individuals already were to a level that’s inhuman. what Guskin’s done to so many and now wants to do to you is so depraved it makes your skin crawl, made worse by how expressive he is. this guy is constantly in your ear singing love songs and speaking sweet nothings. the juxtaposition of this with his violent as fuck intentions, and then when he snaps and starts calling you an ungrateful whore, is masterfully done. but there’s another villain that i don’t think Eddie overshadows because of his own unique strengths. Jeremy Blaire, the Murkoff suit in charge of the Walrider project who captures you sending the snitch email to Miles, is the embodiment of the corporation’s evil into a person: his callous greed and dedication to the company over any sort of empathy or morals are his dictating features. his appearances at pivotal moments to sabotage your escape make him, even over Eddie, Waylon’s biggest obstacle. he kidnaps him and forcefully admits him into the Walrider program at the start, smashes the prison radio to prevent outside contact at the midway point, and shows up right at the end at the open door of the asylum, where he stabs Waylon in a last ditch effort to stop him. dude hangs around like a bad smell with way too much determination for his own good, and he represents not just Murkoff’s power but its omnipresence as a huge, morally corrupt corporate machine, and that a whistleblower is its greatest enemy above all else. this deeper look at Murkoff is another reason the DLC shines. the slight issues i had with the base game of hiding being pretty much useless and some chases being trivialised by the very manageable enemy speed unfortunately remains, particularly against the cannibal in the first half. but another way the final act knocks it out the park is by making you feel like your speed advantage is gone, and it’s like a psychological sledgehammer. forcing Waylon to limp and permanently lowering his speed against the series’ scariest villain is evil as hell, and provides some of the most intense chases in the entire series where it feels like Eddie is constantly breathing down your neck. Whistleblower is a near perfect DLC and would even be the best Outlast game if it was a full one and was extended by an hour or two with the same consistency. but it’s also extremely cheap for its quality, and how tight and phenomenal of a horror experience it is remains its greatest strength because it leaves no room for bringing anything but its A game to every single aspect. rewarding writing which brings essential extra context and information to the main story, somehow ratcheting up the gore and psychologically disturbing content, a terrifying set of encounters and chases, the series’s strongest set of villains, almost eliminating one of the base game’s key weaknesses - it might not count as a full Outlast game, but for me, this is the best Outlast experience, and is a masterclass in horror.